Trump has until Monday to come up with the money.
New York Attorney General Letitia James has urged an appeals court to ignore Donald Trump’s latest effort to worm his way out of paying the $464 million disgorgement from his bank fraud trial.
On Wednesday, an attorney for James told the court that Trump’s claims could not be trusted since they were based on sworn statements by Alan Garten, general counsel at the Trump Organization, and Gary Giulietti, one of Trump’s close friends. There’s a precedent to disqualify them—during the trial, Judge Arthur Engoron decided that Giulietti could not be considered a credible witness and argued that Garten had “professional interests in this litigation.”
Garten, however, snapped back at that. “The court found no such thing. The AG statement is reckless and completely untrue,” Garten said in response to the filing, according to The Washington Post.
So far, Trump has tried and failed to pause the rapidly growing interest on the judgment, counteroffering the court a $100 million bond in lieu of the full amount. He has also approached several brokers and 30 suretors for help securing a bond, though it didn’t seem to work out for him, according to a filing by Trump’s attorneys, who admitted that suretors refused to accept Trump’s real estate as collateral. Instead, they would only accept cash to the tune of $1 billion, which Trump said he and his businesses just don’t have.
I think a lot about Bernie Madoff.
Bernie Madoff ran a massive Ponzi scheme, for decades. He promised high, consistent returns on investments. The scheme relied on money from new investors to pay out returns to existing ones. In 2008, when many investors tried to withdraw their money, the scheme unraveled.
All of his collaborators in his company realized the train wreck. But they knew if they didn’t continue with the lying/scamming, a lot of their colleagues would lose their jobs. So the absolute honest people left, but the morally grey stayed.
I think it’s like that with Trump (and Musk). Trump still employs a LOT of people - everything from managers to gardeners. And in his ranks are people who don’t want this sinking ship fail. The result is that there are competent people who, because they don’t want “innocent” people to suffer, like kitchen staff or gardeners, they’re good at their jobs and unfortunately, that puts money into Trump’s pocket.