Donald Trump Jr arrives at New York court to take stand in father’s fraud trial
Donald Trump’s civil fraud trial ramped up in New York on Wednesday as his son Donald Trump Jr began his testimony in the $250m case, though his answers were evasive.
The former president’s eldest son is the first of four Trump family members to testify in the trial, the outcome of which could topple Mr Trump’s business empire in the state.
On Thursday, Don Jr is expected to finish his testimony before Eric Trump also takes to the stand later in the day.
Next week, Ivanka Trump and the former president himself are also expected to take the stand and give testimony.
Also on Wednesay, the so-called “Trump too small” t-shirt case went before the US Supreme Court on Wednesday – a bizarre trademark dispute referring to the size of the former president’s hands.
Meanwhile, two cases seeking to block Mr Trump from the 2024 presidential ballot based on the 14th Amendment and its ban on insurrectionists running for office are also being heard this week.
The first began in Colorado on Monday with the second taking place before the Minnesota Supreme Court on Thursday.
Alex Woodward reports from on the ground at the courthouse in New York
Key Points
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Shown a letter to Deutsche Bank in 2017, Don Jr is asked whether he signed off on a certification of a statement of financial condition “intending” that the bank would rely on it. The bank was one of the Trump Organization’s chief lenders.
“I would be fine relying on it but I don’t know what their ‘intent’ is,” he said.
After some back-and-forth attempts to clarify what he means, the judge intervenes: “It’s your intent she’s asking about.”
“Then I’m not sure I understand. I’m fine with the bank relying on that information,” Trump Jr replied. “I don’t know if I intended the bank doing anything, I’m fine with them relying on it.”
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 14:40
One week after his “insane amount of stuff email,” the Trump Organization wrote a letter to Mazars for a statement of financial condition.
Donald Trump Jr is shown a letter from the Trump Organization to Mazars that includes several disclaimers to the truth of the contents inside.
Don Jr gets worked up repeatedly stating that he relied on accountants to give them accurate information.
“Every decision I made was based on information I got from Mazars,” Don Jr said. “They were intimately involved with every aspect … for purposes of accounting I rely on accountants.”
He’s now being shown another 2017 document that speaks to the veracity of a 2016 statement of financial condition.
He signed that document as an “attorney in fact”. What does that mean?
“I guess I’m functioning as an attorney for my father as per I guess whatever the lawyers structured for me at the time,” he said.
Asked if that is the case for all years, he said: “Rinse and repeat.”
Note: Donald Trump Jr was the trustee of his father’s revocable trust that managed his assets while he was in office.
The statements of financial condition were sent and prepared under the direction of the trustee. Donald Jr continues to insist he had no involvement whatsoever and relied on the “expertise” of the accountants who prepared them.
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 14:27
NY fraud trial: Don Jr continues testimony
After Donald Trump Jr’s quip yesterday that he should have worn makeup for his court appearance, Judge Arthur Engoron begins proceedings by jokingly asking: “Off the record, Donald Jr, yesterday you said you forgot your makeup, did you remember today?”
Donald Trump Jr in court on 2 November 2023 at the Trump Organization fraud trial
(REUTERS)
Questioning continues as Alex Woodward reports:
Donald Trump Jr, once again, says that he doesn’t know anything about a statement of financial condition.
Colleen Faherty with the attorney general’s office is now showing him an email that was not previously introduced into evidence: a 2017 message concerning a fact-checking from Forbes.
That message was forwarded to Donald Jr and Eric Trump as well as Allen Weisselberg and a Trump Organization marketing employee.
“Insane amount of stuff there,” Trump Jr wrote in the email.
He testified that he does not recall receiving the message.
What if any fact-checking did he do?
“I don’t know that I did any,” he said. “I don’t know that I would spend hundreds of questions worth of time answering Forbes.”
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 14:18
Colorado 14th Amendment trial: Kash Patel denies claim ex-president chose not to call National Guard
A former Donald Trump administration official has denied that the ex-president chose not to summon the National Guard during the January 6 insurrection.
Mr Patel was the chief of staff to acting defence secretary Christopher Miller during the events of 6 January.
The former Trump administration official and right-wing activist denied allegations that the former president obstructed the authorisation of the National Guard’s deployment.
Maroosha Muzaffar has the story.
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 14:10
NY fraud trial: What to expect today
Alex Woodward reports from the New York State Supreme Court in Lower Manhattan:
It’s the 22nd day of a civil trial in a lower Manhattan courtroom targeting Donald Trump for fraud, and the former president still hasn’t stopped falsely claiming that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
But days before he left the White House in January 2021, roughly two weeks after a mob of his supporters stormed the US Capitol to keep him in power, he signed a document that signalled his plan to return to his business as usual.
A document shown by counsel for New York Attorney General Letitia James on 1 November in a trial stemming from her lawsuit targeting the Trump family business shows that then-President Trump transferred control of a trust – which was handled by his oldest son Donald Trump Jr while he was in the White House — back to himself on 15 January, 2021.
The trial in Lower Manhattan concerns what damages, if any, the former president, his adult sons and chief associates could be on the hook for after a judge found them liable for defrauding banks and insurers by inflating wealth and assets over a decade to obtain favourable financial benefits.
But the piece of evidence shown to Donald Trump Jr while he stood on the witness stand on Wednesday could also come into play in two separate criminal cases targeting Mr Trump’s alleged attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, which prosecutors argue he knew the truth of the outcome.
It was another wrinkle that revealed the former president’s overlapping mountain of civil and criminal litigation. At one point during Wednesday’s trial, Trump attorney Christopher Kise had to leave the courtroom to call into a separate hearing; he’s also representing the former president in his classified documents case in a federal court in Florida.
Donald Jr will return to the witness stand on Thursday morning to resume questioning from attorneys for Ms James. He has repeatedly denied any direct involvement with the crafting of his father’s annual statements of financial condition — the documents at the centre of the case — and has pinned the blame on the accountants he said he trusted with them.
It’s a theme that will likely continue in his testimony, and testimony from his brother Eric Trump, who is also expected to take the stand this week.
Their father is scheduled to testify on Monday.
All of them are co-defendants in the case.
Ivanka Trump, who successfully got herself removed as a defendant earlier this year, will testify next Wednesday.
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 13:52
Watch LIVE: New York fraud trial to get underway momentarily
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 13:49
NY fraud trial: ‘I should have worn make-up’ — what happened in court on Wednesday?
Alex Woodward reports from the New York State Supreme Court in Lower Manhattan:
Donald Trump Jr stepped into the witness stand on Wednesday in a $250m civil fraud trial in New York stemming from a blockbuster lawsuit that threatens the Trump family business and its vast real-estate empire.
As the judge allowed photographers to take pictures of the former president’s oldest son, he quipped: “I should have worn make-up.”
Donald Jr, in a dark blue suit and pink tie, is the first among his children to testify in the trial, now in the middle of its fifth week, resuming inside a Manhattan courtroom on 1 November.
Before he took office in January 2017, then-President-elect Trump named his sons Donald Jr and Eric to run his company.
Seven years later, the former president and his two oldest sons are co-defendants in a case that could collapse the family business. Eric Trump also is scheduled to testify this week. Mr Trump will take the stand on 6 November.
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 13:47
Trump-appointed judge hints she may delay classified documents trial
The Donald Trump-appointed judge overseeing the criminal case into his handling of classified documents has now hinted that she may delay the trial – after the former president’s legal team claimed it would take 10 years to go through all the evidence in the case.
In a court hearing in Florida on Wednesday, US District Judge Aileen Cannon – who has repeatedly sided with Mr Trump since being handed the case – cast doubts on it being realistic that the trial can go ahead as planned in May.
“I’m having a hard time seeing how this work can be accomplished realistically in this period of time,” she said.
She also appeared to scold prosecutors, saying that they lacked “a level of understanding to these realities” around the current timeline.
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 13:40
In depth: Could a Colorado judge remove Trump from the ballot?
The 14 Amendment, adopted in the aftermath of the US Civil War, prohibits anyone who has sworn an oath to uphold the constitution — including elected officials — and who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof” from holding office in the future.
A lawsuit filed by a group of Republican voters and a government watchdog group argues that Mr Trump has “failed” that test and rendered him “constitutionally ineligible to appear on any Colorado ballot as a candidate for federal or state office”.
Alex Woodward looks at the details.
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 13:30
All of Trump’s criminal charges and lawsuits and where they currently stand
Former president Donald Trump is facing criminal cases in jurisdictions up and down the East coast of the US, from Washinton to Florida, New York to Georgia, any of which could land him in prison.
Josh Marcus breaks down each case for The Independent.
Oliver O’Connell2 November 2023 13:15
