OPINION:
The Justice Department is investigating another anti-Trump scam. This one involved a left-wing activist, New York Attorney General Letitia James, trying to seize President Trump’s lifetime creation, the Trump Organization, over bank loans that he repaid in full and on time and about which no lending institution filed any complaint.
For the Democrat to pull off something so shaky against a then-former president, she needed a comrade in arms. She found one in Judge Arthur Engoron, who held a two-month trial last year and then imposed a nearly half-billion-dollar fine. Even more ridiculous.
The Justice Department has issued Ms. James subpoenas to investigate whether she violated Mr. Trump’s constitutional rights, news reports say.
Mr. Trump appealed the Engoron verdict. It has been nearly 11 months since oral arguments were heard by a five-justice panel of the New York Supreme Court Appellate Division, which has yet to post its decision.
Mr. Trump’s attorneys basically say New York Supreme Court Judge Engoron is financially ignorant. In a filing reviewed by The Washington Times, the lawyers say the judge “struggled to understand basic banking concepts.” His ruling included “theologically loaded terms more befitting a medieval inquisitor than a civil justice.”
The political odds are against Mr. Trump. The five justices who heard oral arguments are all Democrats, though one was appointed by a Republican governor. Justice Dianne Renwick, the presiding judge, was appointed by New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, an antagonist of Mr. Trump.
Mr. Trump needs three votes to get a reversal. Is there any hope that three Democrats would overturn their party brethren and side with the most hated Republican ever? Judge Engoron is a Democrat who routinely ruled against the president at trial. Ms. James ran for office in 2018 on a platform of “I’m going to destroy Donald Trump.”
The Democratic Party’s civil banking case is not to be confused with the Democrats’ criminal assaults on Mr. Trump. As president, Joseph R. Biden said in 2022, “I’m making sure” Mr. Trump is vanquished. The Biden Justice Department sent a top dog to Manhattan to help a George Soros-financed prosecutor send Mr. Trump to prison over a nondisclosure agreement with a woman.
The Biden Justice Department raided Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, including Melania Trump’s closets, looking for documents the then-former president had a right to possess (unlike Mr. Biden and the secret stash found in his home). It also indicted Mr. Trump for protesting the 2020 election results. Local prosecutors did the same thing in Atlanta and sent a prosecutor to the Biden White House for help.
In the James case, I looked inside Mr. Trump’s 116-page appeal filed in July 2024 to understand why the Justice Department is now subpoenaing Ms. James’ records.
First off, Mr. Trump’s attorneys call the James lawsuit an “unauthorized, unprecedented power-grab.”
“In this case, the New York Attorney General seeks to unwind and penalize complex, highly successful transactions between [the Trump family] and sophisticated Wall Street banks that left all parties deeply satisfied and had no impact on the public interest,” the petition reads.
The trial focused on 10 loans involving, among other sites, golf courses, the Chicago Trump Tower and the Old Post Office building on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. The Trump Organization rebuilt the dilapidated Old Post Office into a spectacular hotel and dining destination. (Democrats considered impeaching Mr. Trump because foreigners stayed there.)
Says the appeal, “No party ever complained or alleged any default. Every loan payment was made on time, and all the loans were repaid in full — some before they came due.”
All loans were repaid. Lenders did their own appraisals. No one complained. What a crime! The Trumps are so diabolical.
Mimicking Ms. James’ civil complaint, Judge Engoron accused Mr. Trump of fraud by inflating property values to secure more favorable loans.
Mr. Trump sold the Old Post Office building in 2022 for $400 million. He had valued it at $130 million. Judge Engoron valued Mar-a-Lago at $27 million, tops. The Trump side said the number was ridiculous and an expert put the true value at $1 billion.
Mr. Trump’s appeal gives examples of lenders, such as Deutsche Bank, doing their own appraisals and checking the books, tax returns and billionaire’s cash on hand.
In coming up with a $464 million penalty, or “disgorgement,” to be paid by the Trump family, Judge Engoron deemed proceeds from sales, such as that of the Old Post Office, “profits” and ignored money Mr. Trump put in. The Trump team said appraisals are complicated and open to differing opinions and do not necessarily match what the property would fetch at a sale.
The Trump legal team paints Judge Engoron as a biased, ill-informed activist who devised his own “plainly erroneous” property valuations. He also let Ms. James’ witnesses testify without any evidentiary foundations.
“President Trump stands among the most visionary and iconic real estate developers in American history,” the appeal states. “As trial evidence highlighted, banks and lenders vied eagerly for his business.”
The mystery now is why the New York appellate court hasn’t issued a decision nearly 11 months after oral arguments in September. Less than two months later, Mr. Trump was elected president. Did that become a factor?
Presiding Judge Renwick, whom the New York Post has painted as a fierce partisan Democrat, will surely back Ms. James. Mr. Trump needs three of the remaining four votes.
At oral arguments, two judges expressed skepticism about the James case. Observers believe the opinion is likely already written but being held by one or more justices.
• Rowan Scarborough is a columnist with The Washington Times.
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