James is seeking sanctions that, if imposed, could effectively end the former president’s real estate career and jeopardize the Trump Organization itself, which was started by his father in Queens in the 1920s. These include barring Trump and Donald Jr.’s children Ivanka and Eric from serving as officers of a New York-registered company again. The attorney general is asking the court to force the Trumps to return at least $250 million in what she claims were illegal proceeds. James also said her office will refer evidence to the Justice Department for possible criminal charges, including bank fraud. “Mr. Trump thought he could get away with the art of stealing, but today, that behavior ends,” James said, referring to the 1987 memoir that helped sharpen Trump’s image as a real estate mogul with a Midas touch. The Art of the Deal. . “We need to hold former presidents to the same standards as ordinary Americans,” he added. The lawsuit represents an extraordinary legal action against a former US president who remains the most powerful figure in the Republican party and is considering another run for the White House. It marked the culmination of a nearly three-year investigation marked by bitter clashes between the attorney general and the Trumps and their lawyers. Trump has repeatedly accused James, a Democrat, of waging a “witch hunt” to destroy his political career. A Trump Organization spokesman on Wednesday called the lawsuit “political harassment” and rejected the claim that any entity had been victimized by the family. “Not only were no banks harmed – in fact, they made huge profits, hundreds of millions of dollars in interest and fees, and never challenged any of the loans in question,” the spokesman said. Many of the details in James’ suit were laid out in a January legal filing. Central to the case is the annual “statement of financial position” prepared by Trump and his advisers to demonstrate his net worth to lenders and prospective business partners. Trump, according to James, has insisted that the number increases every year. To achieve this, he said, the Trumps regularly inflated the value of assets such as office towers and golf clubs and even the former president’s Mar-a-Lago estate. This, in turn, allowed them to secure financial benefits, including access to financing on more favorable terms. The Trumps would then minimize the value of those same assets to lower their tax bills, he claimed. Between 2011 and 2021, the statement of financial condition contained more than 200 false valuations, according to the lawsuit. “With the help of Donald Jr., Eric, Ivanka and other defendants, Trump illegally inflated and deflated his fortune by billions to obtain and satisfy loans, receive insurance benefits and pay lower taxes,” James said. . Among the many examples in a complaint that exceeded 200 pages was Trump’s penthouse apartment. He valued it at $327 million in 2015 — at a time when no apartment in the city had ever sold for more than $100 million. The Trumps justified this by nearly tripling their estimate of the apartment’s square footage. Another case involved 40 Wall Street, an office tower in lower Manhattan. According to James, the Trumps valued it at $524 million in 2011, even though Cushman & Wakefield, a real estate services firm, valued the same building at about $200 million in an appraisal for a separate client. The former president, James claimed, also added a 30 percent brand premium to any property simply because it carried the Trump name. In addition to the Trumps, the suit names Allen Weiselberg, the Trump Organization’s longtime chief financial officer, and Jeffrey McConey, its auditor. In August Weisselberg pleaded guilty to 15 counts stemming from criminal tax fraud in a deal with prosecutors expected to result in a five-month prison sentence. Trump’s prosecution of James has been a long-running affair, with repeated legal delays and questions about the strength of her evidence and the merits and implications of charging a former president. A parallel criminal investigation by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg appeared to stall earlier this year when the two prosecutors overseeing it abruptly resigned. In a statement Wednesday, Bragg said his investigation was “active and ongoing.” One challenge plaguing prosecutors is that the parties Trump dealt with were big lenders, such as Deutsche Bank, and should be expected to do their own due diligence — regardless of the family’s allegations and especially given the reputation of Trump for exaggeration and boasting. Additionally, Trump’s annual financial statement was compiled with the help of his former accountant, Mazars, but was not officially audited by the firm. In February, Mazars cut ties with Trump, saying it could no longer vouch for 10 years of his financial statements. Meanwhile, Trump famously did not keep detailed written records. Prosecutors hoped Weiselberg could help them, but he refused to testify against his boss. In a criminal case, prosecutors must convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt. The civil suit filed by James faces a lower burden of proof. In the meantime, the Trump Organization could face additional complications, according to Daniel Horwitz, an attorney at McLaughlin & Stern. “Anyone accused of fraud will inevitably encounter some level of resistance from financial institutions,” he said. While the attorney general was presenting her complaint in Manhattan, one of the former president’s longtime allies, Tom Barak, was on trial in Brooklyn on charges of illegal lobbying on behalf of the United Arab Emirates. On the first day of the trial, prosecutors laid out their case that Barak “acted as the eyes, ears and voice of the UAE” during a two-year period in which he allegedly tried to insert talking points into Trump’s speeches and agreed to pass regarding sensitive information in Abu Dhabi.

His lawyer, Michael Schachter, dismissed those claims as “ridiculous”, claiming the private equity investor had actually begged Trump to side with Qatar and against neighboring countries – including the UAE – that have imposed a regional embargo on the wealthy emirate. in natural gas. . “Tom helped the UAE’s enemy, Qatar,” Schachter said. He described Barack as “his own man” and dismissed the idea that the founder and chairman of a $40 billion investment firm could have been recruited at the behest of any foreign country. “He did it because he thought it was the right thing to do.” Additional reporting by Mark Vandevelde in New York