Former President Donald Trump made another appearance at the $250 million civil fraud trial against him and his company, even though the star witness he was planning to watch won't be testifying.
Speaking to reporters before he entered the Manhattan courtroom, he decried the trial as "rigged" and accused New York Attorney General Letitia James of election interference as he griped that he should be “someplace else campaigning.” Trump isn’t required to attend the proceedings. He later told reporters he plans to return Wednesday, as well.
James has accused Trump of having wildly exaggerated his net worth on financial statements to banks and insurance companies.
Trump said Tuesday that James and her office are "the frauds" and again complained about her having cited the Palm Beach County, Florida, tax assessor appraisal of the value of his Mar-a-Lago club at $18 million to $27 million from 2011 to 2021 as proof of fraud. Trump's financial statements valued the property at $400 million to $600 million.
He then showed how fungible he considers those values to be. James valued Mar-a-Lago at $18 million when it is “worth maybe close to 100 times that amount,” Trump said. "The house is worth a billion, a billion and a half, 750 million; it’s worth a fortune,” he said, calling it "the most expensive house probably in the world."
Sources had said last week that Trump planned to watch testimony from his former lawyer-turned-foe Michael Cohen that was originally scheduled for Tuesday. But Cohen said Friday he was dealing with a health issue and wouldn't be in court that day as planned. Judge Arthur Engoron said Monday that Cohen's testimony would be delayed for at least a week.
Trump complained to reporters during the lunch break Tuesday that "Cohen didn't have the guts" to appear.
Cohen said in a statement that "if I was afraid of Donald, I wouldn't have written 2 NYT bestsellers, testified before the Mueller team, seven congressional committees, 23 appearances before the Manhattan DA, and provided information to the NYAG that is the basis of this trial. Looking forward to seeing you in court very soon!”
Cohen said in a statement Monday that he'll be ready for Trump whenever he testifies.
“I am thankful the medical condition, while incredibly painful, does not require an immediate procedure," he said. "I anticipate appearing as soon as the pain subsides. When I do testify, I am certain Donald will be in attendance, sitting with his lawyers at the defendant’s table."
James, who brought the case against Trump, has cited Cohen's 2019 congressional testimony about Trump as having sparked the investigation that led to her fraud suit. Cohen at the time told lawmakers that Trump had inflated the value of his assets to secure loans and that he also deflated them for tax purposes.
James has accused Trump of having exaggerated his net worth to the tune of billions of dollars. In a ruling last month allowing the trial to proceed, Engoron found Trump had engaged in "persistent fraud."
She told reporters at the end of Tuesday's trial proceedings that Trump's "entire empire was built on nothing but lies and sinking sand."
"The numbers don't lie," she said. "At the end of the day, justice will be served, and victory will be mine."
Earlier Tuesday, Trump denied any wrongdoing and attacked both the trial and Engoron in a post on his Truth Social platform.
“America cannot let this happen,” he said. “Our legal system is corrupt and broken! Everything emanates from Washington, ‘GET TRUMP.’”
He took a gentler tone with Engoron during the lunch break, telling reporters that "I respect the judge, I like the judge," but that his fellow Democrats are "pushing him around like a pinball."
Instead of hearing from Cohen on Tuesday, Trump and others in the courtroom heard testimony from Trump Organization accountant Donna Kidder, who detailed the company's bookkeeping practices.
She recounted a conversation with the company's former chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg in 2012, when, she said, he told her to omit the company's management charges at one property on a cash flow report to increase the overall value of the property. He described it as going "from one pocket to another," Kidder said.
Also testifying was Doug Larson, a former executive at the commercial real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield. He was asked about the company's appraisals of a building Trump owns at 40 Wall St. in Manhattan and other Trump properties that were undertaken on behalf of Trump’s lenders.
Trump Organization officials cited the appraisals in their financial statements but used a lower cap rate to claim the properties were more valuable than Cushman had estimated.
In one year, Cushman appraised the property at $540 million, while the Trump Organization appraised it at $735 million, court documents show.
Trump's company also said it had consulted with Larson about the valuations, which Larson said didn’t happen. He called the use of his work without his knowledge “inappropriate” and said the information used in the financial statements was “inaccurate.”
Trump lawyer Alina Habba said that banks often appraise properties at lower amounts than property owners and that there was nothing nefarious about the Trump figure.
Engoron held Cushman & Wakefield in contempt last year after it failed to turn over appraisal documents the state attorney general's office had subpoenaed. The company relented after he issued a $10,000-a-day fine.
Trump attended the first three days of his fraud trial in New York, which began Oct. 2. James was also in attendance Tuesday.
Trump’s presence Tuesday has shaken up the dynamic of the trial, with increased security inside and outside the courthouse already in place before his arrival. Friends of Engoron’s clerk are in attendance, as are friends of the prosecutors. James is also in the courtroom after she missed the last several days of testimony.
The clerk appeared to be annoyed by delays caused by Trump’s holding court in the hallway during breaks. Toward the end of the midmorning break, she declared, “We are starting in two minutes,” while Trump was still outside the courtroom.
The trial, which Engoron has said is expected to stretch into late December, has been moving briskly in recent days, in part because Trump's lawyers haven’t been cross-examining witnesses. Trump lawyer Christopher Kise explained that decision to NBC News on Monday, saying Trump's legal team plans to call some of those witnesses, including Weisselberg.
Trump left during the midafternoon break to deal with another legal matter: testifying in a two-hour, closed-door deposition in a case involving former FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, whom he has mocked publicly for years. Strzok and Page were critical of Trump in private text messages to each other while they were involved in then-special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
Trump is being deposed in relation to their separate lawsuits against the Justice Department. Strzok alleges he was wrongfully terminated from the FBI, while Page, who resigned as an FBI lawyer in May 2018, has alleged privacy violations tied to the public disclosures of her text messages with Strzok.
Trump was hit Monday with a partial gag order by the federal judge presiding over the election interference case against him in Washington, D.C.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan’s ruling bars Trump from going after potential witnesses and prosecutors in the case. Trump's lawyers notified Chutkan on Tuesday that he is appealing the ruling.
"The judge said basically I don’t have the right to speak,” Trump griped to reporters Tuesday. “My speech has been taken away from me. I’m a candidate that’s running for office, and I’m not allowed to speak.”
In her ruling, Chutkan said Trump is still permitted to “vigorously seek public support as a presidential candidate, debate policies and people related to that candidacy, criticize the current administration and assert his belief that this prosecution is politically motivated.” She said he was welcome to criticize Mike Pence, his former vice president and one of his 2024 presidential rivals, but couldn’t speak about his role in the case.
Engoron, the judge in the New York fraud trial, issued a more limited gag order in the fraud case this month after Trump posted a message on Truth Social attacking his law clerk.
“Personal attacks on members of my court staff are unacceptable, inappropriate and I won’t tolerate it,” Engoron said, adding that he was instituting “a gag order on all parties with respect to posting or publicly speaking about any member of my staff.”
Trial proceedings Wednesday will consist of continued testimony from Larson, followed by another Cushman witness, David McArdle, and then Jack Weisselberg, the son of Allen Weisselberg, who helped secure financing for Trump while he was working at a real estate investment firm.
The attorney general's office also sent Engoron a letter requesting he allow into evidence testimony from a Trump Organization employee, Patrick Birney, who said Allen Weisselberg once told him that “Mr. Trump wanted his net worth on the Statement of Financial Condition to go up.”
Kise argued that the remark was hearsay and should be stricken from the record.
