Nov. 30, 2023 - Epoch Times
12:37
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| Just yesterday, the ongoing legal battle that President Trump is facing right here in New York experienced, you could say, a bit of a twist. | |
| That's because the testimony that was given by an executive from Deutsche Bank, it appeared to completely shatter the narrative that was being pushed by Ms. | |
| Letitia James, the Attorney General of New York. | |
| However, in order to explain the significance of what this executive said while on the witness stand, well, I need to quickly set the stage for you regarding this entire lawsuit. | |
| As you may know, included among the myriad of different legal cases that have been lobbied against President Trump, you have the case, which was brought forth by the New York Attorney General, Ms. | |
| Letitia James. | |
| This 200-page civil lawsuit was brought forth back in September of last year, and it accuses President Trump In her lawsuit, Ms. | |
| James claimed that over a 10-year period, from 2011 through 2021, President Trump and the other defendants had engaged in numerous acts of fraud and misrepresentation in the preparation of Mr. | |
| Trump's annual statements of financial condition, which included deceiving insurers, tax officials, and lenders by allegedly inflating the value of his properties, including his Mar-a-Lago estate over in Florida. | |
| Ms. | |
| Letitia James claims that this lawsuit of hers is the result of a three-year-long investigation, and here's specifically what she is hoping to achieve with the actual case. | |
| Okay, so the basic claim here, being made by the New York Attorney General, is that President Trump and his being made by the New York Attorney General, is that President Trump and his company, they inflated the value of their assets in order to get better | |
| Meaning, that despite the fact that these banks conducted their own due diligence, despite the fact that after conducting that due diligence, they gave the Trump Organization these loans, despite the fact that these loans and all of the interest on the loans were paid back in full, And despite the fact that these banks themselves appear to want nothing to do with these lawsuits, well, Letitia James still decided to sue the Trump Organization on behalf of the banks. | |
| Which, just as an aside, was actually the fulfillment of a campaign promise that she made while running for Attorney General. | |
| Take a listen. | |
| We will all rise up and resist this man! | |
| Hello! | |
| Let's go! | |
| Hey, hey! | |
| Ho, ho! | |
| Hey, hey! | |
| - Ho, ho! - That's what I did! | |
| Donald Trump, watch the bird! | |
| Lock him up! Lock him up! Lock him up! - Lock him up! - Lock him up! - Now, for his part, over the past month and a half now that the case has been a trial, President Trump, as well as his legal team, have been maintaining the position that these loans were negotiated fairly, that the interest and the principal was paid off in full, and that the only reason that Letitia James filed this lawsuit at all was for political purposes. | |
| However, up until now, everything in this case has been from the prosecution side, meaning that the Attorney General's office has been the one calling forth all the witnesses. | |
| But right now, it's the defense's turn to call witnesses. | |
| And that they did. | |
| Yesterday, Trump's legal team called an executive from Deutsche Bank to the witness stand, and this executive's testimony... | |
| Well, it really called into question the entire premise of Letitia James' argument. | |
| Specifically, Mr. | |
| David Williams, who directly worked on at least one of the loans that were obtained by Trump from the bank, he testified that it's not unusual for there to be a discrepancy between the bank's assessment of a property and that of the client's. | |
| David Williams... | |
| who worked on at least one of the three loans Deutsche Bank made to Trump in the years before he was elected president, testified on Tuesday that it's atypical but not entirely unusual for the bank to cut a client's stated asset value by 50% and approve the loan anyway, as it did with Trump. | |
| Furthermore, there were several exchanges during the questioning phase, which revealed something that frankly most people in real estate already know, which is that during the loan process, there is a natural back and forth between the client and the bank, wherein the client tries to provide the highest valuation of their asset possible, while the bank tries to lowball the value and they meet somewhere in wherein the client tries to provide the highest valuation of their asset Quote, | |
| According to internal bank credit memos used as evidence in the case, Deutsche Bank, which loaned Trump hundreds of millions of dollars for properties in Miami, Chicago, and Washington, cut his stated net worth in 2011 and 2012 from about $4.2 billion to $2.3 billion when evaluating his loan requests. | |
| The same documents show that the bank approved the loans anyway because it expected them to generate a profit based on Trump's history of successful developments and other criteria. | |
| And then, during the actual questioning, this Deutsche Bank executive, he said that it's actually standard practice to review a client's stated net worth and then adjust the valuation as needed. | |
| Here are a few short snippets from the exchange between Trump's lawyer and Mr. | |
| Williams. | |
| Trump's lawyer asks, quote, Then Trump's lawyer asks about due diligence, to which Mr. | |
| Williams responds by saying, The lawyer then asked, Mr. | |
| Williams says no. | |
| Why not? | |
| Mr. | |
| Williams then says the following. | |
| It's just a difference of opinion. | |
| I think we expect clients to provide information to be accurate, but such financial statements are made largely relying on the use of estimates. | |
| And indeed, according to earlier testimony that was given by President Trump when he himself was on the witness stand, he made the argument that his estimates for the values of his properties, they included the potential value of future development, as well as the boost that the properties would receive from the overall Trump name. | |
| And so, that is the essence of the witness's testimony, that these valuations are estimates on both the client's side as well as on the bank's side, and that regardless of what the client says, the bank always conducts their own due diligence anyway, which ties directly back to the argument that Trump's lawyers are making in this particular case, which is that no banks were financially harmed by loaning to either President Trump, to his kids, or to the Trump Organization. | |
| However, on the flip side, even after this testimony from Mr. | |
| Williams, the lawyers representing the state of New York, they continue to double down on their argument. | |
| For instance, quote, Kevin Wallace, a lawyer for Letitia James, told the judge at the end of the day that the bank executive's testimony does not undercut the state's case because the trial doesn't hinge on whether Deutsche Bank was a victim. | |
| Instead, he said, it's whether Trump knowingly created and used false financial documents. | |
| Meaning that the state's argument here is that even if there are absolutely no victims at all, both Trump and the Trump Organization can still be found guilty. | |
| Regardless though, this testimony did have the effect of essentially undermining the state's portrayal of Deutsche Bank as one of Trump's biggest victims. | |
| However, that might all not really even matter. | |
| That's because this case is not playing out before a jury. | |
| Instead, this is what's known as a bench trial with Judge Arthur Ingerin as the sole determiner. | |
| And he has already determined several months ago that President Trump was guilty of committing fraud. | |
| In fact, right after this Deutsche Bank executive gave his testimony on the witness stand, Trump's attorney, he turned to the judge and he asked him to immediately issue a verdict in favor of the defendant, meaning President Trump, arguing that the testimony from the bank executive had destroyed the claim that any of the alleged asset inflation was material arguing that the testimony from the bank executive had destroyed the claim that any Here's specifically what Trump's lawyer told the judge. | |
| Quote... | |
| The bank had no problem with a $2 billion difference, a $3 billion difference. | |
| Large changes to net worth are not unusual. | |
| There's been no demonstration of any materiality issues at all. | |
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| And now, let's head on back to the studio. | |
| However, the judge was not convinced with that argument, and he responded simply by saying this, quote, And so, there you have it. | |
| The banks themselves appear to have been perfectly fine with both the estimates as well as the loan terms, But the state is still pursuing the case anyway, arguing that regardless of the bank's opinions, the Trump organization did lie on the official forms, which is a crime. | |
| Now moving forward, the defense is set to call another three current and former executives of Deutsche Bank as witnesses in order to essentially flip the script even further on the prosecution's version of events. | |
| Those testimonies, they should be coming in today, tomorrow, and on Friday. | |
| And just for your general reference, because the judge in the case has already determined that President Trump is guilty of financial fraud, the rest of the trial is mostly about figuring out the dollar amount of the fine that will be levied against Trump as well as his organization. | |
| As I mentioned earlier, Ms. | |
| Letitia James is pushing for a $250 million fine, which she claims is the amount of illegal profit that the Trump organization made when they inflated their assets. | |
| Now, if I had to wager a guess here, I would assume that the reason that Trump's lawyers are calling these different bank executives to the stand, well, it has less to do with lowering the dollar amount of the actual fine and more to do with the inevitable appeal of this case. | |
| Because when they take this case to appeal, all the testimonies from these different bank executives, they will be in the official transcripts. | |
| That is, of course, just my guess. | |
| I think that because they've already been found guilty... | |
| Getting these bank executives to say their piece on the witness stand has more to do with the appeal process rather than the fine. | |
| Again, just my guess. | |
| Regardless though, moving forward, we have several more banker testimonies to look forward to, and then subsequently on December the 11th, which is two weeks from now, President Trump is set to once again take the witness stand himself. | |
| And so, we'll just have to wait and see how this all plays itself out. | |
| In the meantime, if you'd like to dig through the testimony of Mr. | |
| David Williams for yourself, I'll throw my research notes. | |
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