New York Attorney General Letitia James is prepared to seize former President Donald Trump’s assets if he is unable to find cash to cover a $354 million fine in his civil fraud case, she said Tuesday in an interview with ABC News.
James told ABC News, “If he does not have funds to pay off the judgment, then we will seek judgment enforcement mechanisms in court, and we will ask the judge to seize his assets.”
Trump was fined $354.8 million plus approximately $100 million in pre-judgment interest on Friday after Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoron ruled the former president had inflated his net worth in order get more favorable loan terms.
Trump has said he will appeal the ruling. Still, he will have to pay the fine as a bond to New York State before he can appeal.
When asked about Trump’s defense that the banks were paid back for all loans and there were no victims in the case, James responded “financial frauds are not victimless crimes,” but did not name any victims and instead said the fraud was “massive.”
“He engaged in this massive amount of fraud. It wasn’t just a simple mistake, a slight oversight, the variations are wildly exaggerated, and the extent of the fraud was staggering,” she argued. She then raised a hypothetical situation, saying, “If average New Yorkers went into a bank and submitted false documents, the government would throw the book at them, and the same should be true for former presidents.”
James said she was eyeing Trump’s building on 40 Wall Street known as the “Trump building.”
“We are prepared to make sure that the judgment is paid to New Yorkers, and yes, I look at 40 Wall Street each and every day,” she said.
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She dismissed Trump’s assertion businesses would leave New York over the case, saying, “Last I checked, tourism is up. Wall Street is doing just fine.”
She also gloated about her, columnist E. Jean Carroll, and embattled Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’s cases against Trump, saying, “Someone once told me if you want something done, give it to a woman.”
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