The court ruled last month that Trump and his companies illegally overstated his wealth.
Washington:
Donald Trump’s assets have been seized, a disgrace to his carefully cultivated image as a self-made tycoon, as his lawyers acknowledged on Monday that he did not have enough cash to pay a $464 million fine for fraudulently inflating his wealth. USD fine is appealed.
Trump, the Republican candidate in November’s U.S. presidential election, plans to challenge a February ruling by a New York civil court that would have forced an automatic stay.
But first he must deposit the money into an account administered by the Court of Appeal or post a full bond, and 30 insurance underwriters rejected his request for assistance, his lawyers said in a new filing.
His cash crunch raises the possibility that New York state could begin seizing the former president’s assets as soon as Monday unless a court, known as the Appellate Division, First Department, agrees to delay.
“Defendants have proven to have faced insurmountable difficulties in obtaining a $464 million appeal bond,” Trump Organization general counsel Alan Garten said in a court filing.
Judge Arthur Ngoren ruled last month that Trump and his companies illegally inflated his wealth and manipulated property values to obtain favorable terms for bank loans or insurance.
The judge ordered Trump to pay $355 million plus interest, while his sons Eric and Don Jr. were told to hand over more than $4 million each.
Earlier this month, Trump appealed sexual assault and defamation verdicts in a lawsuit brought by New York writer E. Jean Carroll and successfully raised a separate bond of $91.6 million.
But his attorney said the major bond providers have internal policies that prohibit them from accepting real estate as collateral in fraud cases, and many have limits of no more than $100 million.
That leaves Trump’s only option to pay 120% of the bonds in cash and cash equivalents, totaling $557.5 million, including fees and interest.
Trump testified in an April 2023 deposition in the same case that he had “more than $400 million in cash,” but by then he was already notorious for inflating his wealth.
He asked the Court of Appeal to postpone the bond deadline until his appeal is heard, arguing that the value of his property empire far exceeds the amount he is owed.
He also asked for a smaller bond, but New York Attorney General Letitia James objected, saying he would “attempt to evade enforcement of the sentence or make enforcement more difficult.”
Even with the bond, Trump will continue to pay hefty interest during an appeal that could take years unless he deposits the entire penalty into a court-managed account.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
