Letitia James wore a beaming smile as she walked into a Manhattan courtroom to face Donald Trump in person on Monday. Last week, the New York attorney general won a huge victory in her civil case against the former president and his business alleging a variety of financial crimes when Judge Arthur Engoron ruled Trump had committed fraud by overvaluing his assets and moved to strip him of control over his flagship properties, including Trump Tower.
It is probably why Trump, who entered the courtroom a few minutes later, was scowling.
He walked past James, who was seated among dozens of spectators, amid a clutch of Secret Service agents as he and his attorneys made their way to the defense table in front of Engoron, who will act as judge and jury in the trial.
The prosecution’s opening statement by Kevin C. Wallace repeatedly accused the defendants, which include Trump’s business, children, and long-time associates, of having acted “with the intent to defraud” when they allegedly told banks that assets were worth far more than they really were.
Christopher Kise, the former Florida solicitor general and a member of Trump’s legal team, gave the first opening statement for the defense, arguing that a differing valuations of a property isn’t inherently fraudulent. “Buyers have a duty, sellers have a duty, none of them are wrong — they’re just different,” he said.
Alina Habba, a Trump attorney who is defending some of the other Trump-world defendants in this suit, sought to justify the valuations of Trump’s “Mona Lisa properties,” saying of Mar-a-Lago, for instance, “I assure you there is a person out there that would buy that property, that spectacular property, for way over $1 billion.”
She continued, “There was no intent to defraud, period. The end.”
When the trial was temporarily halted for a lunch break, Trump was reportedly seen glaring at James as he passed her on his way out of the courtroom.
While their attorneys battled inside court, James and Trump sparred outside.
“My message is simple. No matter how powerful you are, no matter how much money you think you may have, no one is above the law,” James told cameras before the hearing began, consistent with her campaign message, which not so subtly hinted she would investigate Trump’s finances.
Trump was not even remotely subtle.
Doubling down on his call over the weekend for Judge Engoron to resign, Trump suggested the judge could be “charged criminally” and called James, who is Black, a “racist.”
“This is a continuation of the single greatest witch hunt of all time,” Trump said.
The court heard from its first witness following the lunch break: Donald Bender, an accountant for the Trump Organization. He worked for the firm Mazars USA and previously complied financial documents for Trump. His testimony is expected to continue on Tuesday.
It was a little more than a year ago when James filed a lawsuit against Trump, his three eldest children, and his namesake company, the Trump Organization. The attorney general’s office alleged that Trump fraudulently inflated the worth of several of his iconic properties — including Mar-a-Lago and his penthouse apartment in Trump Tower — by as much as $3.6 billion with the goal of receiving more favorable loan terms from banks. Though the allegations against his oldest daughter, Ivanka, were ultimately found to be beyond the statute of limitations, Trump and his sons Donald Jr. and Eric are still implicated.
In the case, James is seeking to permanently bar Trump, his children, and his company from operating a business in the state of New York, as well as to fine them $250 million. In a ruling last week, Judge Engoron found the attorney general’s office had sufficiently proved that Trump was liable for fraud and called for the operating licenses for his family’s companies to be rescinded and the businesses to be placed under independent control. It could mean that the heart of Trump’s real-estate empire, atop which he built a half-century of fame and his successful campaign to be president, will be no more. Though Engoron ruled in the attorney general’s favor last week, the trial will decide upon her office’s remaining claims against the defendants including falsifying business records and insurance fraud as well as determine any additional penalties.
This post has been updated throughout.
