New York Attorney General Seeks Summary Judgment

New York Attorney General Letitia James on Wednesday asked a judge for a partial summary judgment against Donald Trump in his $250 million lawsuit accusing the former president of widespread fraud, citing what she called a “mountain of undisputed evidence” of false and misleading financial statements.

In a court filing, James said evidence shows that if Trump’s net worth was correctly calculated, it would be between 17% and 39% lower than what he claimed each year over a decade, ” which translates to the huge sum of $1”. billion or more in all but one year. »

The allegedly false statements included years Trump was in the White House, according to the filing.

James’ filing comes two months before trial begins in civil suit against former president; the Trump Organization; and his sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, outside New York Supreme Court in Manhattan.

James is suing the Trumps for allegedly defrauding banks, insurance companies and others using false financial statements.

This trial would still take place to address other claims, even if Judge Arthur Engoron grants James’ request for partial summary judgment and finds that Trump and the other defendants committed fraud under New York business law. .

James, in his motion, says that Engoron must answer “two simple and straightforward questions” to reach this conclusion.

One of the questions is whether Trump’s annual statements about his financial condition were “false or misleading,” the attorney general wrote.

The other question, she writes, is whether Trump and his co-defendants repeatedly used the financial statements to conduct business transactions.

“The answer to both questions is an emphatic ‘yes,’ based on the mountain of undisputed evidence cited” in documentation submitted by James’ office, the motion states.

“Based on the uncontested evidence, no trial is necessary for the Court to determine that the defendants presented significantly and materially inflated asset values ​​in SFC. [financial statements] and then repeatedly used these SFCs in business transactions to defraud banks and insurers,” James wrote.

“Despite the defendants’ horde of 13 experts, ultimately this is a matter of documents, and the documents leave no doubt that Mr. Trump’s SFCs do not even remotely reflect the “estimated current value” of its assets as they would trade between knowledgeable market participants,” the motion reads.

CNBC has requested comments from a Trump attorney.