On Monday, Trump’s lawyers filed documents alleging that he “denies knowledge”—and doesn’t even know enough “to form a belief”—about the way he allegedly slapped a 30-percent brand premium on some business properties in 2014.
But the very next day, Trump said the complete opposite when he issued a lengthy statement to counter news that his long-time outside accounting firm, Mazars USA, had suddenly ditched him. He took the opportunity to show off his supposed previous net worth of $5.7 billion in 2014—and, more importantly, noted that it didn’t include the typical boost from the “enthusiasm” of the Trump brand.
On Wednesday, prosecutors contended in a letter that Trump can no longer play clueless; he had just revealed that he knows “exactly what OAG is investigating.”
“His answer is more than merely legally deficient: it plainly contradicts his public statements,” they wrote.
That self-own was compounded on Thursday, when a state judge ordered him to turn over evidence about shady real estate values in a case about the Trump Organization’s alleged bank and tax fraud. Trump’s incessant need to boast ended up revealing he had more evidence to turn over.
He said too much—at just the wrong time.
“We’re talking about a guy who’s so in the habit of shooting his mouth off. I think this is quite damaging, and also unusual. Usually people refer everything to their attorney,” said Daniel L. Feldman, a former attorney at the AG’s office who now teaches at the City University of New York’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
And now that New York State Judge Arthur F. Engoron issued an order on Thursday compelling Trump to turn over documents, the New York AG’s lawyers can specifically ask for the information they now know exists.
“What they have is a clear path to do is to say, ‘OK, give us the docs that support the statement you just made since you obviously were basing this on something,” Feldman told The Daily Beast.
Ironically, the statement was apparently prepared with the help of Trump’s lawyers which is shocking. He must have used that inexperienced lawyer from Bedminster who argued the case like Joe Pesci in “My Cousin Vinnie” for him the other day:
After news broke on Monday that Mazars dropped him, the former president and his staff were conspicuously silent on the topic. Trump, who usually spouts off as soon as he can, did not release a statement until a full day later—on Tuesday evening—when his spokespeople finally blasted out a typically baffling missive.
According to two people familiar with the matter, lawyers and financial data were consulted and reviewed during a protracted drafting process, with the former president’s staff taking Trump’s dictated message and adorning it with a shred of coherence.
“They took their time on this one. You need to be careful and cautious and thorough. You do not want to give your enemies anything to use against you or your client, and you want to have a clear… strong message,” one of the sources said…
“It seems somebody dropped the ball, though, doesn’t it?” the person familiar with the situation asked, rhetorically.
Yeah. I do wonder if Trump is going to ever suffer any consequences, however. It all seems so impossible. Still, if it hurts his dishonest business it’s all to the good.