Trump’s sons testify in New York civil fraud trial

The New York Attorney General’s office pressed Donald Trump’s two adult sons Thursday about their knowledge of and involvement with the former president’s financial statements in some of the most significant and tense days of the fraud trial.

The back-to-back appearances Thursday from Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump — who both helped run the Trump Organization while their father was in the White House — comes ahead of the former president’s own testimony on Monday.

Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump are co-defendants in the case, along with their father, the Trump Org., and several company executives.

Here are some key takeaways from the day in court:

Eric Trump confronted with emails showing his work on Trump’s finances: Assistant Attorney General Andrew Amer’s examination grew tense as he pressed Eric Trump about his understanding of his father’s financial statements that were used to support real estate transactions and confronted him with a series of emails dating back to 2010.

Eric Trump acknowledged he provided information to former Trump Organization controller Jeff McConney, who is also a co-defendant in the trial. But he tried to distinguish between specific statements of financial condition — his father’s personal financial statements at the heart of the civil case — and general financial records for the company.

The distinction is relevant because Donald Trump’s statements of finances are the documents that the attorney general pointed to as evidence that he inflated the values of his properties to boost his net worth — and obtain favorable loan terms.

An expert witness for the attorney general testified Wednesday the Trump Organization saved $168 million thanks to the loan rates obtained with the help of fraudulent information.

Donald Trump Jr. said he relied on accountants: Donald Trump Jr. repeatedly said he relied on his accountants and was not involved with the preparations of financial statements for his father, even though he signed them as a trustee of his father’s revocable trust.

He testified that he didn’t draft the financial statements, and when he certified them as a trustee, he relied on the Trump Organization accounting and legal teams that he said assured him they were accurate to sign.

The attorney general’s office and Trump’s lawyers got into a lengthy back-and-forth over attorney-client privilege after Faherty asked what steps the Trump Organization had taken once the attorney general’s investigation into the company began in 2019.

Some internal policies and methodologies “have been bolstered” since the investigation began, Trump Jr. said. One of those changes, he said, was hiring a chief financial officer who is a certified public accountant.

Read more about the Trumps’ fraud case here.

Justice Arthur Engoron presides over the former President Donald Trump's civil fraud trial at New York State Supreme Court on November 2, in New York City. 

Judge Arthur Engoron admonished Donald Trump’s lawyer Chris Kise at the end of the day Thursday after Kise made an offhand comment about the conduct of Engoron’s clerk.  

The trial devolved into tense arguments over defense objections to assistant attorney general Andrew Amer’s attack on Eric Trump’s credibility, when he reminded the court that Eric Trump invoked his Fifth Amendment rights in an investigatory interview years ago in this case. 

Trump’s legal team accused Amer of seeking headlines by bringing up the interview that was years ago. They reminded the court that Eric Trump did not invoke his Fifth Amendment during his deposition taken in March. 

After the objection, Kise made a comment that angered the judge but was inaudible in much of the courtroom. Engoron warned Kise about making comments about his clerk, reminding him that had already put a gag order barring public comment about his staff and suggesting that further commentary would prompt him to extend it to the lawyers as well. 

Engoron said there could be “a bit of misogyny” in the continued criticism of his female law clerk. 

Kise responded that the objections he was making were relevant to the case, and he was allowed to raise concerns about the process of the trial.

Kise said it appeared there was sometimes “co-judging” taking place, noting that someone was handing him information on a frequent basis. “Yesterday we counted 30, 40 times,” he said. 

Another Trump attorney, Alina Habba, then stood to defend Kise, saying he was not misogynistic. “I have the same frankly issues with the person sitting on the bench,” she said. “It’s distracting, and it is insulting.”  

Engoron said he has a right to seek counsel from his clerk and Trump’s legal team has no right to know what they are. 

“She’s a civil servant, she’s doing what I ask her to do.” Those notes are “confidential communications from my law clerk,” Engoron said, now pounding on the bench. 

Eric Trump, still on the witness stand during the exchange, appeared visibly uncomfortable, looking away as Kise and Engoron argued. 

Assistant Attorney General Andrew Amer reviewed a series of interactions Eric Trump had with Trump Organization lawyers and an appraiser from Cushman & Wakefield, who was contracted for appraisals of a potential conservation easement at Trump’s Seven Springs property and at the Briarcliff Manor development at Trump’s Westchester County golf course in New York.  

The exchange was another attempt by the attorney general’s office to undercut claims from the former president’s son that he was not involved with his father’s personal financial statements. 

Amer cited a Seven Springs valuation calculated in Trump Organization controller Jeff McConney’s supporting spreadsheet for Donald Trump’s 2014 financial statement. McConney, a co-defendant, noted a conversation with Eric Trump after he would have received the appraiser’s value of the property at no more than $50 million.

“I already told you I did not provide values. I see nothing wrong with the values. But I did not provide them. I testified pretty extensively to that,” Eric Trump said on the stand. 

Amer asked him if he ever shared the appraiser’s valuation with McConney that year. “No I did not, I would have never thought to because I didn’t work on this document,” he responded.  

Email records shown in court Thursday suggested Eric Trump was aware of the $45 million value Cushman & Wakefield appraiser David McArdle offered for the Briaricliff Manor development in 2015, which turned out to be $58 million less than what was reported on his father’s financial statements from 2013 to 2018, according to the attorney general’s complaint. 

Amer pushed Eric Trump to acknowledge he testified incorrectly in his deposition when he said he wasn’t involved in the appraisal process for Briarcliff Manor, pointing to emails and phone calls about it. 

After a lengthy exchange, Eric Trump said he stood by his testimony that he had limited involvement. 

“I was clearly involved, but to a very small point – and I think I was very clear I had very limited memory of Mr. McArdle,” he added. “I see your emails, absolutely. I made a couple calls.” 

Eric Trump will return Friday to continue testifying in the civil fraud trial against him, his family and their company as court has concluded for the day. 

Former President Donald Trump’s son was pressed by Assistant Attorney General Andrew Amer about his involvement with the financial documents at the heart of the case.

Eric Trump’s brother, Donald Trump Jr., wrapped up his testimony Thursday morning. He testified for approximately 3 hours over two days.

The two adult sons of former President Donald Trump are executive vice presidents at the Trump Organization and are co-defendants in the trial.

Former President Donald Trump is not happy, to say the least, that his sons Don Jr. and Eric have had to take the stand today in the fraud trial.

“So sad to see my sons being PERSECUTED in a political Witch Hunt by this out of control, publicity seeking, New York State Judge, on a case that should have NEVER been brought,” Trump said on his social media platform Truth Social.

Trump also escalated his ongoing criticism of state Attorney General Letitia James in crude terms.

The former president is expected to testify on Monday.

Eric Trump has tried to to distinguish between the specific statements of financial condition — the personal financial statements at the heart of the civil case against Donald Trump, his sons, and his company – and general financial records for the company.

Discussing an August 2013 email Eric Trump exchanged with former Trump Organization controller Jeff McConney about project information he needed for Donald Trump’s annual financial statement, the former president’s son maintained there’s a distinction.

“I clearly understand that I sent notes to Jeff McConney, I worked with him almost every day,” Eric Trump said.

He added: “I don’t think it ever registered that it was for a personal statement of financial condition. It was a detail that was irrelevant to me.”

Assistant Attorney General Andrew Amer played clips from Eric Trump’s recorded deposition in which he repeatedly made assertions that he didn’t know anything about his father’s financial statements and did not recall ever providing asset information to accounting personnel for the annual statements of financial condition. 

The assistant attorney general then asked Eric Trump to concede now at trial that he knew, at the time of the documented exchanges with McConney, a co-defendant, that the information he provided about assets like Seven Springs and the Doral Golf Resort were for his father’s financial statements.

Earlier in the trial, McConney testified that Eric Trump directed him to make certain decisions that led to the inflated valuations of several Trump properties.

Thursday, Eric Trump said “it just didn’t register” that the information was for his father’s personal statements of financial condition. 

Former President Donald Trump's son and co-defendant, Eric Trump, testifies on November 2.

Assistant Attorney General Andrew Amer’s examination of Eric Trump grew tense just before the lunch break as the son of the former president grew visibly agitated when pressed about his understanding of his father’s financial statements that were used to support real estate transactions. 

Amer used a series of emails dating as far back as 2010 and phone conversations to argue that Eric Trump was familiar with the statements, contradicting his testimony. 

For instance, there was a series of February 2012 emails regarding the purchase of a golf club in Charlotte, North Carolina, which referenced a club board member reviewing personal financial statements at the Trump Organization’s New York office to ensure the club board of the company’s ability to run the club. In the email, Eric Trump expressed his concern over the confidentiality of the financial information to the board member. 

Amer pushed Eric Trump to acknowledge that, based on the written exchange, he must have known by 2012 that his father had personal financial statements used to support real estate transactions. Eric Trump asserted that the records shown in court don’t prove that the board member reviewed the statements of financial condition at issue in the civil case. 

“I understand we had financials as a company,” Eric Trump said. “I was not personally aware of the statement of financial condition. I did not work on the of financial condition. I’ve been very, very clear on that.” 

Amer then pointed back to Jeff McConney’s supporting data spreadsheet valuing Seven Springs, suggesting Eric Trump must have known about his father’s financial statements by the time that spreadsheet was created later that year. (McConney is a co-defendant.)

Amer also showed the court an email dated August 20, 2013, that former controller Jeff McConney sent Eric Trump expressly asking for help to value Seven Springs on his father’s annual financial statement. McConney also attached the supporting data spreadsheet for the previous year’s statement detailing the Seven Springs valuation including the note about a conversation with Eric in 2012. 

Still, Eric Trump sought to distance himself from the statement, suggesting his input to McConney was related to plans for land development and not the values ascribed to the property on the spreadsheet. 

CNN reporter explains the moment:

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Former President Donald Trump's son and co-defendant, Eric Trump, attends the Trump Organization civil fraud trial, in New York State Supreme Court.

Assistant attorney general Andrew Amer quickly got to the heart of the civil fraud case once Donald Trump’s son Eric Trump took the stand, asking him about his knowledge of his father’s financial statements

Former Trump Org. Controller Jeffrey McConney, a co-defendant, notated two phone calls with Eric Trump in support of the valuation for the Seven Springs property in Westchester County, New York, which McConney included in his data for the 2013 financial statement.

Eric Trump said he didn’t’ remember the calls, but also said he doesn’t have a reason to doubt they happened if McConney wrote it in the spreadsheet. He added that he didn’t work on his father’s statement of financial condition.

“People ask me questions all the time but I never worked on the statement of financial condition,” Eric Trump said.

“I never worked on it at the time, and I didn’t know anything about it really until this case came into fruition,” he added.

Eric Trump confirmed he ran the daily operations of the Trump Organization with his brother Donald Jr. and chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg when his father became president in 2017.

Donald Trump Jr. steps out for a break at former President Donald Trump's civil fraud trial on November 2, in New York City.

Donald Trump Jr. stopped to speak to reporters as he departed the courthouse after wrapping his testimony in the New York civil fraud trial.

“I think it went really well, if we were actually dealing with logic and reason the way business is conducted,” he said, adding that “unfortunately the AG has brought forth a case that is purely a political persecution.”

He claimed that his family has been unfairly targeted and the trial is a scary precedent for New York.

His testimony ended Thursday after approximately 3 hours over two days.

Trump Jr. repeatedly said in his testimony that he relied on his accountants and was not involved with the preparations of financial statements for his father, even though he signed them as a trustee of the former president’s trust.

Trump’s adult sons are accused in the lawsuit of knowingly participating in a scheme to inflate their father’s net worth to obtain financial benefits like better loan and insurance policy terms.

Eric Trump arrives at New York Supreme Court, on Thursday, November 2.

Donald Trump’s son Eric Trump is now on the stand in the former president’s civil fraud trial.

Eric Trump is testifying after his brother, Donald Trump Jr., wrapped up his testimony. Both brothers are executive vice presidents at the Trump Organization and co-defendants in the trial.

Assistant Attorney General Colleen Faherty introduced the Trump Organization’s 2023 sale agreement with Bally’s Corporation for the company’s city licensing agreement of Donald Trump’s golf course in the Bronx, New York.

Faherty said the property, Trump Golf Links at Ferry Point Park, can be considered for disgorgement because the Trump Org. submitted annual financial attestations about Trump’s net worth to maintain the license based on the fraudulent financial statements.

Disgorgement is the repayment of ill-gotten gains based on the wrongdoing at issue in a civil case, which the court can order defendants to pay as a penalty.

Engoron overruled objections from Trump’s attorneys, arguing that the deal is irrelevant to the case.

Faherty asked Trump. Jr how much was made on the sale.

“I didn’t make anything,” Trump Jr. responded, laughing when Faherty asked how much he made.

Trump Jr. clarified the sale was for $60 million, but he doesn’t know what the company profited after expenses.

Trump Jr. was also asked about his signature on an agreement with Cushman & Wakefield, a firm hired to conduct an appraisal for the Trump Organization as it was considering a conservation easement on a portion of the Briarcliff Golf Course in Westchester, New York.

Earlier in the trial, an executive with Cushman & Wakefield testified at length about his conversations with Eric Trump about the value the firm placed on the property, which was much lower than the value the Trump Organization assigned to the property in its financial statements.

Trump Jr. said he signed the document because of his role as a senior executive, but he deferred to Eric Trump, who is expected to take the stand next.

“It was his project. He worked on it. He would know the details,” Trump Jr testified.

Donald Trump Jr. sits in court during his civil fraud trial at New York State Supreme Court on November 2, in New York City. 

During Thursday’s questioning, Donald Trump Jr. repeatedly said that he relied on his accountants and was not involved with the preparations of financial statements for his father, even though he signed them as a trustee of the former president’s trust.

As a trustee of the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust starting in 2017, Trump Jr. signed certifications for annual financial submittals required for Trump Organization loans at Deutsche Bank for the Old Post Office, Trump International Hotel and Tower in Chicago and Doral Golf Resort & Spa in Florida.

Assistant Attorney General Colleen Faherty pressed Trump Jr. on whether he intended for the bank to use the information he had signed was accurate.

Faherty asked Trump Jr. several questions about the 2017 statement of financial condition and the supporting data spreadsheets accompanying those financial statements. After Trump Jr. said he had no knowledge of the preparation of those documents, she condensed her questioning about the financial statements 2018 through 2020.

“I think we can save ourselves a lot of time,” Trump Jr. said, confirming his answers would be the same for every year. He didn’t prepare the financial statements, and when he certified them as a trustee, he relied on the Trump Organization accounting and legal teams that he said would have assured him they were accurate to sign.

“Rinse and repeat,” he said.

Former President Donald Trump's son and co-defendant, Donald Trump Jr. attends the Trump Organization civil fraud trial, in New York State Supreme Court in the Manhattan borough of New York City, on November 2.

Assistant Attorney General Colleen Faherty began questioning Donald Trump Jr. on his second day of testimony by asking about an email from a Forbes Magazine reporting with questions about Donald Trump’s Trump Tower penthouse apartment, along with a number of other topics.

The questions about Trump’s penthouse included whether it truly was the size Trump had claimed in the past, of 33,000 square feet.

“Insane amount of stuff there,” Donald Trump Jr. wrote in an email to Trump Org. executives, including legal counsel Alan Garten and chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, in response to the questions.

Faherty asked Trump Jr. what fact-checking he did on the inquiry, and he responded he did not know that he did anything.

“I don’t know that I would have spent hundreds of questions worth of time answering Forbes Magazine,” Trump Jr. said.

Faherty also showed Trump Jr. his father’s 2016 statement of financial condition and the supporting data spreadsheet for that statement.

When asked, Trump Jr. said he did not prepare the statement but may have seen it during preparation for this case, and that he knew nothing about the supporting spreadsheet.

The attorney general’s lawsuit has alleged that Trump, his sons and the Trump Organization inflated the value of numerous properties, including Trump’s triplex apartment at Trump Tower. Trump’s financial statement reflected the true size —just under 11,000 square feet — in all the years after the 2017 Forbes article.

Donald Trump’s lawyers in Florida and Washington, DC, are using the former president’s overlapping criminal and civil legal issues to argue for more delays.

Trump attorney Chris Kise was active during the fraud trial in New York on Wednesday, objecting and arguing over the testimony given by the expert witness on the stand and also to one line of questioning directed at Donald Trump, Jr. (the judge essentially agreed with him).  

Kise also called into a hearing on the federal document mishandling charges against Trump in Florida, where Trump’s team is pushing to delay the trial currently scheduled for May until after the 2024 presidential election.

Kise said the overlapping trials makes it “extraordinarily challenging” for him and Trump.

Special counsel Jack Smith’s office argues that Trump is trying to use the overlapping cases to his advantage by saying they are both burdened but also trying to delay the trials.

Trump’s attorneys filed several motions late Wednesday to delay the federal election subversion trial in Washington, DC, as well.

In this sketch from court, Donald Trump Jr. testifies on the stand in court in New York on November 1.

Donald Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., testified on Wednesday that he was not involved in the preparation of his father’s financial statements at any point in time – including after his father became president in 2017 and he was appointed trustee on Donald Trump’s revocable trust.

Trump Jr. testified for 90 minutes in the civil fraud trial against the family and their business. He will continue on the stand on Thursday, followed by his brother, Eric Trump.

During his testimony Wednesday, Assistant Attorney General Colleen Faherty showed Trump Jr. the 2017 statement of financial condition, which Judge Arthur Engoron has already ruled is fraudulent. The former president’s son said again that he didn’t help prepare the statement that year.

“I did not. The accountants worked on it, that’s what we pay them for,” he said.

Trump Jr. also discussed his roles and responsibilities in the Trump Organization since 2001 and as a trustee to the former president’s revocable trust.

While the former president has repeatedly attacked the judge on social media, his son on Wednesday often took a jovial tone with the judge, even joking with him at one point about the pace of his answers.

“I’m sorry your honor, I moved to Florida but I’ve kept a New York pace,” Don Jr. said, smiling at the judge.

Trump Jr. is named as a defendant in the $250 million lawsuit brought by the New York attorney general’s office against the former president, his company and several executives, including three of his adult children.

The lawsuit accuses Trump Jr. and his brother Eric of knowingly participating in a scheme to inflate their father’s net worth to obtain financial benefits like better loan and insurance policy terms.

“As Executive Vice Presidents, the three children were intimately involved in the operation of the Trump Organization’s business,” the complaint states.

Faherty on Wednesday narrowed in on the licensing developments on Trump’s financial statement that year, asking Trump Jr. if he gave the accountants the $246 million valuation attached to the licensing deals.

Keep reading about his testimony.

Ivanka Trump arrives for the funeral of Ivana Trump, on Wednesday, July 20, 2022, in New York.  

Former President Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump is appealing a judge’s ruling ordering her to testify in the civil trial.

An attorney for Ivanka Trump, Bennet Moskowitz, filed the notice of appeal on Wednesday in a New York appellate court after Judge Arthur Engoron ordered her to testify last week.

Ivanka Trump’s attorney had been seeking to quash the subpoena for her testimony because she’s no longer a defendant in the case. But Engoron last week ruled she must testify, though he gave her time to file an appeal.

Among the issues Moskowitz asked the appellate court to consider was whether the New York civil court had jurisdiction over Ivanka Trump since she has not lived or worked in New York since 2017.

Ivanka Trump’s testimony is tentatively slated for next Wednesday, November 8. It’s not clear whether the appeal will affect that timing.

Ivanka Trump had initially been listed as a co-defendant – along with Donald Trump, Eric Trump, Donald Trump Jr., and several Trump Organization executives – in the $250 million lawsuit filed last September by New York Attorney General Letitia James, alleging they were involved in an expansive fraud scheme lasting over a decade that the former president and his eldest children used to enrich themselves.

In June, however, a New York appeals court dismissed Ivanka Trump as a co-defendant, finding the claims against her were too old, because she was not part of an August 2021 agreement between James’ office and the Trump Organization to toll the statute of limitations.

Former President Donald Trump attends the Trump Organization civil fraud trial, in New York State Supreme Court in the Manhattan borough of New York City, on October 24.

The New York civil fraud trial against former President Donald Trump, his eldest sons, their companies and Trump Organization executives is expected to continue Thursday with testimony from Donald Trump Jr.

The civil trial over inflated assets in fraudulent financial statements started earlier this month just after a shocking ruling by Judge Arthur Engoron that found Trump and his co-defendants are liable for “persistent and repeated” fraud at the end of September.

Trump inflated his net worth by as much as $3.6 billion in three separate years between 2011 and 2021, according to the attorney general’s office. Attorneys for Trump have refuted the claims, arguing that asset valuations are highly subjective and that they are still sorting through what the ruling means for the company’s future.

What’s at stake at trial: Trump and his companies could be forced to pay hefty sums in damages for the profits they’ve allegedly garnered through their fraudulent business practices. 

Engoron will consider just how much the Trumps and their businesses will have to pay. 

Since Engoron has already ruled on one of the claims — persistent and repeated fraud —he will now decide on the six other claims:

Engoron set aside more than three months for the trial, which could continue through late December.