Donald Trump took the stand in a Manhattan courthouse on Monday and angrily claimed the financial statements at the heart of his $250m civil fraud lawsuit were “worthless” and the trial was a political “witch-hunt”.
In a day of sometimes heated, sometimes meandering testimony, Trump maintained he had done nothing wrong and accused his prosecutors of playing politics. “We sit here all day – it’s election interference because you want to keep me in the courthouse!” said Trump.
The lawsuit was brought by the New York attorney general, Letitia James, who is accusing the former president and several top Trump Organization executives – including his eldest sons – of fraudulently inflating the value of the former president’s properties to secure better loans from banks.
“The number of grossly inflated asset values is staggering, affecting most if not all of the real estate holdings in any given year,” the lawsuit, which James filed last September, states.
Outside the court, James said she expected Trump to “engage in name-calling and taunts and race-baiting, and call this a witch-hunt.
“But at the end of the day, the only thing that matters are the facts and the numbers – and numbers, my friends, don’t lie,” said James.
Trump was on the attack even before he reached the court. “Got a really Biased, Nasty, Club controlled, but often overturned, Judge, a Racist, Evil, and Corrupt Attorney General, BUT A CASE THAT, ACCORDING TO ALMOST ALL LEGAL SCHOLARS, HAS ZERO MERIT,” he wrote on his Truth Social site. “A dark day for our Country. WITCH HUNT!”
On the stand, Trump sparred with the judge, who threatened to have the former president removed from the court. He was quizzed about assets including Mar-a-Lago, his Trump Tower apartment and his golf course in Aberdeen – all of which have been overvalued in financial statements, according to the New York court.
Prosecutors asked why the value of Trump’s Aberdeen property increased by $245m between 2013 and 2014 when Trump appeared to have done little to the property. “Aberdeen is a very rich place. It’s an incredible piece of land, and it may be the greatest golf course ever built,” said Trump.
He downplayed the importance of the financial statements the judge has already ruled were fraudulent. Shown a financial statement from 2011, Trump pointed out a disclaimer. “We would call it a worthless statement clause,” he said. “They were not really documents that the banks paid much attention to.
“They just weren’t a very important element in a bank’s decision making process, and we’ll explain this as this very crazy trial goes along,” said Trump. “I can look at buildings and tell you what they’re worth,” Trump told the court.
The judge overseeing the trial, Arthur Engoron, ruled in September that Trump committed fraud for years as he expanded his real estate empire. Engoron is holding the trial to decide on what fine should be imposed. The judge specifically threw out Trump’s “worthless clause” argument when he ruled in September: “The defendants’ reliance on these ‘worthless’ disclaimers is worthless,” wrote Engoron.
Trump grew testy at times on the stand. “Your case was that I had no money,” Trump said. “You sued me on the basis that Trump had no money and he wrote up phoney things and he defrauded banks …
“And even though these banks were paid back in full, there was no harm, no anything, everybody got their money in full, there was no victim,” Trump said. “The banks don’t even know what they’re doing in this case.”
“Can you control your client?” Engoron asked Trump’s lawyer. “This is not a political rally. This is a courtroom.
“I’ve asked several times. I’ve asked the witness several times to answer the question,” the judge also said. “I don’t want editorializing. We’ll be here forever and accomplish nothing.”
Engoron threatened to remove Trump from the stand if he continued to fail to answer the questions he was being asked. “I will excuse him and draw every negative inference that I can,” said Engoron.
Engoron has already fined Trump $15,000 for publicly attacking his clerk on social media. Trump has also launched attacks against Engoron himself, calling the judge a “fraudster” and a “Trump hating, radical left, Democrat operative judge”.
In court, Trump said: “The fraud is on behalf of the court!”
“He says that I’m a fraud… he’s the one that didn’t value property correctly,” referring to Engoron. “How do you do that? How do you rule against somebody and call them a fraud, as the president of the United States who did a great job… It’s a terrible thing you’ve done.”
With the court closed on Tuesday for election day, Trump’s hearing could very well go into Wednesday, when his daughter Ivanka Trump is scheduled to testify.
The former president’s testimony follows the testimonies from his two adult sons, Eric and Donald Jr, who repeatedly claimed last week that they do not recall or have knowledge surrounding the statements of the financial conditions at the heart of this trial.
• This article was amended on 8 November 2023. An earlier version incorrectly said the trial was taking place in a Manhattan “federal” courthouse; it is the state court.
