Former President Donald Trump and his sons, Eric and Donald Trump Jr., erupted on social media in response to a New York Judge's ruling Tuesday that the elder Trump committed fraud for years as he built his real estate empire, dubbing the ruling "politically motivated" and attacking the judge and the state's attorney general across a number of posts.
In the Tuesday afternoon decision, Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron found that Trump and his company deceived insurers, bankers and other entities by heavily exaggerating his assets and his net worth in paperwork used when making business deals and securing financing. He also found that Trump, his company and its executives had repeatedly lied about his wealth on his annual financial statements in order to take advantage of favorable loan terms and lower insurance premiums. The judge ruled that those actions violated the law and, thus, canceled the certificates of 10 of Donald Trump's key New York businesses, including the Trump Organization, as well as any other New York entities "controlled or beneficially owned by Donald J. Trump, Donald Trump, Jr., Eric Trump, Allen Weisselberg, and Jeffrey McConney." Engoron ordered the parties to identify three independent receivers within a 10-day period to manage the entities' dissolution.
