For months, some of Donald Trump’s top advisers have assured him that he has virtually nothing to fear from the Manhattan District Attorney’s tax investigation, which they consider merely “fishing” for information. But investigators in the DA’s office have been expanding their criminal investigation into Trump’s business empire, asking questions and testifying on the grill — both recently and in recent days — not just about Trump, but especially about his eldest son, Don Jr. and Allen Weisselberg. , The Daily Beast, one of the former president’s most trusted officers, has learned.
This latest round of interest in Trump Jr.’s activities. and Weisselberg, as well as other developments, underscore the resources and gravity that New York prosecutors devote to the investigation, just as Trump continues to publicly denounce the investigation as one more example of Democrats. grabbing it.
For years, Weisselberg has faithfully served as the Trump Organization’s chief financial officer and has been an apparatus in separate investigations far beyond the team of Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance. (Vance’s specific interest in Weisselberg, however, dates back to 2019.) Weisselberg has been a recurring figure in other federal and Capitol Hill investigations. including for his alleged role in the idea of a plan to hide the reward directed by Trump during the 2016 election to pornographic movie star and alleged lover of Trump, Stormy Daniels. A resulting federal investigation that took place during Trump’s presidency ended up sending former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen to prison, in part for his role in that reward, which constituted a breach of the Trump funding law. campaigns.
During his father’s administration, Trump Jr. he became a MAGA spokesman and activist while simultaneously serving as executive vice president of the Trump Organization, leading the business with his brother, Eric Trump. According to the biography of his company, Trump Jr. participates in “the evaluation of the agreement [and] analysis ”, as well as the leasing operation, among other functions. Trump Jr. he has also overseen the organization’s international relations, the growth of which has been somewhat hampered by his father’s rise to the presidency.
However, in that four-year term, then-President Trump continued to get millions of foreign business entanglements, with revenue from licensing agreements and buildings from various nations around the world. And seconds ForbesTrump’s two sons also “unloaded $ 118 million in real estate from the president since his inauguration in January 2017, and set deals everywhere from New York City and Los Angeles to Charleston , South Carolina and the Dominican Republic “.
The prominent role of Trump Jr. in the Trump Organization it has also attracted the interest of another jurisdiction. Earlier last year, the Attorney General in Washington, DC, sued the Trump inaugural committee, as well as the Trump Organization, accusing them of misusing more than $ 1 million in fundraising when the committee “overpaid[ed]”When booking a portion of the Trump International Hotel in DC during the opening parties of 2017. Last month, the DC attorney general’s spokesman said the office had alerted Trump Jr. who was trying to interview him as part of the ongoing investigation.
“He has asked her several times [in recent weeks], and I told him, as I think he already believes, that this is a great political greatness.”
And in their independent investigation into Trump and his company, Manhattan prosecutors have also expanded the range of investigation into the Trump family’s assets and recruited some additional manpower. Thursday, The New York Times reported that the Manhattan District Attorney’s office had called on Mark Pomerantz, a well-known former federal prosecutor, to assist in the investigation of Trump and his real estate company. In accordance with The Wall Street Journal, prosecutors are taking a look at the loans Trump had taken out on several buildings, including the former president’s marquee title and the brand of the former reality star, Trump Tower in Manhattan.
A Vance spokesman declined to comment on the story. Jason Miller, a senior adviser to former President Trump, also declined. A representative of the Trump Organization did not send any requests for comment. Weisselberg did not respond to a request for comment for press time.
Trump, meanwhile, wants to continue to project an air of legal invincibility, having come to the other extreme as (in his mind) winner of the Mueller investigation, two lawsuits in the Senate and several investigations and indictments. serious misconduct or misconduct. In recent days, while casually overseeing news of New York’s criminal investigation, the former president had been predictably mocked. One of the reasons Trump has said he feels the investigation is “more shit” is because he “trusts” people like his former legal pit bull Cohen, according to a person with direct knowledge of the issue.
Cohen, in fact, has been interviewed several times by investigators, but the magnitude of the investigations in New York goes far beyond the word of Trump’s exfix and personal lawyer. In November, Vance sent a subpoena to the Trump Organization to obtain records related to consulting fees, including some possibly paid to Ivanka Trump, who at the time last year served as a senior White House official.
Meanwhile, some of former President Trump’s closest advisers have also reassured him for weeks that he has nothing to worry about and that New York investigators will find nothing to overthrow him, according to two people who have talked to the former president recently. “She has been asked several times [in recent weeks], and I told him, as I think he already believes, that this is a great political greatness, “said one of these people.
Still, the reality that much of Trump’s immediate post-presidency is likely to be consumed by various investigations and litigation is something that weighs on the mind of the 45th U.S. president. Stopping benefiting from the important legal privileges of being incumbent president, Trump has privately worried that his enemies are investigating or “suing me for the rest of my life,” according to an individual who spoke with Trump on the last few weeks.
Investigators at Vance’s office have generally remained narrow about the scope of the criminal investigation. But for nearly half the time of Trump’s presidency, the office has been studying possible tax and insurance fraud, possible forgery of business documents, and money laundering. According to reports, one of the focuses of the district attorney’s investigation is whether or not Trump’s company intentionally counterfeited the value of its properties to block loans and tax breaks. In recent years, Trump, his administration and his lawyers have been locked in legal clashes with Vance’s team and Democratic lawmakers over whether tax returns could be provided to the then president to investigators.
Ironically, years ago, Vance had been accused of taking a criminal investigation against Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump for allegedly deceiving potential buyers of her Trump SoHo condos.
But this week, Trump’s crew suffered a major blow when it was announced that the U.S. Supreme Court had paved the way for the Manhattan DA to see Trump’s hidden tax returns and other financial records for a wide range of fraud investigation. In response to the order, Vance issued only a three-word statement: “Work continues.”
Conservatives currently enjoy a sizeable majority in the Supreme Court, a majority that Trump created and in which the former Republican president continues to breathe anger for not protecting his interests to his satisfaction. Three days before the court order, Trump’s attorney, Jay Sekulow, told The Daily Beast that the former president’s lawyers “plan to file our petition for a certificate in March” to challenge the lower court’s decision. in their intention to keep these tax returns out. from the hands of the Manhattan DA, and that the “petition will raise important issues.” Following Monday’s Supreme Court order, lawyers and Trump’s team did not answer questions about whether his strategy had changed.
On Monday, Trump issued a statement complaining, “The Supreme Court should never have let this ‘fishing expedition’ pass, but it did,” and unfoundedly accused his enemies of engaging in “fascism” against him. In the written statement, he once again regurgitated the lie that he “won” the 2020 presidential election in which he was decisively defeated by Democratic candidate Joe Biden. That lie led to an undemocratic crusade of months by Trump and Republicans to overturn the election result, a multidisciplinary effort that culminated in the deadly January 6 MAGA riot at the U.S. Capitol.
New developments at the New York spacecraft come when Cohen sat down with Vance researchers Thursday for the fifth time. Vance personally participated with the interview, showing how investigators critically consider Cohen’s role in helping them file charges against the former president.
“The Supreme Court has proclaimed that no one is above the law,” Cohen told The Daily Beast. “Trump, for the first time, will have to take responsibility for his own dirty deeds.”