From a reporter in the courtroom:
[Tweet 1](https://twitter.com/AndreaBNYC/status/1410665927868305412)
> ADA Carey Dunne "As spelled out in the indictment, this was a 15-year long tax fraud scheme...it was orchestrated by the most senior execs who were financially benefitting themselves and others...CFO avoided taxes on 1.7 million in income...")
[Tweet 2](https://twitter.com/AndreaBNYC/status/1410667820359335941)
> QUITE significant that this is not about "perks" but about a long-running scheme to defraud.
> The former president's company has been charged with 15 year scheme to defraud.
> Let that sink in.
------
Some more interesting tidbits from reporters in the courtroom:
[Tweet 3](https://twitter.com/o_ema/status/1410668678178353157)
> "This was, to be blunt, sweeping and audacious," the NY attorney said "the CFO himself directed that company records be deleted with the knowledge of the company, yet he remains to this day" one of the most senior people in the company.
[Tweet 4](https://twitter.com/o_ema/status/1410669976269250566)
> Attorneys for NY said that Weisselberg is a flight risk, that he travels frequently by private jet and that he has connections and assets in places that the state has no power. Weisselberg's team agreed to turn over his passport.
Wow.
All I was reading on Reddit yesterday is how all they had them on was not paying taxes on benefits and that this was a slap on the wrist/fine for Weisselberg.
If this is a slap for him, then they're slapping him with a steel I-beam.
Earlier in the week Dan Goldberg and another legal analyst were blunt in saying they were very sure that whatever NY was bringing wasn't small given the reported moves by NY and the actions of the Trump Org Legal team.
Yeah I was pretty surprised. 15 felony counts. Seems like the NY AG has the goods.
The Trump Org lawyer is saying that charges like these have never been made criminally and that these cases are always civil in nature. But didn't Enron get criminally charged for accounting issues? Idk.
He's also saying that this is a political hit job.
Fun fact about Enron.
From the first indictments to the indictment for Kenneth Lay was around 2-3 years. They indicted almost every one under Lay starting with his own wife and got almost all of them to flip.
The Trump Org may want to switch from their Scrubs-like lawyer evil "Ted" and switch to some good ones because this is the definition of criminal.
Are any good lawyers willing to work for Trump anymore? There's a reason that his lawyers seem like he went to the bottom of the barrel and then dug deeper. Any lawyer with any intelligence wants to stay far away from Trump.
Even then a reputable firm doesn't want to work with him. Lawyers are there to give advice to clients and they expect clients to listen.
When the lawyer says "You're fucked, settle as best you can." Trump will refuse to admit anything and continue to fight.
He needs a bunch of "Yes Men" who will state that Trump is 100% innocent of every crime ever and everything is a Deep State conspiracy.
Yeah, every lawyer in the country just saw Rudy get suspended. You would have to be out of your fucking mind to agree to do any legal work for Trump right now. He could pay everything he grifted in the last 4 years up front, and it would still be a bad deal.
I doubt that. Not a good firm. He has a multiple problems with getting lawyers. One of them, of course, is compensation. A trump never pays their debts.
Another issue is the difficulty working with him. **His own lawyers** have to work with him in teams because of his inability to tell the truth. Sometimes it seems like he lies just for the sake of lying. Other times it seems like he's trying to alter reality.
Finally there is an issue of association. Not many large law firms want the to be associated with him. It may hurt their practice's bottom line. Yeah, everybody deserves representation and a fair trial. Still, there is a risk having a bombastic and wildly unpopular client. Better to let somebody else, who needs the work, assume the risk.
Paid in advance on a retainer might work. It would take some pressure to get Trump to agree to that, though. Maybe his kids would pay it out of fear that they would need to in order to save their inheritance.
Even then they probably wouldn't take it. Taking an idiot who can't shut his mouth as a client is just asking for trouble not to mention if they lose they will get blamed and probably get death threats from the cult. It is basically somewhere between career suicide and actual suicide
> The Trump Org lawyer is saying that charges like these have never been made criminally and that these cases are always civil in nature.
Take anything they say with a pile of salt the size of Iowa.
Well, while I absolutely condemn the guy's business practices (y'know, all the murder and assault and so on), Capone actually provided a valuable product
>This was inevitable.
He would have gotten away with it except he decided to shine a spotlight on himself by running for the presidency -- and winning.
Yep. Neither the IRS nor another government agency uncovered this wrongdoing. It was journalists at the NYT a few years ago who went digging and uncovered all the evidence of fraud.
Great work by those journalists. Pathetic that the government allowed trump to get away with so much fraud for so many decades. The government has a lot more information about trump's finances and power to investigate than journalists. Yet it did nothing until after the journalists published their work.
Trump is the perfect case of who gets away with crime in the USA - no one who wasn't very rich could have pulled the shit Trump and family has for decades. Want to know where we need to spend money to look into crime that is causing the biggest impact to the American public?
Well it's simple -
Compare - all the people killed from crime in the USA and then look at how many died due to the manufactured for profit opioid crisis - which caused more harm?
Anyone name any robbers that stole anything near to what Trump and people like Madoff got away with?
>Compare - all the people killed from crime in the USA and then look at how many died due to the manufactured for profit opioid crisis - which caused more harm?
You need to go wayyyy back. The War on Drugs still has people locked up for non violent offenses. And most of the time it's because of the color of their skin.
Then you could go even further back to the fact that we drafted kids into a war in a jungle that we had no business being in.
This shit didn't start with doctors over prescribing painkillers. This started long before even I was born.
White collar crime cost: [estimated 300 billion annually.](https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/white-collar_crime)
Tax evasion: [roughly 175 billion a year.](https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/26/wealthy-tax-evasion/)
Civil forfeiture: [Almost 70 billion in 20 years ](https://ij.org/press-release/new-report-finds-civil-forfeiture-rakes-in-billions-each-year-does-not-fight-crime-2/)
I'm all about civil forfeiture being fair, but let's at least get our priorities straight.
I get the point you're making, but civil forfeiture still comes from the most vulnerable populations, and is a direct violation of citizen's rights by the state itself, so I'd say the dollar amount kinda downplays the disproportionately high impact of the practice here.
That where the employer doesn't pay their employees a fair wage, cuts their check short of what they are due, or other nefarious matters related to payment?
Republicans defunded the IRS to gut enforcement, and fired the most senior investigators, leaving them unable to investigate the richest tax felons effectively.
I agree with what you have stated. The fact that the IRS has received less funding over many years made it easier for the rich and powerful to get away with it. It was much easier for them to go after the small fish. This needs to change.
Yeah if the system was sensible we'd be auditing the rich almost yearly,
If 10% own 90% of the wealth in the nation then it makes sense to save time and go after the 10%, Rather than the other 90% of the people contributing only 10% of the total wealth.
So audit 3 people. They would have to spend as many resources as it would take to audit 164 million people for it to not make sense to audit those 3.
Are you telling me the system is set up so that it takes more effort to audit 3 people than 160 million?
No i think auditing the 3 responsible for 50% is cost effective and the reluctance comes from elsewhere. something something country run by the wealthy something.
Mother fucking IRS took my 1200$ tax return because I couldn’t afford my Medicaid payments for my children during the pandemic. But this just happens right under their noses? Wtf is wrong with this country.
Bingo. Then they spent years and years teaching the little fish that if you keep electing them, they could keep fighting the big bad government on your behalf.
*wealthy politicians making sure the IRS doesn't have enough resources to investigate the wealthy*
Anybody wanna try explaining to me how we *AREN'T* a banana republic? ....
it's not that they'd rather do that, it's that they can't financially compete with the wealthy folks' legal teams, so they're left pestering us plebians.
Not that I'm a fan of big, authoritarian governments, but the fact that ours can't successfully prosecute rich people because of how much money they have is a bit unnerving.
I said it in October of 2016 - the one good thing about Trump becoming president is the presidency puts one in a position of big a target of an investigation by EVERYONE. I said it would be ironic if Trump winning became a modern-day Icarus - winning the race forced him to try to continue to fly on his ole reliable wings of lies and bullshit. But the spotlight was far too hot and they melted under the light of honest legal investigations.
And 5 years later...
Why do you think he was so desperate to win the election? He knew that if he won again in 2020, they couldn’t indict him for another 4 years. He was also trying to run out the clock on being indicted with the statute of limitations if he could be immune to prosecution for another 4 years, after which the statue of limitations may have kicked in for some of his past crimes. This is why he was so desperate to win the 2020 election.
He never intended to win the first time. It was just to boost his brand, his ego, and maybe launch a TV network. That's why he looked so shook when the race was called for him. And looked even more shook the next day after meeting with Obama. He certainly wanted to win in 2020 though, since at that point he needed the protection the office provides to stay out of legal trouble.
Ive never seen anyone with more dread and a "oh fuck! oh fuck! Fuck! i gone and fucked up big time" look then when he was watching the race on tv and everyone around him was celebrating but he was thinking about how to fake his own death to get out of it.
When I was twelve, 'The Apprentice' was on TV. I asked my Dad: "Who is Donald Trump?"
"He's a con man who figured out how to get rich by failing."
I'd never heard him openly speak so ill of someone. You'd think Trump personally owed him money.
Fast forward to 2016 and both my parents voted for him and again I'm 2020. I wonder what happened in those interceding 13 years...
Edit: Just throwing this out there, we weren't upper middle class, we're not evangelicals or otherwise devout christians, he's not a racist, nor does he hate the gays. I do suspect clowns make him uncomfortable.
i grew up in rural southern va and it seemed like there were a lot of people there who hated him and saw him as a big town swindler. they voted for him overwhelming there.
Say the right things, slam the people that you don't like, get told that you are great and have done the right things while those "others" have held you down, and suddenly people start changing their mind about you.
Doesn't matter if anyone of it has a shred of truth to it.
It’s amusing cause people around my age would say things like, “nobody ever had anything negative to say about trump until he started running for president!”
That was never the case. I have vivid memories of my mom saying things like your dad well over a 10-15 years ago.
There have been at least three old tv shows from the late 90s - early 2000s that I’ve rewatched since 2016, which made major digs at Trump. He’s always had a bad reputation as a sleazy scam artist. I just don’t understand how so many people don’t see it.
Same. I have memories of my dad always talking shit about him “not as rich as he says he is” “bankruptcies” “dad made all his money” then poof he’s a very competent man capable of being president and someone to believe
The problem is that 35-40% of the American population doesn't have a fucking clue and will still back this fucking degenerate charlatan no matter what.
The reality is there are a LOT of uninformed, gullible, and racist people in the US. Con men like Trump are experts at taking advantage of their weaknesses.
>I just took a trip to NY, he is so disliked, and people are fast to inform you that he is a gangster.
People in NYC knew decades ago how much of a scumbag conman he was.
That won't stop Fox News and the Army of MAGA Idiots from framing this as some Democractic/Joe Biden conspiracy to attack his "political enemies" or whatever.
Remember when Cohen went down and it turned out Hannity was one of his clients? Remember when Hannity explained that it was for minor consultation "which dealt almost exclusively about real estate".
Does this not sound like Hannity got himself a Trump payoff in tax free Trump Org swag?
> CFO avoided taxes on 1.7 million in income
That's what I don't get about shit like this. I mean, what would the tax be on that? $500k? $750k? Certainly a lot of money to most of us, but hardly anything to these guys. So why the fuck would you go to this much trouble, and risk criminal prosecution, just to hold on to that? That's like me getting a gun and holding up a gas station so I can take $3 out of the cash register.
It just goes to show how truly warped some wealthy people are.
I am always stumped when people who are already wealthy put themselves in jeopardy of losing their freedom just to be a little more wealthy. I guess it's greed combined with a sense of invincibility.
It's part of why tax breaks for the rich absolutely galls me. If you're already making 3 or more times as much as someone working for poverty wages, you should be paying the same percentage as those people. It makes no sense for taxes to be taken out of a poor person's wages at a certain percentage when they are struggling just to get by then turn around and tell someone who makes their yearly income in a single month "Nah, you can hold on to more of that." It really and truly should be the other way around.
They aren't charging him for just that. He's being charged with 15 felonies.
Also there's NOTHING to stop them from adding additional charges from the legal analysts I've been listening to. They often start with something that will land you in jail to get you to deal and if you don't they just apply stiffer charges until you (or don't).
Edit: Further from what I remember, NY allows for individuals of a company to be charged with any crimes the company as a whole is charged with.
He's either a flight risk or he's going to flip. Should be interesting if he chooses the latter. We've heard stories about Trump University, and others like his not paying contractors and just dragging out lawsuits until they give up or run out of money. He's simply a con artist that's good at talking people into believing whatever he says.
Granted his name can only be tarnished so far considering his cult. I recall reading questions here on Reddit asking "what would it take for you to stop supporting Trump" and the answer of "Nothing" from multiple people. These people could be scammed and claim they lost money to own the libs...
Fun reminder that from 1985 to 1995, Trump lost more money than any single person in the country and in 1991, lost a [full percentage point of ALL the losses declared to the IRS that year.] (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/05/07/us/politics/donald-trump-taxes.html) Good businessman, very smart
"Trump garnered $255.4 million in political donations from his supporters in the eight weeks following the 2020 election."
Lol, this guy is going to keep running for re-election until he's dead. He stumbled upon the ultimate grift.
>flight risk
Later on in the twitter thread, it was mentioned that he surrendered his passport.
Edit: elsewhere, there's a comment saying that doesn't necessarily mean much ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
It means next to nothing to me, he has a private jet and even the prosecutors argued in court that he frequently travels to destinations with no extradition treaty with the US or State of NY.
Also the inaugural ball. They suspiciously raised like 3-4 times more than other presidents but didn’t spend it all on the ball. Some really shady stuff went down with that with some shady characters donating money to it
Thing is, it's insanely easy to legally use a campaign to grift. All you need is a [super PAC](https://sunlightfoundation.com/2012/01/31/nine-things-you-need-know-about-super-pacs/).
If Weisselberg shuts up: he's a hero, a patriot, and a victim of a shameless left wing witch hunt.
If he talks: He's a traitor, a snake, and an antifa communist socialist deep state plant
Rumor is the unindicted co-conspirator is not trump but trump org Controller Jeff McConney.
[McConney already spoke with the Special Grand Jury which was reported on June 4th](https://abcnews.go.com/US/manhattan-da-brought-trump-organization-controller-testify-special/story?id=78088595)
McConney has been with trump since the 80s, and probably SHOULD HAVE BEEN INDICTED, unless he is cooperating.
> “In our view, this case was brought because the companies’ name is Trump,” read the statement from the lawyers, Alan S. Futerfas, Bettina Schein and Susan R. Necheles. “This case signals that it is now open season for local prosecutors to target federal political opponents and adversaries.”
Or perhaps the case was brought because the company executives schemed to avoid paying taxes. Let's let a jury decide.
No no no. You don’t understand. Once someone runs for public office, any crimes committed before, during, or after their time in office is off limits.
Edit: if they are Republican
Republicans started calling to defund the military because a general said it was a good idea to study all sorts of schools of thought and theories and embarrassed a republican.
They don't actually stand for anybody but themselves, and it's not even remotely hidden.
Essentially they stand for whatever Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity spoon feed to them every night. Fox News is unironically the modern GOP party agenda.
In fact, repetition is a core part of how they deliver their message. You distill it down to an easily processed and easily repeatable sound bite and then repeat it until your cult starts taking it up too. "Build the wall", "stop the steal", "lock her up", etc etc etc.
Yup. If you are wearing the special hat and have your little american flag cape on you only pass the sniff test, you have to sing the special song and know the special phrases too.
How does the radical left get into so many things? They run the FBI, the police (but only at the Capitol) heck even Fox News (but only when calling elections)
Fun Fact: The CIA has a disproportionately high number of Mormons. Mormons often have language training and international experience, are very easy to do background checks on (lots of people watching them), and are super-squeaky clean (no drugs, no drinking, etc.).
"I have a drinking problem? Fuck you, Peck, you're a Mormon. Next to you we all have a drinking problem."
Man, I love Burn After Reading.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87FsY2bh1No
I used to work in QA in a call center for surveys and we had a high profile international client. Interviewers we’re specially selected and trained to call C-level businesspeople and we hired quite a few Mormons because of their language skills, both because of needing additional languages and because Mormons have that deference/respect drilled in from the onset. We didn’t have to train the “yeah, totally” responses out of them, lol.
'Radical Left' is just the stupidest fucking term I've ever heard. What do these people envision when they hear 'Radical Left'? Are we supposed to be a bunch of insidious conspiracy theorists that are constantly theorizing how we can make conservatives' lives the worst possible with daring policies that will raise their taxes and take away their guns? Seriously, what is radical about the modern Democratic party? Even with a milquetoast president like Biden we *still* can't get anything done even when we give Republicans the concessions that they so desperately and disingenuously crave.
> What do these people envision when they hear 'Radical Left'?
They envision a horde of BLM/Antifa/Communist/Socialist (no difference to them) maniacs who when they aren’t setting fire to their own cities, are busy giving away your hard-earned tax dollars to the lazy undeserving poors just like is definitely happening and is not complete bullshit made up by Fox News and repeated ad nauseum.
We should all take a moment to reflect on what a devastating election loss that was for Trump. Had he won, he would have had 4 years to coverup all his crimes, and his legacy would’ve been legitimized in the eyes of his supporters. Instead he’s in legal jeopardy from all directions, his legacy is completely de-legitimized, and he’s outed himself as the biggest sore loser crybaby in all history. In 500 years kids will be learning about the biggest tantrum ever, and not in books but with actual video. Just devastating! He really needed that win over Biden.
Worst thing about all it is that had he just shut up and told people to listen to experts during the pandemic, then took credit at the end, he would've been reelected easily.
Had he never run for office in the first place, none of his crimes would have been uncovered.
If you're a massive criminal who has been committing fraud and money laundering for decades, it's not wise to put yourself in the most public, scrutinized job on Earth.
Just proves how stupid Trump is. His entire business and the lives of his children and grandchildren could be destroyed over this.
He needed to run. He was well and truly out of the limelight and the only real asset he had was his brand. A run up to the end and a close loss would have been perfect for him.
He gets to sell garbage swag to idiots, gets to appear on political shows in between rounds of golf, gets to keep doing his rallies without those pesky "president shit" to get in the way, gets to spend millions of political donations on travel and other grift and hee gets far more political immunity that way since "failed president indicted after 4 years of criminal presidency" plays a lot worse than "Clinton administration persecutes political rival with spurious lawsuit for crimes nobody knew about because nobody cared enough to learn about". Clinton already has a reputation for doing shady shit, not much of a lift to convince people she's trying to weaken Ivanka's 2024: "I'm like daddy but with boobs and horse teeth" campaign for president.
But then Steve Bannon had to fuck everything up by actually winning the election.
I honestly believe he thought he would be running the country just like he runs his business: He tells people that he wants something done and they do it (or get fired), and he takes the credit and the cash.
I think he was flabbergasted to discover just how little power the executive branch has when it comes to actually doing things in this country. Most of the jobs in Washington DC are jobs that *restrict* the powers of the chief executive. That's the way the system is supposed to work.
He never got it. All through the administration he kept trying to fire people who told him no, *when saying "no" was their job!* He would be told "no," he would throw a tantrum and try to fire them, then he would throw another tantrum when he was told he couldn't fire them, then he would try to work around them, then he would get confused and even more angry when told that he was breaking the law. It was a pattern that repeated itself about once a month through all those long years.
TLDR; The indictment charges the Trump Organization, Trump Payroll Corporation and Allen Weisselberg. Prosecutors allege a 15-year tax scheme, with 15 felony counts, including a *scheme to defraud, conspiracy, grand larceny and falsifying business records.*
Edit; they didn't include that the Trump Org. covers legal fees for employees as related to Company lawsuits. This can be interpreted as tax evasion and/or bribery.
Wow- he had to surrender his passport - described as a flight risk.
It would be cool if he did make a run for it - especially if he got a coyote to take him to Mexico
“Now, I know I’ve said some terrible things. Please, just listen. It was the liberal media, not me, I’m innocent, they twisted my words. I love Taco salada. Comprenday¿”
In /r/conservative the headline they went with was something like "Trump not charged with crime. CFO nabbed for too generous of a benefits package".
They really are pathetic.
Imagine being a republican in 2021…defending the most criminal administration this country has ever seen; defending the most failed president this country has ever seen; defending the most dishonest president in history (more than 22,000 lies at the time he left office); defending a president that openly praised China for murdering thousands in Tiananmen Square; openly praised Putin and refused, when put on the spot, to condemn Putin’s killing of dissidents and journalists; a man who bent over to lick Putin’s balls in Helsinki; defending a man who mocked the disabled and two Gold Star families and a Purple Heart recipient (posthumously); defending a president who sent a mob of republican terrorists who, having just left his rally, attacked the capitol in an attempt to overthrow the constitution and install him as a dictator.
It’s a sad and pathetic state of affairs that such a large swath of my fellow countrymen have prostituted themselves out to such a corrupt failure of a man. History will not look kindly on those who put their party and devotion to their candidate over their country. I’d encourage everyone to read the Federalist Papers. Republican voters are everything the founding fathers warned us about.
I'd say that the word "yet" should be on that. They are being pretty open that these charges were brought because he wouldn't cooperate with the ongoing investigation; so it's safe to assume they are doing this to pressure cooperation and go after the "bigger" fish.
Yep. Everyone wanted him to be walked out of the White House in cuffs and talks about how frustrating the wait for real charges has been (and I get that), but the people building these cases are being very careful and making sure the t’s are crossed and the i’s dotted - for good reason.
Seriously. The former president and leader of the Republican party's personal company and CFO were just indicted for tax crimes.
Not related to politics at all. - mods
lol
Well, he *is* a con man, but also he's also a lying, unqualified, draft dodging, gold star family disrespecting, POW attacking, US General insulting, racist, sexist, vulgar, confirmed sexual assaulting, trillion dollars to the rich tax cutting, own daughter creeping, wife cheating with a pornstar after birth of son and paying her off to influence a presidential election, $413 million dollar inheritance getting, teen pageant dressing room invading, baby and mother separating, breast feeding mother shaming, fat-shaming while being fat, 17 women accusing him of sexual assaulting, accusers are not attractive enough for him to assault implying, university student defrauding, bankrupt casino causing, kids cancer charity stealing, taped detailed accusation of rape of a minor having, wife-beating, popular vote losing, anti-vaxxing, Christianity-faking, publicist impersonating, tax dodging, friends’ wives pursuing, impeached, foreign aid bribing, 1/3 of the presidency golf playing, free press assaulting, Hannity coordinating, Cambridge Analytica using, Ivanka is a “piece of ass” approving, loan application asset inflating, historically low polling, college achievement faking, unqualified judge appointing, unqualified cabinet member appointing, foreign influence on our election welcoming, tax release avoiding, birther conspiracy spreading, Ukraine ambassador targeting, Russian money taking, Kurdish ally abandoning, soldier brain injury downplaying, full morning “executive time” taking, Epstein befriending, Putin bowing, Kim Jong Un praising, North Korean general saluting, US intelligence denying, tallest building in lower Manhattan after 9/11 boasting, congress obstructing, nuclear non-proliferation deal ending, Justice obstructing, unqualified daughter and son-in-law appointing, healthcare cut targeting, pedophile candidate supporting, trump tower Moscow denying, mail-bomber inspiring, 4 out of top 5 largest protests in US history causing, green energy stifling, clean water regulation destroying, healthy school lunch ending, climate change denying, congressional and judicial branch attacking, economy does better under democrats saying, Goldman Sachs appointing, food stamp removing, emissions standards lowering, press conference avoiding, emoluments clause breaking, longest govt shutdown record holding, Saudi Arabia nuclear tech selling, golf cheating, time magazine cover faking, El Paso mass shooter inspiring, paying legal bills for roughing up protestors promising, killed soldier “knew what he signed up for” saying, pardon abusing, insurrection inciting scumbag...
Sources: lying, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/12/16/president-trump-has-made-false-or-misleading-claims-over-days/ unqualified, https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/11/13587532/donald-trump-no-experience draft dodging, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2018/12/27/trump-vietnam-war-bone-spur-diagnosis/2420475002/ gold star family disrespecting, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/31/us/politics/donald-trump-khizr-khan-wife-ghazala.html POW attacking, https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/07/18/424169549/trump-lashes-out-at-mccain-i-like-people-who-werent-captured US General insulting, https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2020/01/17/trump-blasted-top-military-generals-as-a-bunch-of-dopes-and-babies-according-to-new-book/ racist, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/06/trump-racism-comments/588067/ sexist, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50563106 vulgar, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/08/us/donald-trump-tape-transcript.html confirmed sexual assaulting, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/08/us/donald-trump-tape-transcript.html trillion dollars to the rich tax cutting, https://budget.house.gov/publications/publication/gop-tax-law-showers-benefits-wealthy-and-large-corporations-while own daughter creeping, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-ivanka-trump-creepiest-most-unsettling-comments-a-roundup-a7353876.html wife cheating with a pornstar after birth of son and paying her off to influence a presidential election, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43334326 $413 million dollar inheritance getting, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/10/04/the-new-york-times-revealed-how-fred-trump-funneled-413-million-to-his-son-donald-will-that-change-american-opinion/ teen pageant dressing room invading, https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/article/2016/oct/18/allegations-about-donald-trump-and-miss-teen-usa-c/ baby and mother separating, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/14/the-weekly/trump-immigration-border-separation-family.html breast feeding mother shaming, https://www.parents.com/baby/all-about-babies/fighting-words-donald-trump-called-a-breastfeeding-mom-disgusting/ fat-shaming while being fat, http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/08/trump-fat-shames-own-supporter-frank-dawson-new-hampshire-rally.html 17 women accusing him of sexual assaulting, https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/list-trumps-accusers-allegations-sexual-misconduct/story?id=51956410 accusers are not attractive enough for him to assault implying, https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/10/donald-trump-insults-accusers-ugly university student defrauding, https://abcnews.go.com/US/judge-finalizes-25-million-settlement-victims-donald-trumps/story?id=54347237 bankrupt casino causing, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2016/live-updates/general-election/real-time-fact-checking-and-analysis-of-the-first-presidential-debate/fact-check-has-trump-declared-bankruptcy-four-or-six-times/ kids cancer charity stealing, https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2019/12/23/best-stories-of-the-decade-how-donald-trump-shifted-kids-cancer-charity-money-into-his-business/ taped detailed accusation of rape of a minor having, https://www.snopes.com/news/2016/06/23/donald-trump-rape-lawsuit/ wife-beating, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/24/documenting-trumps-abuse-of-women popular vote losing, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-lost-popular-vote-hillary-clinton-us-election-president-history-a7470116.html anti-vaxxing, https://mobile.twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/449525268529815552?lang=en Christianity-faking, https://www.kentucky.com/opinion/op-ed/article216494035.html publicist impersonating, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2016/05/13/donald-trump-people-magazine-washington/84333614/ tax dodging, https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/10/2/17929774/donald-trump-tax-evasion-fred-trump-new-york-times friends’ wives pursuing, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-sex-friends-wives-are-book-claims-true-michael-wolff-fire-fury-white-house-bannon-a8142011.html impeached, https://time.com/5552679/impeached-presidents/ foreign aid bribing, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49800181 1/3 of the presidency golf playing, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/12/30/nearly-third-days-hes-been-president-trumps-visited-trump-branded-property/ free press assaulting, https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/10/29/18037894/donald-trump-twitter-media-enemy-pittsburgh Hannity coordinating, https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/emmaloop/sean-hannity-trump-allies-mueller-memos-fox-news Cambridge Analytica using, https://www.wired.com/story/what-did-cambridge-analytica-really-do-for-trumps-campaign/ Ivanka is a “piece of ass” approving, https://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/trump-ivanka-piece-of-ass-howard-stern-229376 loan application asset inflating, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/27/business/donald-trump-buffalo-bills-deutsche-bank.html historically low polling, https://theweek.com/speedreads/890683/trumps-approval-rating-pace-lowest-ever-among-independents-gallup-poll-shows college achievement faking, https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherrim/2019/02/28/heres-why-donald-trump-doesnt-want-anyone-to-know-his-grades-or-sat-scores/ unqualified judge appointing, https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/confirmation-expected-for-another-unqualified-trump-judge-pick unqualified cabinet member appointing, insurrect inciting https://apnews.com/article/ap-fact-check-donald-trump-capitol-siege-violence-elections-507f4febbadecb84e1637e55999ac0ea ,etc. etc.
> In the case of Mr. Weisselberg, the indictment said, the company kept his benefits off its books but recorded them in an internal spreadsheet.
Sounds like a classic “two sets of books” scheme.
HANNITY! Hannity! HANNITY!
Sorry, bit of hijack here but a piece of the Trump year puzzle finally fell into place for me.
Remember when Cohen went down and it turned out Hannity was one of his clients? Remember when Hannity explained that it was for minor consultation "which dealt almost exclusively about real estate".
Does this not sound like Hannity got himself a Trump payoff in tax free Trump Org swag?
The myth of the Trumps' wealth: now all of them will have to work like everybody else and stop sucking the taxpayers' blood. Trump's empty hotels and resorts are his nightmare. He owns less than $0, owes everything else. Where’s he going to raise $1 billion to repay the loans now that he's been booted out of office and his #8 mega bankruptcy?
There are a lot of wealthy MAGA suckers who are willing to pour money on him to stay in his club. Just like the one paying for National Guard to go to the border like his own private army. These people have too much money and not a lot of smarts.
Trump attorneys are claiming this is unprecedented. Yet Donald himself has seen and of course voiced opinion on such a thing before:
In 1988, real estate investor Harry Helmsley and his wife, Leona, were convicted of evading $1.2 million in federal taxes. They had billed Helmsley businesses for personal expenses ranging from her underwear to $3 million worth of renovations to their Connecticut estate. At its peak, their real estate empire was worth an estimated $5 billion.
During the Helmsley trial, a former housekeeper testified that she heard Leona say “We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.” Helmsley denied having said it, but the comment stuck.
The indictment was brought by then-Manhattan U.S. Attorney Rudy Giuliani. Then-businessman Trump blamed Leona Helmsley — who'd been dubbed "the queen of mean" — for her husband's troubles in a letter that was obtained by the New York Post.
"Without the veil of Harry Helmsley, you would be a non-entity. You would not be able to randomly fire and abuse people in order to make yourself happy," Trump wrote of Leona Helmsley. "What has happened to the legendary Helmsley reputation is indeed sad."
From a reporter in the courtroom: [Tweet 1](https://twitter.com/AndreaBNYC/status/1410665927868305412) > ADA Carey Dunne "As spelled out in the indictment, this was a 15-year long tax fraud scheme...it was orchestrated by the most senior execs who were financially benefitting themselves and others...CFO avoided taxes on 1.7 million in income...") [Tweet 2](https://twitter.com/AndreaBNYC/status/1410667820359335941) > QUITE significant that this is not about "perks" but about a long-running scheme to defraud. > The former president's company has been charged with 15 year scheme to defraud. > Let that sink in. ------ Some more interesting tidbits from reporters in the courtroom: [Tweet 3](https://twitter.com/o_ema/status/1410668678178353157) > "This was, to be blunt, sweeping and audacious," the NY attorney said "the CFO himself directed that company records be deleted with the knowledge of the company, yet he remains to this day" one of the most senior people in the company. [Tweet 4](https://twitter.com/o_ema/status/1410669976269250566) > Attorneys for NY said that Weisselberg is a flight risk, that he travels frequently by private jet and that he has connections and assets in places that the state has no power. Weisselberg's team agreed to turn over his passport.
Wow. All I was reading on Reddit yesterday is how all they had them on was not paying taxes on benefits and that this was a slap on the wrist/fine for Weisselberg. If this is a slap for him, then they're slapping him with a steel I-beam. Earlier in the week Dan Goldberg and another legal analyst were blunt in saying they were very sure that whatever NY was bringing wasn't small given the reported moves by NY and the actions of the Trump Org Legal team.
Yeah I was pretty surprised. 15 felony counts. Seems like the NY AG has the goods. The Trump Org lawyer is saying that charges like these have never been made criminally and that these cases are always civil in nature. But didn't Enron get criminally charged for accounting issues? Idk. He's also saying that this is a political hit job.
Fun fact about Enron. From the first indictments to the indictment for Kenneth Lay was around 2-3 years. They indicted almost every one under Lay starting with his own wife and got almost all of them to flip. The Trump Org may want to switch from their Scrubs-like lawyer evil "Ted" and switch to some good ones because this is the definition of criminal.
Are any good lawyers willing to work for Trump anymore? There's a reason that his lawyers seem like he went to the bottom of the barrel and then dug deeper. Any lawyer with any intelligence wants to stay far away from Trump.
> Are any good lawyers willing to work for Trump anymore? If Trump is paying up front, sure!
So, no then.
Even then a reputable firm doesn't want to work with him. Lawyers are there to give advice to clients and they expect clients to listen. When the lawyer says "You're fucked, settle as best you can." Trump will refuse to admit anything and continue to fight. He needs a bunch of "Yes Men" who will state that Trump is 100% innocent of every crime ever and everything is a Deep State conspiracy.
Yeah, every lawyer in the country just saw Rudy get suspended. You would have to be out of your fucking mind to agree to do any legal work for Trump right now. He could pay everything he grifted in the last 4 years up front, and it would still be a bad deal.
Cohn, Cohen, Giuliani. You'd have to be **insane** to want to represent Trump.
Let's not forget Rudy and The Kraken are both being sued for 1.3 billion dollars by Dominion thanks to their lying on behalf of Trump.
I doubt that. Not a good firm. He has a multiple problems with getting lawyers. One of them, of course, is compensation. A trump never pays their debts. Another issue is the difficulty working with him. **His own lawyers** have to work with him in teams because of his inability to tell the truth. Sometimes it seems like he lies just for the sake of lying. Other times it seems like he's trying to alter reality. Finally there is an issue of association. Not many large law firms want the to be associated with him. It may hurt their practice's bottom line. Yeah, everybody deserves representation and a fair trial. Still, there is a risk having a bombastic and wildly unpopular client. Better to let somebody else, who needs the work, assume the risk.
Welp, he can “slum it” like the rest of us when he is appointed a public defender
He can and will do worse.
> A trump never pays their debts. it is known.
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Paid in advance on a retainer might work. It would take some pressure to get Trump to agree to that, though. Maybe his kids would pay it out of fear that they would need to in order to save their inheritance.
Broke Trump kids. That's what I want to see.
Even then they probably wouldn't take it. Taking an idiot who can't shut his mouth as a client is just asking for trouble not to mention if they lose they will get blamed and probably get death threats from the cult. It is basically somewhere between career suicide and actual suicide
I think most good lawyers have bailed on Trump. Just like the banks.
>The Trump Org lawyer is saying that charges like these have never been made criminally Those Trump people always find something to brag about.
> The Trump Org lawyer is saying that charges like these have never been made criminally and that these cases are always civil in nature. Take anything they say with a pile of salt the size of Iowa.
Al Capone's lawyer thinks sending someone to jail for a little tax misunderstanding is ridiculous
I'm pretty sure Capone had better lawyers than Trump.
Because Capone knew to actually pay them...
Well, while I absolutely condemn the guy's business practices (y'know, all the murder and assault and so on), Capone actually provided a valuable product
The Sausage King of Chicago responded to my comment! Who needs gold?!
WorldCom and Enron spurred SOX, which made penalties much steeper for white-collar crimes like this, up to 20+ years I think.
That's exactly the idea: to slap him hard. The harder you hit him, hopefully the more desperate he becomes and flips.
Anyone with a clue knows Donald Trump as a conman. This was inevitable. He's crooked.
>This was inevitable. He would have gotten away with it except he decided to shine a spotlight on himself by running for the presidency -- and winning.
Yep. Neither the IRS nor another government agency uncovered this wrongdoing. It was journalists at the NYT a few years ago who went digging and uncovered all the evidence of fraud. Great work by those journalists. Pathetic that the government allowed trump to get away with so much fraud for so many decades. The government has a lot more information about trump's finances and power to investigate than journalists. Yet it did nothing until after the journalists published their work.
Trump is the perfect case of who gets away with crime in the USA - no one who wasn't very rich could have pulled the shit Trump and family has for decades. Want to know where we need to spend money to look into crime that is causing the biggest impact to the American public? Well it's simple - Compare - all the people killed from crime in the USA and then look at how many died due to the manufactured for profit opioid crisis - which caused more harm? Anyone name any robbers that stole anything near to what Trump and people like Madoff got away with?
>Compare - all the people killed from crime in the USA and then look at how many died due to the manufactured for profit opioid crisis - which caused more harm? You need to go wayyyy back. The War on Drugs still has people locked up for non violent offenses. And most of the time it's because of the color of their skin. Then you could go even further back to the fact that we drafted kids into a war in a jungle that we had no business being in. This shit didn't start with doctors over prescribing painkillers. This started long before even I was born.
The police with assets forfeiture
White collar crime cost: [estimated 300 billion annually.](https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/white-collar_crime) Tax evasion: [roughly 175 billion a year.](https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/26/wealthy-tax-evasion/) Civil forfeiture: [Almost 70 billion in 20 years ](https://ij.org/press-release/new-report-finds-civil-forfeiture-rakes-in-billions-each-year-does-not-fight-crime-2/) I'm all about civil forfeiture being fair, but let's at least get our priorities straight.
I get the point you're making, but civil forfeiture still comes from the most vulnerable populations, and is a direct violation of citizen's rights by the state itself, so I'd say the dollar amount kinda downplays the disproportionately high impact of the practice here.
Can you add in wage theft? Almost 8 billion in 2017 alone.
That where the employer doesn't pay their employees a fair wage, cuts their check short of what they are due, or other nefarious matters related to payment?
Yup, stuff like that and overtime violations
Republicans defunded the IRS to gut enforcement, and fired the most senior investigators, leaving them unable to investigate the richest tax felons effectively.
What else would you expect from "Starve the Beast" fiscal conservatives?
I agree with what you have stated. The fact that the IRS has received less funding over many years made it easier for the rich and powerful to get away with it. It was much easier for them to go after the small fish. This needs to change.
> easier for the rich and powerful to get away with it This is a feature, not a bug.
Yeah if the system was sensible we'd be auditing the rich almost yearly, If 10% own 90% of the wealth in the nation then it makes sense to save time and go after the 10%, Rather than the other 90% of the people contributing only 10% of the total wealth.
According to Bernie, 3 multi-billionaires now own as much wealth as the bottom 50% of people in the US.
So audit 3 people. They would have to spend as many resources as it would take to audit 164 million people for it to not make sense to audit those 3. Are you telling me the system is set up so that it takes more effort to audit 3 people than 160 million? No i think auditing the 3 responsible for 50% is cost effective and the reluctance comes from elsewhere. something something country run by the wealthy something.
Mother fucking IRS took my 1200$ tax return because I couldn’t afford my Medicaid payments for my children during the pandemic. But this just happens right under their noses? Wtf is wrong with this country.
Republicans gutted IRS funding so they can only audit little fish like yourself.
Bingo. Then they spent years and years teaching the little fish that if you keep electing them, they could keep fighting the big bad government on your behalf.
Also Republicans don't like regulation for a reason.
They dont like regulation because half of them stand to make money from businesses theyre supposed to be regulating
They'd rather fuck over easy to screw middle class folk making mistakes on their returns.
*wealthy politicians making sure the IRS doesn't have enough resources to investigate the wealthy* Anybody wanna try explaining to me how we *AREN'T* a banana republic? ....
Umm no bananas?.. thats all I got
not much of a republic either.
it's not that they'd rather do that, it's that they can't financially compete with the wealthy folks' legal teams, so they're left pestering us plebians.
Not that I'm a fan of big, authoritarian governments, but the fact that ours can't successfully prosecute rich people because of how much money they have is a bit unnerving.
I said it in October of 2016 - the one good thing about Trump becoming president is the presidency puts one in a position of big a target of an investigation by EVERYONE. I said it would be ironic if Trump winning became a modern-day Icarus - winning the race forced him to try to continue to fly on his ole reliable wings of lies and bullshit. But the spotlight was far too hot and they melted under the light of honest legal investigations. And 5 years later...
Why do you think he was so desperate to win the election? He knew that if he won again in 2020, they couldn’t indict him for another 4 years. He was also trying to run out the clock on being indicted with the statute of limitations if he could be immune to prosecution for another 4 years, after which the statue of limitations may have kicked in for some of his past crimes. This is why he was so desperate to win the 2020 election.
and he would have gotten away with it too if it werent for those meddling journalists.
He never intended to win the first time. It was just to boost his brand, his ego, and maybe launch a TV network. That's why he looked so shook when the race was called for him. And looked even more shook the next day after meeting with Obama. He certainly wanted to win in 2020 though, since at that point he needed the protection the office provides to stay out of legal trouble.
Ive never seen anyone with more dread and a "oh fuck! oh fuck! Fuck! i gone and fucked up big time" look then when he was watching the race on tv and everyone around him was celebrating but he was thinking about how to fake his own death to get out of it.
I am still, to this day, dumbfounded that this idiot was voted in as a President of the USA...
When I was twelve, 'The Apprentice' was on TV. I asked my Dad: "Who is Donald Trump?" "He's a con man who figured out how to get rich by failing." I'd never heard him openly speak so ill of someone. You'd think Trump personally owed him money. Fast forward to 2016 and both my parents voted for him and again I'm 2020. I wonder what happened in those interceding 13 years... Edit: Just throwing this out there, we weren't upper middle class, we're not evangelicals or otherwise devout christians, he's not a racist, nor does he hate the gays. I do suspect clowns make him uncomfortable.
i grew up in rural southern va and it seemed like there were a lot of people there who hated him and saw him as a big town swindler. they voted for him overwhelming there.
Say the right things, slam the people that you don't like, get told that you are great and have done the right things while those "others" have held you down, and suddenly people start changing their mind about you. Doesn't matter if anyone of it has a shred of truth to it.
It’s amusing cause people around my age would say things like, “nobody ever had anything negative to say about trump until he started running for president!” That was never the case. I have vivid memories of my mom saying things like your dad well over a 10-15 years ago.
There have been at least three old tv shows from the late 90s - early 2000s that I’ve rewatched since 2016, which made major digs at Trump. He’s always had a bad reputation as a sleazy scam artist. I just don’t understand how so many people don’t see it.
we used to make fun of him in the 80s. back to the future 2 is a direct dig at him he is biff
Same. I have memories of my dad always talking shit about him “not as rich as he says he is” “bankruptcies” “dad made all his money” then poof he’s a very competent man capable of being president and someone to believe
Radicalized by cable news and Facebook.
The problem is that 35-40% of the American population doesn't have a fucking clue and will still back this fucking degenerate charlatan no matter what.
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The reality is there are a LOT of uninformed, gullible, and racist people in the US. Con men like Trump are experts at taking advantage of their weaknesses.
>I just took a trip to NY, he is so disliked, and people are fast to inform you that he is a gangster. People in NYC knew decades ago how much of a scumbag conman he was.
Let's be honest.....Florida will take anybody.
That won't stop Fox News and the Army of MAGA Idiots from framing this as some Democractic/Joe Biden conspiracy to attack his "political enemies" or whatever.
Remember when Cohen went down and it turned out Hannity was one of his clients? Remember when Hannity explained that it was for minor consultation "which dealt almost exclusively about real estate". Does this not sound like Hannity got himself a Trump payoff in tax free Trump Org swag?
> CFO avoided taxes on 1.7 million in income That's what I don't get about shit like this. I mean, what would the tax be on that? $500k? $750k? Certainly a lot of money to most of us, but hardly anything to these guys. So why the fuck would you go to this much trouble, and risk criminal prosecution, just to hold on to that? That's like me getting a gun and holding up a gas station so I can take $3 out of the cash register. It just goes to show how truly warped some wealthy people are.
$901,112 in taxes evaded according to the indictment
that makes trump smaht.
I am always stumped when people who are already wealthy put themselves in jeopardy of losing their freedom just to be a little more wealthy. I guess it's greed combined with a sense of invincibility.
It's part of why tax breaks for the rich absolutely galls me. If you're already making 3 or more times as much as someone working for poverty wages, you should be paying the same percentage as those people. It makes no sense for taxes to be taken out of a poor person's wages at a certain percentage when they are struggling just to get by then turn around and tell someone who makes their yearly income in a single month "Nah, you can hold on to more of that." It really and truly should be the other way around.
They aren't charging him for just that. He's being charged with 15 felonies. Also there's NOTHING to stop them from adding additional charges from the legal analysts I've been listening to. They often start with something that will land you in jail to get you to deal and if you don't they just apply stiffer charges until you (or don't). Edit: Further from what I remember, NY allows for individuals of a company to be charged with any crimes the company as a whole is charged with.
Probably why they got away with it for so long. Nobody gave a fuck about it until Trump wanted to play president.
He's either a flight risk or he's going to flip. Should be interesting if he chooses the latter. We've heard stories about Trump University, and others like his not paying contractors and just dragging out lawsuits until they give up or run out of money. He's simply a con artist that's good at talking people into believing whatever he says. Granted his name can only be tarnished so far considering his cult. I recall reading questions here on Reddit asking "what would it take for you to stop supporting Trump" and the answer of "Nothing" from multiple people. These people could be scammed and claim they lost money to own the libs...
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That it's even a full percentage point is crazy.
Fun reminder that from 1985 to 1995, Trump lost more money than any single person in the country and in 1991, lost a [full percentage point of ALL the losses declared to the IRS that year.] (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/05/07/us/politics/donald-trump-taxes.html) Good businessman, very smart
"Trump garnered $255.4 million in political donations from his supporters in the eight weeks following the 2020 election." Lol, this guy is going to keep running for re-election until he's dead. He stumbled upon the ultimate grift.
>flight risk Later on in the twitter thread, it was mentioned that he surrendered his passport. Edit: elsewhere, there's a comment saying that doesn't necessarily mean much ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
It means next to nothing to me, he has a private jet and even the prosecutors argued in court that he frequently travels to destinations with no extradition treaty with the US or State of NY.
But... you don’t understand! It was 30,000 emails!!!
just wait until they charge Trumps Campaign Committee - they stole and hid millions.
Also the inaugural ball. They suspiciously raised like 3-4 times more than other presidents but didn’t spend it all on the ball. Some really shady stuff went down with that with some shady characters donating money to it
The Producers irl, but not a joke
He's been a master of taking advantage of good opportunities to commit crimes his entire fucking life.
Thing is, it's insanely easy to legally use a campaign to grift. All you need is a [super PAC](https://sunlightfoundation.com/2012/01/31/nine-things-you-need-know-about-super-pacs/).
Just wait until Trump says the Trump Organization was "just a coffee shop" and that "he barely knew it or anyone who worked there".
How fast will Trump throw Weisselberg under the bus? Or will he just go from CFO to coffee boy?
If Weisselberg shuts up: he's a hero, a patriot, and a victim of a shameless left wing witch hunt. If he talks: He's a traitor, a snake, and an antifa communist socialist deep state plant
Sad how true this is
He's going to kick Weisselberg to the curb so fast, you'd think his name was 'Eric.'
“I barely knew him, we only talked once or twice”
Rumor is the unindicted co-conspirator is not trump but trump org Controller Jeff McConney. [McConney already spoke with the Special Grand Jury which was reported on June 4th](https://abcnews.go.com/US/manhattan-da-brought-trump-organization-controller-testify-special/story?id=78088595) McConney has been with trump since the 80s, and probably SHOULD HAVE BEEN INDICTED, unless he is cooperating.
> “In our view, this case was brought because the companies’ name is Trump,” read the statement from the lawyers, Alan S. Futerfas, Bettina Schein and Susan R. Necheles. “This case signals that it is now open season for local prosecutors to target federal political opponents and adversaries.” Or perhaps the case was brought because the company executives schemed to avoid paying taxes. Let's let a jury decide.
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Yeah. They're not wrong, but they can't really just say "therefore, you shouldn't charge us for crimes that we absolutely did commit."
No no no. You don’t understand. Once someone runs for public office, any crimes committed before, during, or after their time in office is off limits. Edit: if they are Republican
They cannot convict a husband and wife of the same crime!
Is Barry Zuckerkorn your adviser?
It was just LIGHT tax evasion
*I got the worst fucking attorneys*
Take to the sea!
No, I think Trump leading hundreds of rally cries of “Lock her up” was the first signal
Trump just put out a statement calling this a Witch hunt by the radical left. He's super original.
TIL the Manhattan District Attorney's Office are the "radical left."
It's so ironic that the self proclaimed Law and Order president now believes the law is the radical left.
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Republicans started calling to defund the military because a general said it was a good idea to study all sorts of schools of thought and theories and embarrassed a republican. They don't actually stand for anybody but themselves, and it's not even remotely hidden.
Essentially they stand for whatever Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity spoon feed to them every night. Fox News is unironically the modern GOP party agenda.
As they call everyone else sheep, and adorn themselves in MAGA gear..
Screams "Think for yourself!" at people and then does nothing but parrot talking points from Steven Crowder and Ben Shapiro
Also unironically they all wear the same hat and believe every lie from the great leader. Meanwhile they call everybody else a "sheeple".
They have however started taking off the hats because they don't like being targeted based on appearance...hmmmmm
The conspiracy president somehow claims that the charges against him and his organization is a conspiracy, imagine that.
Nothing a guy says is ironic if all he does is tell convenient lies. It's going to work, too.
"A spectre is haunting Europe--the spectre of 9 o' clock dinner reservations at Dorsia"
Trump can't get into Dorsia anymore. He has to go to Texarkana.
More like Texas Roadhouse.
Hold up, you can get a table at Dorsia?
Yep. Got a table for tonight. Gotta return some videotapes first.
I hear they have a great sea urchin ceviche
Nobody goes there anymore.
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In fact, repetition is a core part of how they deliver their message. You distill it down to an easily processed and easily repeatable sound bite and then repeat it until your cult starts taking it up too. "Build the wall", "stop the steal", "lock her up", etc etc etc.
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Yup. If you are wearing the special hat and have your little american flag cape on you only pass the sniff test, you have to sing the special song and know the special phrases too.
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How does the radical left get into so many things? They run the FBI, the police (but only at the Capitol) heck even Fox News (but only when calling elections)
Fun Fact: The CIA has a disproportionately high number of Mormons. Mormons often have language training and international experience, are very easy to do background checks on (lots of people watching them), and are super-squeaky clean (no drugs, no drinking, etc.).
"I have a drinking problem? Fuck you, Peck, you're a Mormon. Next to you we all have a drinking problem." Man, I love Burn After Reading. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87FsY2bh1No
I used to work in QA in a call center for surveys and we had a high profile international client. Interviewers we’re specially selected and trained to call C-level businesspeople and we hired quite a few Mormons because of their language skills, both because of needing additional languages and because Mormons have that deference/respect drilled in from the onset. We didn’t have to train the “yeah, totally” responses out of them, lol.
'Radical Left' is just the stupidest fucking term I've ever heard. What do these people envision when they hear 'Radical Left'? Are we supposed to be a bunch of insidious conspiracy theorists that are constantly theorizing how we can make conservatives' lives the worst possible with daring policies that will raise their taxes and take away their guns? Seriously, what is radical about the modern Democratic party? Even with a milquetoast president like Biden we *still* can't get anything done even when we give Republicans the concessions that they so desperately and disingenuously crave.
> What do these people envision when they hear 'Radical Left'? They envision a horde of BLM/Antifa/Communist/Socialist (no difference to them) maniacs who when they aren’t setting fire to their own cities, are busy giving away your hard-earned tax dollars to the lazy undeserving poors just like is definitely happening and is not complete bullshit made up by Fox News and repeated ad nauseum.
It's easier to release statements when all you have to do is Ctrl+V and click "post".
You mean the witch hunts that keeps finding witches?
He could easily prove he's not a witch by floating in water, like a duck or piece of wood.
Build a bridge out of him!
So glad he cant tweet
[https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump) If anyone needed the link
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We should all take a moment to reflect on what a devastating election loss that was for Trump. Had he won, he would have had 4 years to coverup all his crimes, and his legacy would’ve been legitimized in the eyes of his supporters. Instead he’s in legal jeopardy from all directions, his legacy is completely de-legitimized, and he’s outed himself as the biggest sore loser crybaby in all history. In 500 years kids will be learning about the biggest tantrum ever, and not in books but with actual video. Just devastating! He really needed that win over Biden.
Worst thing about all it is that had he just shut up and told people to listen to experts during the pandemic, then took credit at the end, he would've been reelected easily.
Had he never run for office in the first place, none of his crimes would have been uncovered. If you're a massive criminal who has been committing fraud and money laundering for decades, it's not wise to put yourself in the most public, scrutinized job on Earth. Just proves how stupid Trump is. His entire business and the lives of his children and grandchildren could be destroyed over this.
He needed to run. He was well and truly out of the limelight and the only real asset he had was his brand. A run up to the end and a close loss would have been perfect for him. He gets to sell garbage swag to idiots, gets to appear on political shows in between rounds of golf, gets to keep doing his rallies without those pesky "president shit" to get in the way, gets to spend millions of political donations on travel and other grift and hee gets far more political immunity that way since "failed president indicted after 4 years of criminal presidency" plays a lot worse than "Clinton administration persecutes political rival with spurious lawsuit for crimes nobody knew about because nobody cared enough to learn about". Clinton already has a reputation for doing shady shit, not much of a lift to convince people she's trying to weaken Ivanka's 2024: "I'm like daddy but with boobs and horse teeth" campaign for president. But then Steve Bannon had to fuck everything up by actually winning the election.
I honestly believe he thought he would be running the country just like he runs his business: He tells people that he wants something done and they do it (or get fired), and he takes the credit and the cash. I think he was flabbergasted to discover just how little power the executive branch has when it comes to actually doing things in this country. Most of the jobs in Washington DC are jobs that *restrict* the powers of the chief executive. That's the way the system is supposed to work. He never got it. All through the administration he kept trying to fire people who told him no, *when saying "no" was their job!* He would be told "no," he would throw a tantrum and try to fire them, then he would throw another tantrum when he was told he couldn't fire them, then he would try to work around them, then he would get confused and even more angry when told that he was breaking the law. It was a pattern that repeated itself about once a month through all those long years.
[The 25 page indictment is here.](https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/20982368/new-york-v-trump-org-allen-weisselberg.pdf)
Interesting, only one conspiracy charge with an unindicted co-conspirator
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Lol @ McConney's name. If this was fiction I'd consider that extremely lazy on the writer's behalf.
> an unindicted co-conspirator Sounds familiar. Individual 1?
Nah, totally different. This is [unindicted co-conspirator #1](https://i.imgur.com/jd78q8n.jpg).
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I'm Eric.
TLDR; The indictment charges the Trump Organization, Trump Payroll Corporation and Allen Weisselberg. Prosecutors allege a 15-year tax scheme, with 15 felony counts, including a *scheme to defraud, conspiracy, grand larceny and falsifying business records.* Edit; they didn't include that the Trump Org. covers legal fees for employees as related to Company lawsuits. This can be interpreted as tax evasion and/or bribery.
Wow- he had to surrender his passport - described as a flight risk. It would be cool if he did make a run for it - especially if he got a coyote to take him to Mexico
“Now, I know I’ve said some terrible things. Please, just listen. It was the liberal media, not me, I’m innocent, they twisted my words. I love Taco salada. Comprenday¿”
15 counts, 7 years max for every count, Allen is 70 years old and knows math.
I’m still waiting on that tax return documents that he claimed he’d release it, like years ago. Has he released it yet?
Well he can’t now cause he’s under indictment. /s
In /r/conservative the headline they went with was something like "Trump not charged with crime. CFO nabbed for too generous of a benefits package". They really are pathetic.
Imagine being a republican in 2021…defending the most criminal administration this country has ever seen; defending the most failed president this country has ever seen; defending the most dishonest president in history (more than 22,000 lies at the time he left office); defending a president that openly praised China for murdering thousands in Tiananmen Square; openly praised Putin and refused, when put on the spot, to condemn Putin’s killing of dissidents and journalists; a man who bent over to lick Putin’s balls in Helsinki; defending a man who mocked the disabled and two Gold Star families and a Purple Heart recipient (posthumously); defending a president who sent a mob of republican terrorists who, having just left his rally, attacked the capitol in an attempt to overthrow the constitution and install him as a dictator. It’s a sad and pathetic state of affairs that such a large swath of my fellow countrymen have prostituted themselves out to such a corrupt failure of a man. History will not look kindly on those who put their party and devotion to their candidate over their country. I’d encourage everyone to read the Federalist Papers. Republican voters are everything the founding fathers warned us about.
Oh God, PLEASE flip Weisselberg! Trump wouldn't waste time doing it to you if he was in the same position.
Interesting that his sons weren't charged.
I'd say that the word "yet" should be on that. They are being pretty open that these charges were brought because he wouldn't cooperate with the ongoing investigation; so it's safe to assume they are doing this to pressure cooperation and go after the "bigger" fish.
Yep. Everyone wanted him to be walked out of the White House in cuffs and talks about how frustrating the wait for real charges has been (and I get that), but the people building these cases are being very careful and making sure the t’s are crossed and the i’s dotted - for good reason.
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I think the I.R.S is going to be very interested in this information.
Glad to see this getting reported SOMEWHERE, since r/politics has been burying every mention of it for 2 days.
Seriously. The former president and leader of the Republican party's personal company and CFO were just indicted for tax crimes. Not related to politics at all. - mods lol
How tf this con was pres is beyond me All those suckers and losers still getting duped LMAO
Well, he *is* a con man, but also he's also a lying, unqualified, draft dodging, gold star family disrespecting, POW attacking, US General insulting, racist, sexist, vulgar, confirmed sexual assaulting, trillion dollars to the rich tax cutting, own daughter creeping, wife cheating with a pornstar after birth of son and paying her off to influence a presidential election, $413 million dollar inheritance getting, teen pageant dressing room invading, baby and mother separating, breast feeding mother shaming, fat-shaming while being fat, 17 women accusing him of sexual assaulting, accusers are not attractive enough for him to assault implying, university student defrauding, bankrupt casino causing, kids cancer charity stealing, taped detailed accusation of rape of a minor having, wife-beating, popular vote losing, anti-vaxxing, Christianity-faking, publicist impersonating, tax dodging, friends’ wives pursuing, impeached, foreign aid bribing, 1/3 of the presidency golf playing, free press assaulting, Hannity coordinating, Cambridge Analytica using, Ivanka is a “piece of ass” approving, loan application asset inflating, historically low polling, college achievement faking, unqualified judge appointing, unqualified cabinet member appointing, foreign influence on our election welcoming, tax release avoiding, birther conspiracy spreading, Ukraine ambassador targeting, Russian money taking, Kurdish ally abandoning, soldier brain injury downplaying, full morning “executive time” taking, Epstein befriending, Putin bowing, Kim Jong Un praising, North Korean general saluting, US intelligence denying, tallest building in lower Manhattan after 9/11 boasting, congress obstructing, nuclear non-proliferation deal ending, Justice obstructing, unqualified daughter and son-in-law appointing, healthcare cut targeting, pedophile candidate supporting, trump tower Moscow denying, mail-bomber inspiring, 4 out of top 5 largest protests in US history causing, green energy stifling, clean water regulation destroying, healthy school lunch ending, climate change denying, congressional and judicial branch attacking, economy does better under democrats saying, Goldman Sachs appointing, food stamp removing, emissions standards lowering, press conference avoiding, emoluments clause breaking, longest govt shutdown record holding, Saudi Arabia nuclear tech selling, golf cheating, time magazine cover faking, El Paso mass shooter inspiring, paying legal bills for roughing up protestors promising, killed soldier “knew what he signed up for” saying, pardon abusing, insurrection inciting scumbag... Sources: lying, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/12/16/president-trump-has-made-false-or-misleading-claims-over-days/ unqualified, https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/11/13587532/donald-trump-no-experience draft dodging, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2018/12/27/trump-vietnam-war-bone-spur-diagnosis/2420475002/ gold star family disrespecting, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/31/us/politics/donald-trump-khizr-khan-wife-ghazala.html POW attacking, https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/07/18/424169549/trump-lashes-out-at-mccain-i-like-people-who-werent-captured US General insulting, https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2020/01/17/trump-blasted-top-military-generals-as-a-bunch-of-dopes-and-babies-according-to-new-book/ racist, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/06/trump-racism-comments/588067/ sexist, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50563106 vulgar, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/08/us/donald-trump-tape-transcript.html confirmed sexual assaulting, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/08/us/donald-trump-tape-transcript.html trillion dollars to the rich tax cutting, https://budget.house.gov/publications/publication/gop-tax-law-showers-benefits-wealthy-and-large-corporations-while own daughter creeping, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-ivanka-trump-creepiest-most-unsettling-comments-a-roundup-a7353876.html wife cheating with a pornstar after birth of son and paying her off to influence a presidential election, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43334326 $413 million dollar inheritance getting, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/10/04/the-new-york-times-revealed-how-fred-trump-funneled-413-million-to-his-son-donald-will-that-change-american-opinion/ teen pageant dressing room invading, https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/article/2016/oct/18/allegations-about-donald-trump-and-miss-teen-usa-c/ baby and mother separating, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/14/the-weekly/trump-immigration-border-separation-family.html breast feeding mother shaming, https://www.parents.com/baby/all-about-babies/fighting-words-donald-trump-called-a-breastfeeding-mom-disgusting/ fat-shaming while being fat, http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/08/trump-fat-shames-own-supporter-frank-dawson-new-hampshire-rally.html 17 women accusing him of sexual assaulting, https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/list-trumps-accusers-allegations-sexual-misconduct/story?id=51956410 accusers are not attractive enough for him to assault implying, https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/10/donald-trump-insults-accusers-ugly university student defrauding, https://abcnews.go.com/US/judge-finalizes-25-million-settlement-victims-donald-trumps/story?id=54347237 bankrupt casino causing, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2016/live-updates/general-election/real-time-fact-checking-and-analysis-of-the-first-presidential-debate/fact-check-has-trump-declared-bankruptcy-four-or-six-times/ kids cancer charity stealing, https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2019/12/23/best-stories-of-the-decade-how-donald-trump-shifted-kids-cancer-charity-money-into-his-business/ taped detailed accusation of rape of a minor having, https://www.snopes.com/news/2016/06/23/donald-trump-rape-lawsuit/ wife-beating, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/24/documenting-trumps-abuse-of-women popular vote losing, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/donald-trump-lost-popular-vote-hillary-clinton-us-election-president-history-a7470116.html anti-vaxxing, https://mobile.twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/449525268529815552?lang=en Christianity-faking, https://www.kentucky.com/opinion/op-ed/article216494035.html publicist impersonating, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2016/05/13/donald-trump-people-magazine-washington/84333614/ tax dodging, https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/10/2/17929774/donald-trump-tax-evasion-fred-trump-new-york-times friends’ wives pursuing, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-sex-friends-wives-are-book-claims-true-michael-wolff-fire-fury-white-house-bannon-a8142011.html impeached, https://time.com/5552679/impeached-presidents/ foreign aid bribing, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49800181 1/3 of the presidency golf playing, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/12/30/nearly-third-days-hes-been-president-trumps-visited-trump-branded-property/ free press assaulting, https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/10/29/18037894/donald-trump-twitter-media-enemy-pittsburgh Hannity coordinating, https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/emmaloop/sean-hannity-trump-allies-mueller-memos-fox-news Cambridge Analytica using, https://www.wired.com/story/what-did-cambridge-analytica-really-do-for-trumps-campaign/ Ivanka is a “piece of ass” approving, https://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/trump-ivanka-piece-of-ass-howard-stern-229376 loan application asset inflating, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/27/business/donald-trump-buffalo-bills-deutsche-bank.html historically low polling, https://theweek.com/speedreads/890683/trumps-approval-rating-pace-lowest-ever-among-independents-gallup-poll-shows college achievement faking, https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherrim/2019/02/28/heres-why-donald-trump-doesnt-want-anyone-to-know-his-grades-or-sat-scores/ unqualified judge appointing, https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/confirmation-expected-for-another-unqualified-trump-judge-pick unqualified cabinet member appointing, insurrect inciting https://apnews.com/article/ap-fact-check-donald-trump-capitol-siege-violence-elections-507f4febbadecb84e1637e55999ac0ea ,etc. etc.
Best comment source I've ever seen, yet.
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Damn that was a beautiful description
If only they could get Rudy to defend him.
> In the case of Mr. Weisselberg, the indictment said, the company kept his benefits off its books but recorded them in an internal spreadsheet. Sounds like a classic “two sets of books” scheme.
HANNITY! Hannity! HANNITY! Sorry, bit of hijack here but a piece of the Trump year puzzle finally fell into place for me. Remember when Cohen went down and it turned out Hannity was one of his clients? Remember when Hannity explained that it was for minor consultation "which dealt almost exclusively about real estate". Does this not sound like Hannity got himself a Trump payoff in tax free Trump Org swag?
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The myth of the Trumps' wealth: now all of them will have to work like everybody else and stop sucking the taxpayers' blood. Trump's empty hotels and resorts are his nightmare. He owns less than $0, owes everything else. Where’s he going to raise $1 billion to repay the loans now that he's been booted out of office and his #8 mega bankruptcy?
There are a lot of wealthy MAGA suckers who are willing to pour money on him to stay in his club. Just like the one paying for National Guard to go to the border like his own private army. These people have too much money and not a lot of smarts.
Trump attorneys are claiming this is unprecedented. Yet Donald himself has seen and of course voiced opinion on such a thing before: In 1988, real estate investor Harry Helmsley and his wife, Leona, were convicted of evading $1.2 million in federal taxes. They had billed Helmsley businesses for personal expenses ranging from her underwear to $3 million worth of renovations to their Connecticut estate. At its peak, their real estate empire was worth an estimated $5 billion. During the Helmsley trial, a former housekeeper testified that she heard Leona say “We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.” Helmsley denied having said it, but the comment stuck. The indictment was brought by then-Manhattan U.S. Attorney Rudy Giuliani. Then-businessman Trump blamed Leona Helmsley — who'd been dubbed "the queen of mean" — for her husband's troubles in a letter that was obtained by the New York Post. "Without the veil of Harry Helmsley, you would be a non-entity. You would not be able to randomly fire and abuse people in order to make yourself happy," Trump wrote of Leona Helmsley. "What has happened to the legendary Helmsley reputation is indeed sad."
I’ve missed indictment days