Letitia James live tweets $114,000 daily interest charges on Trump’s $464m fraud ruling
New York Attorney General trolls former president as interest starts accruing on monster judgment
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Your support makes all the difference.A $455m judgment against Donald Trump is increasing by more than $110,000 each day due to interest penalties.
And New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is preprared to seize his assets if necessary, is not going to let Mr Trump forget.
When the final judgment in the sprawling fraud trial against Mr Trump, his adult sons Donald Jr and Eric Trump, and former Trump Organization executives was approved on Friday, the attorney general’s X account posted the exact figure down to the last cent.
Twenty four hours later, her account wrote: “+$114,553.04”.
Post-judgment interest is accruing at a rate of 9 per cent on the $464m judgment against five individuals and the Trump Organization after a judge determined that the former president fraudulently inflated his net worth and assets over a decade to maintain favourable financing terms on some of his brand-building properties.
The total owed back to the state among all the defendants – money that is effectively forfeited as “ill-gotten gains” – amounts to roughly $364m, plus at least $100m in interest.
The interest on Mr Trump’s portion of a final judgment comes to more than $112,000 each day.
On Monday, his legal team filed notice of an appeal, but did not appear to bost bond, which he would need to do to stop collections on the judgment.
Ms James has said she is is prepared to seize his assets, if necessary.
“We are prepared to make sure that the judgment is paid to New Yorkers, and yes, I look at 40 Wall Street each and every day,” she told ABC News last week.
Mr Trump delivered a keynote speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland on Saturday, where he called himself a “proud dissident”.
He has 30 days to post a bond on appeal, which would require him to pay the full judgment either as a deposit with the court or as a surety bond, at a significant cost.
The final judgment came after a three-year investigation and 11 weeks of witness testimony during a trial that ended in January.
New York County Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron’s 92-page ruling released on 16 February found Mr Trump, his sons Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump, former Trump Organization executives Allen Weisselberg and Jeffrey McConney, and companies behind Mr Trump’s brand-building properties were liable for falsely inflating his net worth and assets to secure favourable financing terms over a decade.
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