Trump fraud case 'will continue' after judges have 'profound disagreement' on major ruling
An appeals court has thrown out the massive penalty against President Donald Trump in his civil fraud case, but "profound disagreement" among the judges who decided the ruling means their decision won't likely be the final word.
CNN's Kara Scannell reported that the five-judge panel tossed the nearly half-a-billion-dollar judgment against Trump imposed by New York Judge Arthur Engoron in a case brought by state Attorney General Letitia James, who accused the president of fraudulently inflating the value of his real estate holdings to obtain better loan terms from banks.
"This is a huge win for President Donald Trump," Scannell said.
"Now this is a 323-page opinion," she added. "The judges, remarkably, could not reach unanimity on any one opinion, and they note that this was there were profound disagreements in how they were analyzing this. But enough of them, they had agreed to this so that the case could move forward to the next stage, where they expect it will be appealed further. But this decision does say that the judgment, the nearly half $1 billion is thrown out. You'll remember that Trump had posted $175 million bond, that will be given back to him at some point. But that was a real significant judgment against the president."
Engoron found Trump liable for fraud in September 2023, after he had been indicted in multiple jurisdictions for attempting to subvert his election loss and for mishandling classified materials – all of which were later dismissed.
"At the time he was facing the criminal charges," Scannell said. "It was unclear if he would be able to raise the money, but now that is no longer a concern. That judgment is against him has been thrown out. Now, this opinion did affirm the liability in the case which found him liable for fraud, but, again, the judges here were not unanimous in how they felt that this should play out. One judge wanted a new trial, others saying that that's impractical because Trump is the president of the United States. So they are expecting there to be further litigation on this, but the headline here is that Trump is no longer liable for half $1 billion."
"They do, the judges here do expect this to be appealed," she added. "We've reached out to the New York attorney general's office, have not heard back, have also reached out to Trump's legal team, have not heard back from them yet about what their next steps here will be. But it is likely that attorney general's office will appeal this, so the litigation will continue."
Leave a Comment
Related Post