Moments after Digital World Acquisition Corporation voted to merge with Trump Media, the parent company for Donald Trump's Truth Social platform, its stock took a quick drop — losing 12 percent of its value at one point.
According to a report from CNBC, stock for the company which will be listed as DJT starting next week, began the day at $44.20 before taking a quick nosedive to below $38, before a bounceback to 3.5 percent below opening.
The former president was expected to see a $3 billion windfall after the merger was completed but, by the time he is able to sell any portion of his stock, that dollar figure could change radically downward as other investors cash out.
As CNBC is reporting, "A total of 11% of the tradable shares of DWAC are being sold short, FactSet data shows."
"This means investors holding these positions are betting the price will fall before they have to buy the shares back and return them to the entities who loaned the shares to them," the report adds.
Criminal defense lawyer Robert DeNault had warned investors should expect to see drops now that the merger was approved.
"The [Special purpose acquisition companies] merger between Digital World and Trump Media/Truth Social is vastly overvalued and the stock price will plummet in short order," he wrote.
Judge Aileen Cannon handed special counsel Jack Smith a victory in his federal classified documents case against former President Donald Trump, court records show.
Cannon Friday ruled that Smith can substitute summaries for some sensitive intelligence materials he'll need to share with Trump and his attorneys as the stalled Florida case slouches toward its yet-to-be-decided court date.
"Upon review of the Motion, relevant filings, arguments raised during hearings, and the full record," writes Cannon, "the Court GRANTS the Special Counsel’s Motion as to Categories 3 and 4 in their entirety, as well as most of the Category 2 requests as set forth in the Court’s Classified Order."
The information in question pertains to lists of potential witnesses — who Smith says have already begun receiving threats on social media — as well as national security documents the Justice Department did not want to hand over to Trump.
Cannon's concession to Smith's demand comes as she faces mounting criticism over a perceived bias toward the former president responsible for her appointment to Florida's Southern District court.
The federal judge's decisions in the past have twice been slapped down by a conservative 11th Circuit appeals court panel. Cannon's recent decision to grant attorneys two weeks to craft Presidential Records Act jury instructions raised eyebrows among legal experts, who say she's looking for ways to delay.
“She is giving credence to arguments that are on their face absurd,” former federal Judge Nancy Gertner told the Washington Post Wednesday. "She is ignoring a raft of other motions, equally absurd, that are unreasonably delaying the case.”
Delay is the name of the game for Trump, who has pleaded not guilty to 37 counts that include willful retention of national defense information, conspiracy to obstruct justice and concealing a document in a federal investigation.
If Trump can manage both to push the court date to 2025 and win the upcoming presidential election, he would find himself ideally situated to kill the case completely.
That may be why news Smith's victory failed to appease Cannon's critics on social media Friday.
"She's a hack," Eric Edelstein wrote. Replied @dmeneilley, "That’s an insult to hacks."
Predictions about the future of former President Donald Trump's presidential campaign, civil court litigation and financial standing were thrown into disarray Friday when news broke that his social media company had agreed to a merger that could net him $3 billion.
But now that Digital World Acquisition Corporation has voted in favor of a merger with the Trump Media, the parent company of Truth Social, predictions of disaster have been replaced with phrases that include "corruption," "messed up" and "fiddlesticks."
Trump critic Ed Krassenstein, dubbed by Rolling Stone as one of "Trump’s Cringiest Reply Guys," was quick to respond to the news, arguing the merger paved a pathway to corruption should Trump return to the White House in 2025.
"Foreign governments would buy and sell the stock in order to try and get favors from Trump or even to try and get retribution with Trump," wrote Krassenstein. "This would be corruption at its finest for any president, but for some reason Republicans don’t care."
"Hot take," wrote DeNault. "The [Special purpose acquisition companies] merger between Digital World and Trump Media/Truth Social is vastly overvalued and the stock price will plummet in short order."
Economist, journalist and Yale University fellow James S. Henry had one word to describe his reaction: "Fiddlesticks."
"Thanks for moving so quickly on this, SEC," wrote Henry. "Yet another triumph for 'free markets' and 'the rule of law as the foundation of democracy.'"
CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Evan Gold admitted he was not surprised, but suggested should Trump cash out on his claim, it could prove a death knell for the company.
"As expected they approved the merger of Truth Social and public offering which should make a bundle for Trump," wrote Gold. "The question is will he have to wait 6 months or will they also approve his ability to sell early (and perhaps kill the baby and it's cradle)?"
CNN legal analyst Shan Wu took to the airwaves Friday to temper the optimism that the Truth Social merger would provide a bandaid solution to Trump's financial problems, the largest among them a $464 million civil fraud trial ruling due Monday.
Trump, despite boasting he has almost $500 million cash at hand, had not, as of Friday, been able to secure a bond to cover the payment.
Wu noted that while the merger comes at an opportune moment, it also arrives with serious strings attached, namely several outstanding lawsuits accusing Trump Media of scheming to lock its co-founders out of stock options.
"He was probably counting on that timing," said Wu. "That's actually been kinda messed up for him because now there are some lawsuits pending among the investors, the partners originally. And those suits would actually stop them from be able to take the money he is anticipating on taking out of that deal."
But when host Jim Acosta asked Wu if the merger could get Trump out of his financial "jam," Wu replied, "It definitely could."
It won't be easy to seize Donald Trump's property to satisfy the $464 million judgment against him in the New York fraud case.
Prior mortgages on Trump properties won't prevent New York Attorney General Letitia James from trying to collect on his assets, but some of those loans are forbiddingly steep and would make a forced sale less attractive, according to MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin.
"I tell you this because while Trump complains that the New York AG is desperate to sell off his empire, James herself has little interest in doing so," Rubin wrote.
"Not only would she collect after any prior secured lenders and/or creditors are paid but also, as her office explained in a reply brief Wednesday, shifting 'the risk of executing on Defendants’ illiquid assets' to the attorney general would itself be unacceptable."
Trump earlier this week complained that the need to find the bond would force him into a "fire sale" of his properties, though he has not apparently started to sell anything yet.
Axos Bank holds more than $100 million in loans to the former president for Trump Tower’s commercial portion and $125 million for the Doral golf course in Miami, according to a Washington Post report, so that makes those properties less valuable in lieu of the judgment the former president owes to the state for habitually defrauding banks.
"The position of the attorney general's office is that, if Trump and his businesses truly cannot obtain or provide an undertaking, they should consent to have their real estate assets 'held by [the New York] Supreme Court to satisfy the judgment,'" Rubin wrote.
The former president must come up with a bond worth 110 percent of the judgment by Monday or James will enforce the penalty, but Rubin doesn't expect James to start snapping up Trump properties and selling them off.
"In other words, the office is saying that it does not want a mess of “a fire sale” any more than Trump does; in lieu of an adequate bond or cash, it would much rather Trump simply let the court hold the assets in a kind of escrow," Rubin said.
In a deal that could eventually net Donald Trump around $3 billion or more, shareholders in Digital World Acquisition Corporation this Friday voted in favor of a merger with the former President's social media company.
The vote comes over two years after DWAC said it planned to merge with Trump Media & Technology Group, which owns the Truth Social platform, NBC News reported.
"It also comes as Trump faces the possibility that New York Attorney General Letitia James on Monday will start trying to collect on a massive $454 million civil fraud judgment against him," NBC News' report stated, adding the the combined company now known as "Trump Media" could begin to be publicly traded next week under the stock symbol DJT, Trump’s initials.
Former President Donald Trump's lawyers are scrambling to explain away his $500 million boast, posted to Truth Social Friday morning, after they said in court filings their client couldn't come up with that kind of cash, according to a new report.
Trump's attorneys told CNN reporter Kara Scannell Friday morning that Trump's all-caps claim that he currently has almost $500 million in cash — more than the $464 million he's been ordered to pay in his New York City civil fraud trial — wasn't exactly right.
"His lawyers clarified that statement to me this morning, saying Trump was referring to the cash he has made through running his business, which he has disclosed on his campaign forms," Scannell told host Jim Acosta. "But that's not the actual amount of cash that he currently has on hand."
Trump's contradictory statement arrived just three days before the payment comes due and as New York Attorney General Letitia James readies her team to begin seizing the former president's eponymous golf course and Westchester estate Seven Springs.
Acosta then turned to Trump's former White House lawyer, and CNN commentator, Jim Schultz for his take on Trump's financial standing ahead of the looming deadline.
"Trump has repeatedly said that his paying this half-billion-dollar bond would be impossible, but he just posted that he has raised nearly $500 million," Acosta said. "Which is it?"
Schultz said he'd trust the lawyers over the former president.
"His lawyers were making the argument that he doesn't, right?" said Schultz. "So I think that's the representation that I would probably trust the most as it relates to what he has and what he doesn't have."
Schultz then urged Trump to seriously consider filing for bankruptcy, which he argued was the former president's best option from a legal perspective, if not a political one.
"If he were to file bankruptcy, a lot of this would be stayed," said Schultz. "But that might not look so good during a presidential campaign."
Donald Trump's Truth Social rant Friday in which he claimed to be sitting on $500 million in cash was met by a mixture of skepticism and mirth on CNN, with co-hosts and legal experts suggesting he likely doesn't have the money — and if he does it just opened up a whole new can of worms for him.
In an early all-cap post, the former president boasted: "THROUGH HARD WORK, TALENT, AND LUCK, I CURRENTLY HAVE ALMOST FIVE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS IN CASH, A SUBSTANTIAL AMOUNT OF WHICH I INTENDED TO USE IN MY CAMPAIGN FOR PRESIDENT."
That led former Watergate prosecutor Nick Akerman to question what exactly the former president is trying to do as the deadline for coming up with a $454 million financial fraud bond looms.
With CNN co-host John Berman asserting, "If you're the appeals court, who's got to decide whether to reduce the money or not, wouldn't you look at this post on Truth Social saying, 'Wait a second, you just told me you have the money you were saying it's impossible [to find]. Why should we give you any grace here, if you're saying you've got it?"
"That's right," Akerman agreed. "I mean, that is the dumbest thing he could have possibly done, to put that on Truth Social, because that is a direct admission by him that he has the money."
"Now, keep in mind, even with this operating money or cash that he supposedly has, if he doesn't pony up and put up a bond, [New York Attorney General] Letitia James is going to be able to go in and basically put restraining orders on all of his bank accounts, everything that relates to him, and all of that money is going to be tied up and frozen.
"So if he's really got that money, he's got to put it up."
In a post to Truth Social this Friday morning, Donald Trump claimed that he has "almost" $500 million in cash — a claim that contradicts his lawyers who said earlier this week that complying with the $464 million judgment against him in New York Attorney General Letitia James' civil fraud case against him would cause "irreparable harm."
"THROUGH HARD WORK, TALENT, AND LUCK, I CURRENTLY HAVE ALMOST FIVE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS IN CASH, A SUBSTANTIAL AMOUNT OF WHICH I INTENDED TO USE IN MY CAMPAIGN FOR PRESIDENT. THE OFTEN OVERTURNED POLITICAL HACK JUDGE ON THE RIGGED AND CORRUPT A.G. CASE, WHERE I HAVE DONE NOTHING WRONG, KNEW THIS, WANTED TO TAKE IT AWAY FROM ME, AND THAT’S WHERE AND WHY HE CAME UP WITH THE SHOCKING NUMBER WHICH, COUPLED WITH HIS CRAZY INTEREST DEMAND, IS APPROXIMATELY $454,000,000. I DID NOTHING WRONG EXCEPT WIN AN ELECTION IN 2016 THAT I WASN’T EXPECTED TO WIN, DID EVEN BETTER IN 2020, AND NOW LEAD, BY A LOT, IN 2024.THIS IS COMMUNISM IN AMERICA!" Trump wrote in his usual all-caps style.
The deadline for Trump to post the bond for the full amount is this Monday. If he fails to do so, James can start the process of seizing his assets.
On X, critics of Trump and legal analysts wasted no time in pointing out the contradiction. One of whom was former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti, who said either Trump or his lawyers are lying.
"Tump now claims that he has almost $500 million in cash, but his lawyers recently told the appellate court that he has no means to post a $454 million bond. One of them is lying, and you can expect the court to ask Trump’s lawyers about this," Mariotti wrote in a post to X.
The New York Times' Maggie Haberman also commented on the contradiction.
"Trump here appears to be saying he has the cash for the bond his folks have indicated he doesn’t have and therefore dozens of companies turned him down (and that he planned to self-fund the campaign, which is also a new claim)," she wrote.
Legal analyst Norm Eisen pointed out that Trump's own words may come back to haunt him.
"This is so dumb — now he can’t claim hardship to get a stay," he wrote on X. "AG Tish James can help herself, including to this supposed money!"
While Trump is liable for $454 million, added interest is causing the amount he owes to increase by more than $111,000 a day.
During an appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," on Friday morning, investment banker and former Donald TrumpWhite House official Anthony Scaramucci claimed that Wall Street executives are laughing among themselves at the former president's attempts to raise nearly a half billion for his financial fraud appeals bond.
Speaking with the "Morning Joe" panel, the former White House director of communications said he has been in contact with Wall Street bankers, all of whom are skeptical of loaning the embattled former president any money at all considering his history of not paying his bills.
"He defaults on everything, you know, if you talk to interior designers, architects, construction workers, plumbing people, he doesn't pay his bills," he explained, "He's always been that way. You can't give him the money because you don't have the 100 percent certainty — I mean, if he was rated by Moody's, he'd be a C-plus debt rating, which is specious."
"His problem now is going to be about the identity he presents to his audience," he continued. "You know, 'I'm the guy. I'm the business maverick' If you don't really have the money like you've been saying you've had the money all these years, I think it is a big Achilles heel for him."
Pressed on why he can't get the cash he needs from his son-in-law Jared Kushner, Scaramucci first smiled before elaborating, "He may end up getting the money. The question is, where did he get the money? Did he get it from Wall Street? From anybody who knows him? Where is the money?"
"He's not getting it from Wall Street. I can tell you that," he continued. "Because of a declarative 'no' from every distressed lender on Wall Street. There was a little giggle group chat among a lot of people saying, can you believe this guy is looking for a half a billion dollars with a 15 percent coupon?"
Donald Trump is making clear what type of candidates he prefers by endorsing an accused wife beater who recently made offensive comments about contraception for an Arizona county-level race.
The former president extended his endorsement Friday morning to state Sen. Sonny Borrelli, who is running for the Mohave County board of supervisors, one day after he implored Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell to investigate unsubstantiated claims of election fraud in the 2020 and 2022 elections.
"Arizona State Senator Sonny Borrelli has been on the front line of fighting against corrupt elections since day one," Trump posted on Truth Social. "Sonny is a proven fighter for the People of Arizona, and a huge supporter of veterans and law enforcement. It is said that 'all politics is local,' and that is especially true at the county level where elections are run fairly or rigged."
Borrelli, who's currently the state Senate majority leader, claimed Thursday that an unnamed "cybersecurity expert" told him that data and equipment used in the two election cycles "had been altered" in a way that was "undetectable," which a spokeswoman for Mitchell said had "amused" the county attorney.
“She wondered how further investigation would allow us to find something that is undetectable,” said Jeanine L’Ecuyer, a press aide for Mitchell – a Republican who this week announced she would support Trump for re-election.
Trump won Mohave County in his last election by a 75 percent to 23.7 percent margin over Joe Biden but lost Maricopa County by 50.3 percent to 48.1 percent gap, and he and his supporters have focused on investigating baseless claims of fraud there and targeting local officials for abuse and harassment.
"Sonny served our Country for 22 years as a U.S. Marine, and served his City and State for almost 14 years," Trump posted. "He will do an AMAZING job as a county supervisor. I wholeheartedly endorse Sonny Borrelli to be the next County Supervisor for District 3 of the Mohave County Board of Supervisors!!"
Borrelli helped block a legislative priority of Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs by refusing to allow a vote on codifying access to birth control as a right in Arizona, and he used offensive language with a reporter to justify his legislative tactic.
“Like I said, Bayer Company invented aspirin – put it between your knees,” Borrelli said. “They’re creating a controversy that doesn’t exist because nobody’s opposing — nobody has any kind of plan to ban any contraceptives."
The Lake Havasu City Republican has been hounded for years by allegations that he punched his ex-wife in an altercation witnessed by her son, who claimed he saw Borrelli strike her three times in the face with his closed fist, knocking her into a video poker machine in their living room.
The boy said his stepfather crashed through his bedroom door and ripped a phone from the wall to prevent him from calling 911, although when asked about the 2001 incident during an election campaign 15 years later he dismissed the allegations as "f*cking bullsh*t" and said the boy, who had gone on to serve in the Marine Corps, would likely agree.
Nevertheless, he later pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct and paid a $300 fine rather than fight an assault charge in that case.
"I took one for the team, I handled it like a man," Borrelli said in 2016. "How many times do I have to pay for a misdemeanor?"
After spending a considerable amount of time documenting the multiple Donald Trump properties that will be at risk of seizure if the former president doesn't come up with $462 million for an appeals bond in New York, MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski noted the desperation of the Trump campaign to rake in every dollar it can.
With New York Attorney General Letitia James reportedly already getting the paperwork ready to go to grab Trump properties next week in anticipation that he will fail to find anyone willing to back an appeals bond, the "Morning Joe" co-host cited a pop-up ad featuring Don. Trump Jr. where he begs for cash.
After pointing out that President Joe Biden's campaign is now labeling Trump as "Broke Don," Brzezinski called out the desperation of the former president's campaign.
"Just last night I got like one of those video ads that pop-up before you watch a video and it was like Donald Trump Jr's face saying, 'Give us five dollars. Chip in."' I was like, 'Wow, God, you guys are scraping,'" she told the "Morning Joe" panel.
"I mean, yeah, when they've got to email you?" co-host Joe Scarborough laughed along with the rest of the panel.
"It was like a video," she explained before grimacing and adding, "It was jarring. Very close up."
Donald Trump claimed to have exactly enough cash to pay off his New York fraud judgment in an early morning, all-caps rant.
The ex-president was ordered by justice Arthur Engoron to pay $454 million in penalties after he was found liable for habitually defrauding lenders by inflating property values for his own financial benefit, and he complained that New York Attorney General Letitia James had brought the case to hurt his re-election chances, although she filed the lawsuit two months before he officially announced.
"Through hard work, talent, and luck, I currently have almost five hundred million dollars in cash, a substantial amount of which I intended to use in my campaign for president," Trump posted on Truth Social.
Trump just entered into an agreement with the Republican National Committee and state parties that will send donations first to his campaign committee and then to the leadership PAC that pays his legal bills before the national GOP gets a cut, and his Save America PAC has already spent more than $72.5 million on legal expenses since the start of 2021.
"The often overturned political hack judge on the rigged and corrupt A.G. case, where I have done nothing wrong, knew this, wanted to take it away from me, and that's where and why he came up with the shocking number which, coupled with his crazy interest demand, is approximately $454,000,000," Trump posted.
The judge ordered Trump to pay $355 million in damages, but that number quickly ballooned due to a 9-percent interest rate, and he must put up a bond under New York law that amounts to 110 percent of that to stave off the penalty while the appeals process plays out, but the ex-president has been unable to find an insurer to cover that amount because they feel the loan is too risky.
"I did nothing wrong except win an election in 2016 that I wasn't expected to win, did even better in 2020, and now lead, by a lot, in 2024," Trump posted. "This is communism in America!"
James gave him a 30-day grace period to pay off the penalty that ends Monday, after which she may begin seizing his assets to satisfy the judgment.
During an appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," the head of the Anti-Defamation League scorched Donald Trump for trying to tell American Jews how to vote when he has a long history of consorting with white supremacists.
Speaking with co-host Joe Scarborough, ADL head Jonathan Greenblatt first listened to a recording to the former president telling podcast host Sebastian Gorka recently, "Any Jewish person that votes for Democrats hates their religion, hates everything about Israel and they should be ashamed of themselves."
Asked for comment, he replied, "Well, there's a lot there; let me try to break it down. First, with respect to what President Trump said, obviously, it is patently false and prejudicial."
"It is bigotry to say that Jews hate Israel if they vote for the Democratic Party," he continued. "I don't need President Trump or any politician to lecture me on how I am supposed to vote. Israel has been a bipartisan concern for decades and decades and decades. There's been consensus on supporting the Jewish state because it is a democracy, because it is our best ally in the Middle East, because it is committed to the same kind of values America is committed to."
"For that reason, again, Democrats and Republicans have been good on Israel," he added. "Look, the person who dines with [white supremacist] Nick Fuentes, you know it is calling the kettle black to tell us what is anti-Semitic. I mean, give me a break. really?"
