There's something worse than being forced to sell off assets to pay a fine.
Longtime investigative reporter Susanne Craig noticed a key moment in the final arguments in the New York fraud trial against Donald Trump. Trump's lack of liquidity was cited as a possible motive for his grossly inflating his wealth.
"The argument has been that he submitted these statements of financial condition in order to get better rates at the banks," she said. "And they went through some of the spending that Donald Trump has been doing recently. There have been a lot of renovations at three properties. He put $250 million into Doral and the old post office; he spent $225 million on renovations."
What the prosecutors said is that Trump was in a "cash crunch," and that is why he needed to inflate his wealth, which would have fallen below a certain point that would have cost him more or would have removed the possibility of being able to get capital from banks.
ALSO READ: How Trump's campaign visits cost local police departments
"Then secondly, I was listening to it because he is facing coming into a judgment with this judge of penalties going up to $370 million," Craig also pointed out. "We're looking at the hundreds of millions of dollars range. The attorney general painted the picture that the cash position is not good. It also supports the analysis that we have done at The New York Times that he doesn't have a lot of cash on hand to meet a penalty of that size."
It means, she explained, that Trump will be in a position where he'll have to sell off some of his properties. He will face the humiliation of being a giant in the New York real estate world and falling so far.
Former senior Robert Mueller prosecutor Andrew Weissmann explained that while there's "no crime of being cheap, if it's motive for you to put down something false," then it is.
He also noted Craig's point about Trump being forced to sell his assets could be even more undignified because there has been a financial monitor appointed to handle the Trump Organization finances from the point at which fraud was determined. The monitor may seize the assets to sell them off in a kind of fire-sale.
"Very often the courts of appeals will require a cash bond," said Weissmann. "And so that issue of can he wait until the appeal is over to start paying this, that may not be an option."
See the conversation below or at the link here.
Trump may be forced to endure something more undignified than selling his assets: analystyoutu.be
