Life just keeps getting worse and worse for the scandal-ridden ex-president, as New York Attorney General Letitia James is now reportedly calling on the court to start slapping Donald Trump with steep daily fines as he continues to delay and refuse to turn over the documents that he was court-ordered to produce in connection to a subpoena from James’ office in her investigation in the former president’s family company, the Trump Organization.
Today, the New York Attorney General officially filed a court motion asking the courts to hold the disgraced ex-president in contempt of court and seeking daily fines for his blatant refusal to comply.
In a new statement, Attorney General James said, “The judge’s order was crystal clear: Donald J. Trump must comply with our subpoena and turn over relevant documents to my office. Instead of obeying a court order, Mr. Trump is trying to evade it. We are seeking the court’s immediate intervention because no one is above the law.”
Ultimately James is seeking a fine of $10,000 that would apply daily against Trump for every day that he does not produce the documents her office has requested, in compliance with the court order against him.
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The Daily Beast reports that assistant Attorney General Andrew Amer wrote in the court filing, “This court’s order was not an opening bid for a negotiation or an invitation for a new round of challenges to the subpoena. The ship has long since sailed on Mr. Trump’s ability to raise any such objections.”
James’ office wrote in the filing, “The Trump Organization is not presently searching any of Mr. Trump’s custodial files or devices, and has no intention of doing so between now and April 15, 2022.”
Trump and his family have worked tirelessly yet unsuccessfully to shut down the New York Attorney General’s investigation into his family business, but James keeps marching forward, recently announcing that her office discovered “significant evidence” pointing to fraudulent or misleading practices within the Trump Organization. James’ findings ultimately resulted in the resignation of one of the company’s top accounting firms, who admitted that a staggering decade’s worth of financial documents they produced on the Trump Organization “should no longer be relied upon.”
Back in December, after hearing two hours’ worth of verbal arguments, state judge Arthur Engoron shot down a desperate plea by Donald, Ivanka, and Don Jr. Trump to quash the subpoenas issued against them by James’ office. To make matters that much worse for the Trump clan, he proceeded to order that all three of them must sit for depositions in James’ case no later than 21 days after the ruling.
The Trumps’ lawyers immediately pushed back on this ruling, arguing that the subpoenas were little more than a pawn for James to secure evidence in a parallel Trump Organization investigation that she’s involved in, and accused the NY AG of trying to cheat them out of a law that would essentially grant them blanket immunity for their testimonies.
Engoron ultimately ruled that the Trump family’s argument “completely misses the mark,” and pointed out that all of the Trump family members were well within their right to invoke the 5th Amendment during the depositions to avoid incriminating themselves.
He also specifically pointed out that Donald’s middle son Eric did just that, “more than 500 times,” during his October 2020 deposition in James’ case.
Engoron laid waste to Trump’s argument that James’ case was somehow politically motivated, simply because she is a Democrat.
Featured image via Political Tribune gallery
