The criminal trial for the Trump Organization is underway this week on charges covering a years-long scheme to evade taxes on high-dollar benefits provided to executives, a lot of which went to Allen Weisselberg, a longtime personal ally of the former president himself.
Weisselberg pleaded guilty to all 15 of the felony charges he faced after failing to get the case dismissed, but the company resisted. Since a company obviously can’t go to jail, it is facing the prospect of hefty fines — at $1.6 million — if prosecutors convince jurors. Weisselberg hasn’t directly implicated Trump in the ex-president’s personal capacity, but he has directly implicated the former president’s family business in the years of tax evasion. Throughout those years, Weisselberg benefited from a lot, including Manhattan apartment space, cars for which lease payments were covered, and even tuition for grandchildren of his. In connection to his plea deal, Weisselberg is testifying at the Trump company’s trial. If he doesn’t testify truthfully, he could face years of jail, instead of the just months-long stint that is currently looming. Weisselberg was also required to pay nearly $2 million before sentencing.
“This case is about greed and cheating, cheating on taxes,” Susan Hoffinger, a prosecutor on the team of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, said in court Monday. “The scheme was conducted, directed and authorized at the highest level of the accounting department.” She added to jurors that Weisselberg “will give you the inside story of how he conducted this tax scheme.” Although Trump wasn’t directly charged, the former president was already a topic of discussion. Hoffinger discussed his signatures on tuition money for Weisselberg’s family and a Manhattan apartment lease. Weisselberg also stood accused of concealing his New York City residency from the appropriate tax authorities, helping him evade further taxes. Susan Necheles, serving as an attorney for the Trump business, tried to isolate the blame for the tax evasion on Weisselberg.
“You must not consider this case to be a referendum on President Trump or his politics,” she told jurors. “It started and it ended with Allen Weisselberg. Allen Weisselberg did this.” She also claimed Weisselberg is under “extreme pressure” leading to him implicating the company — falsely, in her telling. The company and Trump himself are also facing a sweeping civil lawsuit from New York state Attorney General Letitia James, who alleges a separate years-long pattern of financial corruption at the firm involving deceptive statements of value. Trump recently lost in an attempt to move the case from in front of New York Judge Arthur Engoron, who has previously ruled against the former president during the preceding investigation. Trump subsequently singled out Engoron — by name — in public complaints about the case on Truth Social, where he essentially villainized the judge.
