When recently on the stand in the trial over fraud allegations from New York state Attorney General Letitia James against members of the Trump family and close associates of theirs, Michael Cohen — former lawyer to ex-President Trump — implicated three adult children of the former president.
“Cohen testified that Trump’s three oldest children — Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump — assisted with his financial statements by giving information about projects they were involved with,” NBC reported. And it’s these financial statements that, in general, have provided the foundation for the case from James, which alleges there were brazen misrepresentations in these claims of value for assets tied to Trump. Donald Jr. and Eric are named in James’ case, while Ivanka was formerly a target as well before a court removed her on statute of limitations concerns.
Still, all three are scheduled to soon testify, facing questions from James’ team — who will have the chance to examine their relationships to these ostensibly false statements.
Eric specifically has been referenced in other testimony as well, including remarks from now former Trump Organization executive Jeffrey McConney and an individual who’s worked at the real estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield. Perhaps most notably, the individual from the outside firm said Eric had, in fact, been involved in discussions related to the claimed value for Trump assets — which seemed to flatly contradict comments made earlier in a deposition for which Eric sat. James pointed to the discrepancy in brief remarks outside of court.
In connection to other testimony from Cohen in which some thought he’d seemed to contradict himself, Trump’s corner sought a quick win from the presiding judge, but the judge — Arthur Engoron — rebuffed this push, concluding that there was plenty of other evidence even if there were problems with Cohen’s testimony. Cohen had been seeking to clarify that his argument was that Trump had communicated an ambition for stated values of his assets to be raised… but that Trump didn’t do so in precise language, instead giving himself an air of plausible deniability.
