Barbara Jones, the court-appointed monitor supervising Trump business practices amid the fraud case from New York state Attorney General Letitia James, has reported some $40 million in initially undisclosed transfers involving bank accounts tied to a Trump financial trust that were supposed to be under her supervision.
Trial in the case is currently moving forward, with outcomes at this stage set to be decided by the presiding judge, Arthur Engoron. The money that Jones uncovered included $29 million meant to cover tax obligations incurred by the ex-president and millions more produced in connection to the wide-ranging litigation from writer E. Jean Carroll, who accused Trump of both sexual misconduct and defamation. “We have discussed with Defendants why these transactions were not previously disclosed and I have now clarified (and Defendants have agreed) that all transfers of assets out of the Trust exceeding $5 million must be reported,” Jones said.
The language of Jones’ letter suggests that the Trump team had come up with some kind of systematic explanation for why they weren’t disclosing these transactions to her, which the monitor evidently denied. She credited other issues to simple oversight, and that explanation is absent in this section. While it’s unclear any specific consequences will stem from the Trump team’s initial failures to meet these reporting requirements, it’s probably not the most supportive look as they try and make the case before Engoron that their disputed business practices over the years were actually legitimate.
Other notable points of Jones’ recent, regular update to the court on her Trump supervision include a note that she’d sought documentation related to the operations of the Trump business behind Truth Social, which is the former president’s alternative social media platform. Jones didn’t specify in particular detail what she might have found in such materials. In sum, she described a new state of what she called “enhanced monitoring” for the defendants following these lapses.
