Trump's Troubles

Why We Can’t Just Shrug Off the Fani Willis Scandal

“If the DA prosecuting Trump prolonged an investigation to justify a hefty salary for a romantic partner, that is a genuine conflict of interest that would require her dismissal.”

The Daily Beast is no friend to Trump or America First.

 

To the extent that there is any valid complaint, it is that tax fraud among the rich is endemic and almost never caught or penalized.

Still trying to get a feel how common this specific form of fraud is. I had a feel about the commonality of his property valuation discrepancy (artificially high for bank statements to get loans; artificially low for ad valorem tax purposes). That is common, from my experience, and also occurs in a lot of family probate disputes. Property to be divided is valued below market value for estate tax purposes, which the IRS accepts within reason) but then the family member seeking to buy out family members tries to use that artificially reduced value.

What DT did different was the EXTREME discrepancies, multiples beyond anything that reputable lawyers would come close to signing off on.

One "trick" we often use for this form of tax fraud, i.e. loan forgiveness (discharge) that should be reported as taxable income but is not, is the family member that took a lot of money from M&D that were understood as loans to be repaid from their distribution, but they later claim mom or dad orally "forgave" in a private conversation. We ask for the tax returns treating that "forgiveness" as income.

DT's scheme is obviously planned and large and the target of the fraud is the IRS, not siblings. But same principles.

 

Does zero to establish reasonable doubt for Trump even if true. Who she is dating is unconnected to the crime Trump committed.

 

It matters not to the cultists. If she smashed a mailbox as a teen or was late returning library book, they would seize upon that to defend their orange god.

 

I think the play here is to get her dismissed, get a more Trump friendly DA appointed, and have that person drop the charges.

 

One issue is that Trump's arguments often fall apart after being widely disseminated as talking points, and they will just move on to the next thing. The correspondence from Trump's lawyer is in the link, and she says she just had questions based upon a New York Post article. Trump's lawyer says she now considers the matter resolved.

https://www.meidastouch.com/news/alina-habba-backs-down-fast-after-threat-of-sanctions

After E. Jean Carroll's lawyer Roberta Kaplan filed a scathing letter with the court this morning ripping Alina Habba's frivolous and false allegations that Judge Kaplan mentored her over 30 years ago, Habba responded with a letter saying she would like to just forget the whole thing.

Kaplan denied in her response to the court that she was ever mentored by Judge Kaplan and said she didn't even remember him from the time they both worked for the same large law firm for less than two years together. Kaplan also suggested that Habba planted the allegation in the NY Post with no corroboration just to justify filing the frivolous letter for media attention, and that she is considering seeking sanctions against Habba for making the allegations without any evidence. You can read my story about that here.

Habba responded to Kaplan's letter less than two hours later, denying that she was the source of the Post story. Habba then said that she accepts Kaplan's representation that there was no mentoring of her by Lewis Kaplan in 1992-93, and that she is prepared to drop it now and forget the whole thing.

 

It feels like a replay of only poor people pay taxes(Helmsley). Only this time the poor people are applauding the fraudster.

 

Trump Super PAC paid $50 million in lawyer fees in 2023. 2024 bill might be even higher, with more court appearances.

 

At least he is fleecing Republican donors and not the general electorate.

 

He does love the poorly educated.

 

Hasn’t it always been like that? All the election challenges looked like they were done by Monty Python

 

Not to mention there is ZERO evidence the investigation was prolonged beyond the time necessitated by its complexity. The story made some knowledge-light readers feel better, though.

 

Roger Parloff with a great thread on the legal issues behind the 14th Am, Art 3 disqualification for insurrection issue

 

Thanks for posting. I won't pretend to know what SCOTUS will do, especially since there seems to be multiple ways they could rule, but certainly doesn't appear to be a 9-0 slam dunk. Of course that could still happen but doesn't look like a foregone conclusion.