Trump said 'Ku Klux Klan-dressed protesters' who allege they were beaten by his bodyguards have 'no one to blame but themselves'


Trump said protesters who allege that they were beaten up by his security detail outside Trump Tower in 2015 had "no one to blame but themselves." The former president on Monday sat for a four-hour-long deposition about the case. 

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Cheryl Teh
Mon, October 18, 2021

Former President Donald Trump sat for a four-hour deposition in regards to a 2015 lawsuit.

Protesters allege in the lawsuit that they were hit by members of Trump's security detail.

Trump said in the deposition the protesters have "no one to blame but themselves."

Former President Donald Trump said on Monday that protesters who alleged his bodyguards beat them had "no one to blame but themselves."

The former president made these comments after sitting for a four-hour-long deposition on October 18. He was asked to testify in a lawsuit brought by protesters who allege that his bodyguards beat them up outside Trump Tower during a 2015 demonstration.

The incident happened on September 3, 2015, when Trump was on the campaign trail. A crowd of demonstrators had gathered, some dressed in Ku Klux Klan robes and hoods, gathered outside Trump Tower to protest then-presidential candidate Trump's comments that Mexicans were "rapists" who were "bringing drugs" and "bringing crime" to America in June 2015.

Trump's security detail was then filmed approaching protesters and wrangling the placards they held from their hands. Five of the protesters filed a lawsuit on September 9, 2015, against Trump, the Trump Organization, the Trump 2016 campaign, and several members of Trump's security detail, alleging that they were beaten during the scuffle.

It is unclear if any of the five protesters who are suing Trump were wearing Klan robes.

"The Klu [sic] Klux Klan dressed protester case should have never been brought as the plaintiffs have no one to blame but themselves," wrote Trump in a statement posted to Twitter by his spokeswoman Liz Harrington on Monday. "Rather than protest peacefully, the plaintiffs intentionally sought to rile up a crowd by blocking the entrance to Trump Tower on 5th Avenue, in the middle of the day, wearing Klu Klux Klan [sic] robes and hoods."

Trump added that his security staff tried to "de-escalate the situation."

"After years of litigation, I was pleased to have had the opportunity to tell my side of this ridiculous story - Just one more example of baseless harassment of your favorite President," Trump said in the statement.

Trump avoided sitting for a deposition while president, arguing that he should receive immunity from testifying as president. But earlier this month, New York State Supreme Court Justice Doris Gonzalez ordered Trump to sit for a deposition regarding the case.

Trump also faces several other ongoing civil lawsuits, which are moving through the legal system more quickly now that he is out of office.


Trump Dodges Questions in Marathon Deposition Over Protest Violence, Lawyer Claims

Kate Briquelet, Lachlan Cartwright
Mon, October 18, 2021


David Dee Delgado/Getty

Donald Trump testified under oath for about four-and-a-half hours on Monday over his role in a 2015 incident where protesters allege they were assaulted by his security team outside Trump Tower.

The deposition took place at Trump Tower, from 10 a.m. to about 2:30 p.m., according to the activists’ lawyer, Benjamin Dictor, who claimed that there were a handful of questions Trump declined to answer. The attorney added that he planned to ask the judge in a civil suit stemming from the episode later this month whether the ex-commander in chief must respond to those queries.

Amanda Miller, a spokesperson for the Trump Organization, vigorously disputed the account of the proceedings.

“Mr. Dictor’s claim is completely false,” she said. “President Trump answered every single question that was asked of him at his deposition today. There was not a single question he did not answer. They were just not the answers Mr. Dictor was hoping for.”

Trump was joined by three or four Secret Service personnel and two lawyers, Dictor said, adding that the ex-president was presented with evidence, including documents and videos relevant to the case.

“This deposition was like any other deposition of an employer who was a defendant in a civil matter,” Dictor told The Daily Beast following the proceeding. (Dictor is a labor attorney who also represents the NewsGuild, a media workers’ union that represents staffers at many outlets, including The Daily Beast’s editorial union).

“Everything proceeded professionally,” Dictor added.

A video of the lengthy testimony will be played for a jury when the case heads to trial, which is likely to be scheduled during an Oct. 25 case conference.

“After years of litigation, I was pleased to have had the opportunity to tell my side of this ridiculous story—just one more example of baseless harassment of your favorite President,” Trump said in a statement to The Daily Beast.

Trump’s attorney, Jeffrey Goldman, who was present for the deposition, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

As The Daily Beast previously reported, the reality TV maven turned president tried to quash a subpoena that would force him to testify in connection with the suit, but this year, a state appellate court dismissed Trump’s request.

HBO Exposes the Violent Chaos of Trump’s Jan. 6 Rioters in ‘Four Hours at the Capitol’

On Monday, the ex-president was expected to be questioned about whether he authorized or condoned his henchmen to manhandle protesters or otherwise remove activists from his events in general, as well as what role one particular guard—Keith Schiller—played in Trump’s inner circle.

Among the other potential subjects of inquiry on Monday was Matthew Calamari, the Trump Organization’s chief operating officer and former director of security who was present the day of the rally. Last month, sources told The Daily Beast that Calamari was under scrutiny by Manhattan prosecutors as part of a tax fraud probe into the business and its executives.

Since leaving office, Trump has continued to face a wave of litigation, including from his niece Mary Trump and Summer Zervos, who is suing Trump for defamation. Zervos, who was a contestant on The Apprentice, alleges Trump defamed her when he called her a liar after she accused him of sexual assault.

The protester case stems from a 2015 press conference, during which security guards allegedly roughed up a group of demonstrators who gathered outside the Fifth Avenue skyscraper to protest Trump’s notoriously racist outburst about Mexican immigrants. Months earlier, when announcing his candidacy, he said Mexico and other countries were “sending people” who were bringing drugs and crime to America. Trump also called immigrants “rapists.”

In response, Efrain Galicia and four other Mexican activists displayed a “Make America Racist Again” banner outside the building on Sept. 3, 2015. They also wore parody Ku Klux Klan costumes after Trump was endorsed by former KKK leader David Duke.

Days after the event, the activists filed a lawsuit in Bronx County Supreme Court alleging Trump’s security team attacked them and destroyed their property, and named Trump, his political campaign, the Trump Organization, and Schiller as defendants.

According to the complaint, Gary Uher, one of Trump’s guards, shoved a protester shortly after he put on his KKK costume. While a second activist filmed the incident, Trump security officer Edward Jon Deck Jr. allegedly shoved her, too, after ordering her to stop recording.

Galicia arrived with three protest signs soon after and set them against cement planters on the sidewalk. Uher and an unnamed guard approached the group and tossed Galicia’s banners to the ground, the lawsuit alleges. When Galicia went to reinstall his posters, Schiller “swiftly and menacingly approached Galicia” before ripping one banner in half and walking away with the other.

When Galicia followed Schiller to retrieve his property, the complaint alleges, Schiller “swung around and struck Galicia with a closed fist on the head with such force that it caused Galicia to stumble backwards.” Galicia says an unnamed guard then put him in a chokehold.

In a 2016 deposition of his own, Schiller testified that he clocked Galicia because he believed the protester was reaching for Schiller’s concealed firearm.

Schiller added, however, that he never discussed the Galicia incident with Trump. When asked if he always obeyed Trump’s orders to remove disruptive activists at events, Schiller replied, “Not always, no.”

“I’m not a robot,” Schiller testified. “It’s been times when it wasn’t appropriate and I didn’t do it.”

Meanwhile, in an affidavit, Uher said he “politely asked just one of the demonstrators (who was dressed in a Ku Klux Klan outfit) to move away from the main entrance” and that he “escorted this person a short distance so that pedestrian traffic in and out of the Premises would not be obstructed.” Uher, a former FBI agent, added, “Beyond this one very brief interaction, I had no other interactions with any of the many other demonstrators.”

Uher also said he was submitting a photo as an exhibit which showed him “gently guiding this individual down the sidewalk, without force…”

For his part, Deck also denied attacking any of the demonstrators. In a 2016 deposition, Deck said he saw someone “run after Mr. Schiller and jump on his back and grab him around the waist,” so he grabbed the person to protect the fellow guard.

“I saw somebody creating a very, very extremely dangerous situation of going for somebody’s gun on a waistband, underneath his—on his hip,” Deck testified.

“There is no other physical act that occurred which could give rise to any claim of an assault or battery,” Deck stated in a 2017 affidavit, “and I committed no such act.”

Read more at The Daily Beast.

WAIT, WHAT?
The IRS went easy on Trump's tax returns because he used accountants, congressional report says



Dareh Gregorian and Gretchen Morgenson and Amanda Terkel and Laura Strickler and Sarah Fitzpatrick

Thu, December 22, 2022 

House Democrats are scrutinizing why the Internal Revenue Service failed to fully audit Donald Trump's tax returns when he was in the White House, despite an agency policy mandating such a review.

Some insight into the lapse came in a report Tuesday from the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT), a bipartisan congressional panel that examined Trump's tax returns from 2015-20.

The report suggests that part of the reason the IRS gave Trump the benefit of the doubt was because he used professional accountants for his returns, a practice widely employed by wealthy individuals.

The use of accountants is no guarantee of financial honesty. In fact, Trump's own accountants ditched him this year after questions were raised about the accuracy of the information he was giving them.


Despite a policy mandating that IRS review a sitting president's returns, the agency did not begin to audit Trump until 2019 — two years into his presidency, and after Democrats took control of Congress.

The JCT said in its report this week that it was not able to interview any IRS agents directly, but its review of the audit materials show that the agent who did a “preliminary risk analysis to determine the scope of the examination” of Trump's 2015 return supported a “limited scope.”

“As additional support for a limited examination, the agent noted that the taxpayer hires a professional accounting firm and counsel to prepare and file his tax returns, and those parties perform the necessary activities to ensure the taxpayer properly reports all income and deduction items correctly,” the report said.

In its conclusion, the JCT questioned why the IRS agent reviewing the return gave the involvement of accountants so much weight.

“We also fail to understand why the fact that counsel and an accounting firm participated in tax preparation ensures the accuracy of the returns,” the report said. “We would assume this fact would be true of most, if not all, returns of high-net worth individuals, and do not believe such individuals should be subject to limited scope audits on this basis.”

“It does seem inequitable,” said Steven Rosenthal, a senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, a Washington think tank, who previously practiced tax law.

He added that the IRS’s over-reliance on, and deference to, professional accountants “illustrates how outgunned the IRS is.”

ProPublica reported in 2019 that the IRS audits the working poor at about the same rate as the wealthiest 1%, in part because audits of wealthier Americans are more time-consuming and require more resources.

Rosenthal said what troubled him the most was information in the report that indicated the IRS may have limited its inquiry into Trump’s taxes because of “case sensitivity.”

The agent noted the "complexity" of the review, given how the return tied back to earlier returns and numerous other Trump entities, but "decided not to utilize the Specialist Referral System in the practice network unless absolutely needed (due to case sensitivity); hence, no specialists were assigned," the JCT report said.

In other words, according to the JCT analysis, the agent assigned to the 2015 review did have other options available for dealing with the large, complex nature of Trump's taxes.

The audit of Trump's 2015 taxes was not part of the mandatory presidential review, the JCT report said, but a review of Trump’s 2016 taxes opened later in 2019 was.

That audit listed more concerns and asked for more documentation than the 2015 audit, but the JCT still noted a dozen more avenues where the agency should have pressed for more information, including $40 million in deductions.

The JTC also chided the agent conducting the 2016 audit for putting too much faith in Trump's accountants.

"While the IRS delved into more issues in 2016 than 2015, we are not comfortable with any reliance on professional tax preparation to ensure accuracy, and it does not appear any specialists were called in to assist," the report said. "As the audit is not complete, we cannot comment on the results of the audit."

The IRS did not respond to a request for comment.

The JCT report was issued Tuesday, after the House Ways and Means Committee voted to make Trump's 2015-20 tax returns public. Trump was the first president not to make his tax returns public since the 1970s.

The returns had been expected to be released this week, but Ways and Means Committee Chair Richard Neal, D-Mass., told reporters Thursday they might not be released for the “next couple of days” because staffers were still redacting sensitive personal information from the documents.

Neal is pressing for legislation that would require the IRS to publish and audit presidential tax returns.

The returns were prepared by the accounting firm Mazars, which quit working for Trump and the Trump Organization this year after investigations by the New York attorney general and Manhattan district attorney raised red flags about information Trump's entities had been providing Mazars for years.

New York AG Letitia James has since filed a $250 million suit against Trump and his company alleging they inflated the company's net worth by billions of dollars in order to get more favorable terms from banks and insurance companies, including on a decade of financial statements that had been prepared by Mazars.

In its resignation letter to the Trump Organization in February, Mazars Group General Counsel William J. Kelly said: “We write to advise that the Statements of Financial Condition for Donald J. Trump for the years ending June 30, 2011 — June 30, 2020, should no longer be relied upon and you should inform any recipients thereof who are currently relying upon one or more of those documents that those documents should not be relied upon.”

James also sent a criminal referral about her findings to the IRS. A spokesperson for the agency's criminal division told NBC News in September that “IRS Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) receives tips about potential criminal activity from a variety of sources every day. Special agents review information received for further criminal investigation. The agency doesn’t confirm the existence of investigations until court documents are publicly available.”

Trump has denied any wrongdoing, and his lawyer Alina Habba said of James' allegations that “we are confident that our judicial system will not stand for this unchecked abuse of authority, and we look forward to defending our client against each and every one of the Attorney General’s meritless claims.”


Donald Trump is America's poorest billionaire

Rick Newman
·Senior Columnist
Thu, December 22, 2022

Former President Donald Trump loses vast amounts of money. Yet he lives a gilded lifestyle and never runs short of the cash needed to pay lawyers perpetually defending him against charges large and small. How does he do it?

We’re gradually finding out, now that Congress has obtained six years’ of Trump’s tax returns from the IRS. Democrats investigating Trump’s finances haven’t yet released the full returns, but they’ve published two reports that provide an overview of Trump’s income and reveal how he keeps his tax bill remarkably low. Ordinary taxpayers might feel infuriated. Or envious.

From 2015 through 2020, Trump declared a positive income in two years and a negative income in four years. His losses heavily outweigh his gains. For the six years in total, Trump reported $52.6 million in negative income, or, in other words, $52.6 million in losses.

A typical worker can’t live on negative income. Yet Trump manages to do so. That’s because he uses business losses to offset real income and reduce the amount of taxes he owes. To a large extent, this is legal, given multiple provisions of the tax code that provide relief for business owners, and especially for real-estate developers such as Trump. The details of Trump’s complete tax returns will go a lot further toward explaining whether he cheats.

There’s considerable evidence that he does cheat. “Trump avoids paying taxes by creating a lot of losses, both real and fake,” tax lawyer Steve Rosenthal of the Tax Policy Center said. “From a tax standpoint he’s often underwater, but that’s an artifact of the tax system and not so much real.” Rosenthal calls Trump’s financial statements “tax-aggressive.”

Two New York Times exposés, based on 20 years of Trump’s financial data leaked by his niece Mary Trump, detailed many possible instances of tax fraud. The New York State attorney general is suing Trump for a variety of “dubious tax schemes … including instances of outright fraud.” One practice under scrutiny is valuing properties sharply lower in tax filings than in other business documents. Tax experts studying the two Congressional reports point out several red flags suggesting fraud, including undocumented charitable donations and payments to family members that might actually be gifts.

Trump has repeatedly derided probes of his finances as politically motivated “witch hunts,” and described himself as “smart” for using tax breaks to boost his take-home pay. Yet he never released his tax returns, even though he pledged to do so many times. The Internal Revenue Service is supposed to audit the tax returns of every president, but it never finished an audit of Trump while he was president. There’s evidence Trump or his advisers pressured the IRS to back off.

Trump does earn substantial amounts of money, though the exact sources of his income aren’t defined in the two Congressional overview reports. From 2015 through 2020, for instance, Trump earned $59 million in interest and dividend payments, ranging from a low of $6.8 million in 2017 to a high of $11.4 million in 2019. Most of that income is from interest payments, though it’s not clear if that is simple interest on financial assets or something more complex.

From 2015 through 2019, Trump earned $86 million in capital gains. The source of these gains isn’t clear, but it’s well known that Trump makes a lot of money by licensing his name for use on commercial properties and other types of products. There’s no capital gain listed for 2020, for reasons unknown.

For most Americans, the main source of income is wages, otherwise known as the paycheck you earn for going to a job. Not Trump. His wage income was $14,141 in 2015 and a paltry $978 in 2016. Once he became president, his wage income jumped to nearly $400,000, because of his presidential salary. Trump said he didn’t need the money and would donate his presidential pay to various federal agencies.

Add it up, and Trump’s income from those sources was about $147 million for those six years, or $24.6 million per year. That would have placed Trump among the top 0.1% of earners and garnered a tax bill of millions each year.

Yet Trump paid just $1.8 million in income taxes, or $300,000 per year. As a percentage of those three income sources, that’s just 1.2%. In 2020, Trump paid no income tax. In 2016 and 2017, he paid just $750. President Joe Biden, by comparison, paid $150,000 on $568,000 in income in 2021, for an effective tax rate of 26%.

Unlike most people, Trump uses massive losses to whittle his tax bill to nearly nothing. Offsetting his $147 million in income for those six years is $221 million in losses, for net income during those six years of -$52 million, or a loss of around $8.7 million per year. But Trump almost certainly does not end up $8.7 million poorer every year, as the numbers suggest. Instead, he spreads business losses across many years, as the tax code allows, to offset income in years when he may have endured no losses at all.

Some of those business losses are doubtless legit. Trump’s Washington, D.C., hotel, for instance, reportedly lost $70 million during the four years he was president. Those losses could help offset Trump’s income for years into the future, keeping his tax bill low. Trump, who takes pride in his business acumen, says the report of losses is not accurate, but his company is private and doesn’t have to report its numbers publicly.

The biggest question regarding Trump’s taxes is whether he overstates or invents business losses to avoid paying taxes even more. There are many ways Trump could do this, such as inflating the cost of maintenance or other expenses at his properties or using loans as income and then defaulting on them. Trump’s finances are housed in a trust that includes more than 500 business entities, making his tax reporting extremely complex. Many tax experts say an underfunded IRS is woefully outgunned against wealthy filers like Trump whose lawyers and accountants can create endless streams of money to follow and simply exhaust IRS auditors.

One of the Congressional reports, by the Joint Committee on Taxation, raised a slew of questions about the IRS’s deferential handling of Trump’s tax filings while Trump was president. The committee criticized the IRS for accepting the accuracy of Trump’s filings without question and for failing to appoint specialists to examine unusual elements of Trump’s returns. The committee also listed several red-flag items the IRS should examine more closely, including the validity of a $105 million loss carried over from one year to another and unsubstantiated charitable deductions of at least $21 million.

The House Ways and Means Committee says it will soon release Trump’s complete returns for 2015 through 2020, which will give tax sleuths reams of information that will help piece together Trump’s broader tax strategy. Those returns will most likely list the sources for all of his claimed business losses, which will help establish whether they’re legitimate or not.

The publication of Trump’s tax returns, which took years and involved several court challenges, is a political bonanza for Democrats, who certainly don’t mind embarrassing Trump just as his political fortunes are dimming. But Trump’s tax controversies also highlight some gaps Congress could close if it chooses to act. One thing Congress could do is pass a law requiring the IRS to audit every president's tax returns, instead of merely abiding by internal policy that any given president could push back on. The House of Representatives quickly passed such a bill on Dec. 22, but the Senate is unlikely to get to it this year, which means a reboot for the measure in 2023. Trump’s taxes also revive important questions of tax fairness, such as the lower tax rates on capital gains that are the main source of income for many wealthy people than on the labor income middle-class workers rely on.

The Trump returns also make public the fact that Trump has probably enjoyed very favorable IRS treatment for years, probably well before he became president. That doesn’t mean anybody will necessarily prosecute Trump for tax fraud, but the IRS is now in the position of having to prove it’s not a lapdog that rolls over when an insistent president puts on the pressure. The IRS will now appoint all the specialists necessary to properly audit Trump’s complicated returns, which could cost Trump a lot of money if the agency disallows millions in deductions. Trump will never be poor, but he always knew that a public glimpse at his tax returns would make him less rich.

FIRST FAMILY OF GRIFTERS 
Donald Trump: Former US president receives subpoena

Trump's two eldest children Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka have also been summoned to testify in an investigation into the family's business practices.



The disclosure was made public via a court filing

New York's attorney general issued subpoenas to former US President Donald Trump and his two eldest children on Monday.

Attorney General Letitia James' office said in the filing that it is seeking testimony and documents from Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump "in connection with an investigation into the valuation of properties owned or controlled'' by the former president and his company, the Trump Organization.

The subpoenas come amid an ongoing criminal investigation into the organization and its executives and whether they manipulated the value of some of its assets.

The investigation into Trump's business affairs

James has spent more than two years looking into whether the Trump Organization deceived banks or tax officials regarding the value of the group's assets, increasing them to gain favorable loan terms or diminishing them to enjoy tax benefits.

The attorney general's efforts to get testimony from Trump was reported in December, but the court filing Monday was the first public acknowledgement that investigators were also seeking information from his two eldest children.

The family are expected to try and quash the subpoenas, sparking a probable legal battle similar to the one that occurred last year after James' office subpoenaed another Trump son.

Trump instigated legal proceedings against James on December 20, seeking to end the investigation after she called for him to sit for a deposition on January 7.

New York attorney general subpoenas Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump Jr. in fraud inquiry


Issued on: 03/01/2022 -

New York Attorney General Letitia James recently subpoenaed former President Donald Trump and his two eldest children, demanding their testimony in connection with an ongoing civil investigation into the family’s business practices, according to a court filing made public Monday.

The subpoenas for Trump, his son, Donald Trump Jr., and his daughter, Ivanka Trump, stem from an investigation “into the valuation of properties owned or controlled” by Trump and his company, the Trump Organization, the filing said.

Messages seeking comment was left with lawyers for the Trumps and James' office.

The attorney general's attempt to get testimony from the former president was reported in December, but the court filing Monday was the first public disclosure that investigators were also seeking information from Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr.

The Trumps are expected to file court papers seeking to quash the subpoenas, setting up a legal fight similar to one that played out last year after James' office subpoenaed another Trump son.

Trump sued James last month, seeking to end the investigation after she requested that he sit for a Jan. 7 deposition. Trump's lawsuit, filed in federal court, alleges that the probe has violated his constitutional rights in a “thinly-veiled effort to publicly malign Trump and his associates.”

Monday's court filing was the attorney general office's first public acknowledgement that it has previously subpoenaed Trump's testimony.

James, a Democrat, has spent more than two years looking at whether the Trump Organization misled banks or tax officials about the value of assets - inflating them to gain favorable loan terms or minimizing them to reap tax savings.

James’ investigators last year interviewed one of Trump’s sons, Trump Organization executive Eric Trump, as part of the probe. James’ office went to court to enforce a subpoena on the younger Trump and a judge forced him to testify after his lawyers abruptly canceled a previously scheduled deposition.

Although the civil investigation is separate from a criminal investigation being run by the Manhattan district attorney's office, James’ office has been involved in both. Earlier this year, former District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. gained access to the longtime real estate mogul’s tax records after a multiyear fight that twice went to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Before he left office at the end of last year, Vance convened a new grand jury to hear evidence as he weighed whether to seek more indictments in the investigation, which resulted in tax fraud charges in July against the Trump Organization and its longtime CFO Allen Weisselberg.

Weisselberg pleaded not guilty to charges alleging he and the company evaded taxes on lucrative fringe benefits paid to executives.

Both investigations are at least partly related to allegations made in news reports and by Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, that Trump had a history of misrepresenting the value of assets.

James’ office issued subpoenas to local governments as part of the civil probe for records pertaining to Trump’s estate north of Manhattan, Seven Springs, and a tax benefit Trump received for placing land into a conservation trust. Vance later issued subpoenas seeking many of the same records.

James’ office has also been looking at similar issues relating to a Trump office building in New York City, a hotel in Chicago and a golf course near Los Angeles. Her office also won a series of court rulings forcing Trump’s company and a law firm it hired to turn over troves of records.

(AP)

President Trump's tax returns show he has company: How rich Americans avoid taxes

Nathan Bomey, USA TODAY•September 28, 2020

Details of President Trump's tax returns have been revealed by reports from New York Times

Like President Donald Trump, rich Americans often deploy sophisticated tax-avoidance strategies to maximize their wealth.

Not to be confused with tax evasion, which is illegal, tax avoidance is entirely legal, even if many view it as unfair. .

A sweeping New York Times report published Sunday revealed numerous tax reduction strategies used by Trump. He's not alone. Affluent taxpayers often have more avenues than ordinary Americans to avoid paying Uncle Sam.

Wealthy Americans are the largest source of under-reported income, according to IRS data analyzed by researchers. The top 1% of American taxpayers account for about 34% of misreported income, according to one study published in the National Tax Journal.

Still, many wealthy Americans deploy complex, arcane but wholly legal strategies to minimize their tax obligations. Some use fairly straight-forward strategies that allow them to minimize their taxes under the tax code.

President Donald Trump points to a question as he speaks during a briefing with reporters in the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House.

Here are some of the most common tax-avoidance strategies deployed by the wealthy:
Growing wealth through investments

It's much harder to avoid taxes on your paycheck than on your investments.

In general, the federal government taxes regular wages at higher rates than investment income. The long-term capital gains tax rate maxes out at 20%, while the highest income-tax rate is currently 37%.

In other words, if you make a salary of $1 million, the government keeps $370,000. But if you make $1 million on stocks or similar investments, the government keeps $200,000.
Selling assets at strategic times

Taxes on assets like stocks and real estate investments aren't owed until they are sold. That helps people like Jeff Bezos, the Amazon CEO, founder and richest person in the world, to grow their wealth rapidly while avoiding a huge tax bill. Then they can be strategic about when they sell.

By stockpiling assets without selling, rich investors can minimize their tax burden.

"Wealthy individuals can wait to sell until it makes the most sense for them, such as a year in which they will have large capital losses to offset the gain," according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

Unrealized capital gains accounted for more than one-third of the assets held by the richest 1% of Americans in 2013, according to a Federal Reserve analysis. By comparison, the bottom 90% of Americans have only 6% of their assets in unrealized capital gains.
Using business income loopholes to reduce personal tax liability

The 2017 tax bill passed signed into law by Trump allowed for a 20% deduction on certain business income that passes through partnerships, sole proprietorships and S-corporations.

This is income that individuals report on their personal IRS returns, but the tax break allows them to reduce the tax rate on that money by up to 7.4 points, according to the CBPP.

This setup is most likely to help the wealthy: 61% of the benefits go to the wealthiest 1% of Americans, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

Lisa De Simone, associate professor of accounting at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin, said many tax breaks that are available for business owners were put in place to stimulate risk-taking and innovation.

“There’s a notion that there are lots of tips and tricks that only the wealthy can take advantage of,” De Simone said. “The provisions weren’t written to try to help the wealthy get away with things.”

Instead, she said, new businesses can benefit when they’re able to deduct early losses from income.

“You don’t have to be super-rich in order to claim a business loss," she said.
Taking advantage of death tax policies to enrich their heirs

The tax code allows Americans to build wealth through deferred capital gains and then pass those assets tax-free along to their heirs upon death.

Called the "stepped-up basis" tax break, this loophole "encourages wealthy people to turn as much of their income into capital gains as possible and hold on to assets until death, when a lifetime of gain becomes permanently exempt from tax," according to the CBPP.

To be sure, the inheritor could be subject to paying the estate tax if the total value of the estate exceeds a certain threshold. But that threshold has been substantially increased.

The 2017 tax law doubled the amount of a deceased person's wealth that's shielded from the estate tax from about $5.5 million to more than $11 million. The limit is poised to reset to its original amount in 2025 unless Congress takes action.

Contributing: Susan Tompor of the Detroit Free Press

Follow USA TODAY reporter Nathan Bomey on Twitter @NathanBomey.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump tax returns: How rich Americans avoid taxes

Report: Financial records appear to show Ivanka Trump got 'consulting fees' to reduce father's tax bill

Catherine Garcia,
The Week•September 27, 2020


Tax records obtained by The New York Times appear to show that President Trump reduced his taxable income by treating his eldest daughter, Ivanka Trump, as a consultant, then deducting this as a business expense.

The Times reports that Trump Organization tax records show between 2010 and 2018, President Trump wrote off as business expenses $26 million in "consulting fees." The consultants are not listed by name, but the Times compared the tax records to financial disclosures Ivanka Trump filed when she started working at the White House in 2017 as a senior adviser to her father. Ivanka Trump reported receiving $747,622 in payments from a consulting company she co-owned — the same exact amount in consulting fees the Trump Organization claimed as tax deductions for hotel projects in Hawaii and Vancouver.

As an executive officer with the Trump Organization, Ivanka Trump managed the Hawaii and Vancouver hotel projects, "meaning she appears to have been treated as a consultant on the same hotel deals that she helped manage as part of her job at her father's business," the Times said. Ivanka Trump earned a salary of about $480,000 while serving as an executive with the Trump Organization, and the amount jumped up to $2 million after her father became president, the Times reports; since leaving to work in the White House, she has not received a salary from the company.

The tax filings also show that Trump collected $5 million for a hotel deal in Azerbaijan and reported $1.1 million in consulting fees and made $3 million in Dubai while reporting a $630,000 consulting fee. People with direct knowledge of the deals told the Times they were not aware of any consultants or third parties who would have been paid in connection with the projects. When asked about the matter, Alan Garten, a lawyer for the Trump Organization, did not comment.

The Internal Revenue Service said for consulting fees to be deducted as an expense, they must be an "ordinary and necessary" part of running a business, and the recipient must still pay income tax.


Trumpworld is imploding



Rick Newman
Senior Columnist,
Yahoo Finance•September 28, 2020

Donald Trump has many well-known enemies—and some stealthy ones, as well.

The main takeaway from a New York Times report on Trump’s tax records is that Trump claims to be a billionaire, yet in some years pays little or nothing in federal income taxes. Trump uses many legal tax credits to lower his bill, but may also break the law by exaggerating his business expenses or mischaracterizing payouts to family members.

There’s also an unstated revelation in the Times expose: Somebody close to Trump turned on him, leaking financial information that could be both politically damaging and legally treacherous. The Times isn’t saying where it got the detailed information on nearly 20 years of Trump tax returns, and isn’t even releasing the documents, to protect the source. But it seems obvious that a Trump insider is trying to damage him, flouting Trump’s famous demand for loyalty from anybody who works with him.

Trump is in a close reelection race, and it’s possible he could beat Democrat Joe Biden once the ballots are counted in November. At the same time, however, a more ominous scenario is unfolding. Trump’s notoriety as a combative president has brought unprecedented scrutiny to a family business that for decades was a black box, its inner workings secret. Trump is now facing more legal scrutiny than ever, including criminal probes into possible felonies. There are even signs his supposedly iron grip on the Republican Party could shatter if there’s an opportunity to dispatch Trump and move on.

First, the legal cases. The Manhattan district attorney is investigating Trump and his businesses for various types of fraud, probably including some of the tax-avoidance strategies described in a 2018 New York Times feature. The DA investigation is secret, so it’s not clear what the exact focus is. But city, state and federal prosecutors have an obligation to investigate possible crimes if they become aware of them, and the intense scrutiny of Trump’s finances since he became president may have surfaced plenty of trouble. Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, went to jail in part for his role facilitating a campaign-finance felony: the hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal. Trump signed the checks, meaning he’s at least as complicit as Cohen.

The New York State attorney general is mounting a separate investigation into whether Trump has misstated asset values to lower his tax payments or defraud lenders or insurers. The New York AG initiated this probe after Cohen testified before Congress in 2019 and accused Trump of fraud. Cohen might seem like an old story at this point, but the information he revealed after the FBI raided his office in 2018 could fuel investigations into Trump for years, and possibly lead to convictions.

It’s obviously tricky to investigate a sitting president, one reason the federal Justice Dept. has had no apparent role in probing Trump since William Barr became attorney general in 2019. But Trump won’t be president forever, and federal investigators could join the city and state probes of Trump at some point. The Justice Department’s Southern District of New York led the Cohen prosecution, which culminated in Cohen’s 2018 guilty plea on eight criminal counts. If Cohen provided incriminating information on Trump as part of that case, it would be logical for the Justice Dept. to pick up the probe once Trump is no longer president and certain legal privileges of the office expire.

SEPTEMBER 28th 2020: According to a report in The New York Times, Donald Trump paid $750 in federal income tax in both 2016 and 2017. - File Photo by: Dennis Van Tine/STAR MAX/IPx 2016 4/17/16 Donald Trump campaigns in Staten Island, New York City. (NYC)

All of this comes as Trump’s businesses are apparently under mounting financial pressure. According to the latest Times report, most of Trump’s properties lose money, and he owes $421 million in loans, much of that due in the next few years. Trump’s hotels, resorts and golf courses are struggling amid a travel rout, and while the presidency has elevated Trump’s visibility, his unpopularity may have harmed the brand.

Some of Trump’s legal woes stem from the decision of his niece, Mary Trump, to spill secrets of the family business to the New York Times for its 2018 expose on the Trump Organization’s aggressive tax strategies. Mary Trump is now suing the president and other family members for fraud relating to the family inheritance. Unless the various Trumps settle the suit, it could make public even more damaging information about Trump and his clan.

Matching these business and family mutinies are defections by former Trump aides now openly opposing his reelection, such as former national security adviser John Bolton and former spokesperson Anthony Scaramucci. Trump also faces unprecedented opposition from within his own party, with many moderate GOP officials endorsing Biden, funding anti-Trump ads and posting testimonials describing how Trump has let them down. More than 75 former Republican national-security officials have signed an open letter declaring Trump a threat to the nation.

Trump has manhandled most Republican elected officials, largely because he can mount furious opposition to their candidacies if they cross him. But this superpower is waning, too. Several otherwise loyal Senate Republicans, including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, pushed back on Trump after he suggested he wouldn’t leave office if he loses to Biden. Some Republicans privately loathe Trump and fear he’s wrecking their party. They might not have the guts to oppose him publicly, but they might not help him, either, in a tight election that could bring Trump’s political end.

Nobody should count Trump out. He’s a renowned escape artist who has bounced back from four bankruptcies and many scandals. What’s different now, however, are growing fissures in the facade that for decades protected Trump’s family and business. Prosecutors and the public are getting a look inside, and it’s messy. People turn on the boss when it becomes a matter of survival, and the closer the scrutiny, the more trouble there’s likely to be. Trump’s downfall may not be imminent, but it is starting to look inevitable.

Rick Newman is the author of four books, including “Rebounders: How Winners Pivot from Setback to Success.” Follow him on Twitter: @rickjnewman. Confidential tip line: rickjnewman@yahoo.com. Encrypted communication available. Click here to get Rick’s stories by email.

Mary Trump’s book accuses President Trump of embracing ‘cheating as a way of life’

MAGGIE HABERMAN AND ALAN FEUER
THE NEW YORK TIMES
PUBLISHED JULY 7, 2020
Open this photo in gallery

In this file photo taken on June 26, 2020, U.S. President Donald Trump looks on during a meeting in the East Room of the White House, in Washington.MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Mary L. Trump, President Donald Trump’s niece, plans to publish a tell-all family memoir next week, describing how a decades-long history of darkness, dysfunction and brutality turned her uncle into a reckless leader who, according to her publisher, Simon & Schuster, “now threatens the world’s health, economic security and social fabric.”

The book, “Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man,” depicts a multi-generational saga of greed, betrayal and internecine tension and seeks to explain how Trump’s position in one of New York’s wealthiest and most infamous real estate empires helped him acquire what Mary Trump has referred to as “twisted behaviours” – attributes like seeing other people in “monetary terms” and practising “cheating as a way of life.”

Tell-all book by Mary Trump to be released two weeks early due to ‘extraordinary interest’

Mary Trump, who at 55 has long been estranged from Donald Trump, is the first member of the Trump clan to break ranks with her relatives by writing a book about their secrets. Since late June, her family – led by the president’s younger brother, Robert S. Trump – has been trying to stop the publication of the book, citing a confidentiality agreement that she signed nearly 20 years ago during a dispute over the will of the family patriarch, Fred Trump Sr., the president’s father. But a judge in New York has refused to enjoin Simon & Schuster from releasing the memoir and is expected to soon rule on whether Mary Trump herself violated the confidentiality agreement.

Open this photo in gallery 

This cover image of Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man, by Mary L. Trump. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Here are some of the highlights from her manuscript:

CHEATING ON A COLLEGE ENTRANCE TEST

As a high school student in Queens, Mary Trump writes, Donald Trump paid someone to take a precollegiate test, the SAT, on his behalf. The high score the proxy earned for him, she adds, helped the young Donald Trump to later gain admittance as an undergraduate to the University of Pennsylvania’s prestigious Wharton business school.


Donald Trump has often boasted about attending Wharton, which he has referred to as “the best school in the world” and “super genius stuff.”

SENDING A BROTHER TO THE HOSPITAL ALONE

It has long been part of the Trump family’s lore that the eldest child of Fred Trump Sr., Fred Trump Jr., who was better known as Freddy, was the black sheep of the dynasty. Freddy Trump was a handsome, garrulous man and a heavy drinker who, after a miserable experience working for his father, left his job in real estate to pursue a passion for flying, becoming a pilot for Trans World Airlines.

Donald Trump has often remarked that his brother’s departure from the family business opened space for him to move into and succeed. “For me, it worked very well,” Donald Trump told The New York Times during his presidential campaign about serving under his father. “For Fred, it wasn’t something that was going to work.”

Fred Trump Sr. could be brutal to his namesake, shouting at him once as a group of employees looked on, “Donald is worth ten of you,” Mary Trump writes.

Freddy Trump died in 1981 from an alcohol-induced heart attack when he was 42, and Mary Trump tells the story in her book about how his family sent him to the hospital alone on the night of his death. No one went with him, Mary Trump writes.

Donald Trump, she added, went to see a movie.

”NO PRINCIPLES,” A SISTER SAYS

Even at the start of Donald Trump’s campaign, his sister, Maryanne Trump Barry, a retired federal appeals court judge, had deep reservations about his fitness for office, Mary Trump writes.

“He’s a clown – this will never happen,” she quotes her aunt as saying during one of their regular lunches in 2015, just after Donald Trump announced that he was running for president.

Maryanne Trump was particularly baffled by support for her brother among evangelical Christians, according to the book.

“The only time Donald went to church was when the cameras were there,” Mary Trump quotes her aunt as saying. “It’s mind boggling. But that’s all about his base. He has no principles. None!”

DONALD TRUMP, NARCISSIST

Mary Trump, a clinical psychologist, asserts that her uncle has all nine clinical criteria for being a narcissist. And yet, she notes, even that label does not capture the full array of the president’s psychological troubles.

“The fact is,” she writes, “Donald’s pathologies are so complex and his behaviours so often inexplicable that coming up with an accurate and comprehensive diagnosis would require a full battery of psychological and neurophysical tests that he’ll never sit for.”

At another point she says: “Donald has been institutionalized for most of his adult life, so there is no way to know how he would thrive, or even survive, on his own in the real world.”

Like other critics of the president, Mary Trump takes issue in the book with the notion that Donald Trump is a strategic thinker who operates according to specific agendas or organizing principles.

“He doesn’t,” she writes. “Donald’s ego has been and is a fragile and inadequate barrier between him and the real world, which, thanks to his father’s money and power, he never had to negotiate by himself.”

Who likes Donald Trump? Lots of Republicans, but especially Hispanic voters, plus very rural and very conservative people

Jonathan Schulman, Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science, Northwestern University 

Matthew A Baum, Professor of Global Communications and Professor of Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School

Fri, August 11, 2023 

Former President Donald Trump greets supporters following a 2020 

campaign rally in Arizona. Isaac Brekken/Getty Images


Despite multiple state and federal indictments, recent polling indicates that former President Donald Trump retains a commanding lead in the race for the 2024 Republican Party presidential nomination.

So it seems useful to understand who, exactly, supports Trump – and whether the multiple criminal indictments against the former president have had any effect on his nomination prospects.

We are a multiuniversity team of social scientists that has been regularly polling Americans in all 50 states since April 2020.

Our most recent survey, which ran from June 29, 2023, to Aug. 1, 2023, included 7,732 Republicans or Republican-leaning independents. We explored who, among these respondents, supports Trump in the 2024 Republican primary and how they reacted to his June 2023 indictment for withholding classified documents.

Since no other Republican candidate in our survey received more than 5% support, we focus on Trump and his nearest rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

Consistent with recent polls, we found that Trump has a commanding 40-point lead over DeSantis.

While Trump leads DeSantis across nearly all major demographic categories, his advantage is especially large among Hispanic voters. The same is true when considering Republicans who said that they do not have higher education degrees and those who are very conservative, live in very rural places or are lower-income.
Very conservative voter support

People who identified as “very conservative” comprised 14% of the Republicans in our survey. Their support for Trump in 2024 is overwhelming: They support Trump over DeSantis by a 69-12 margin.

A recent FiveThirtyEight report showed that the most conservative Republicans were not always such strong supporters of Trump, but their support has risen substantially since Trump’s election in 2016.

Very conservative respondents were also the most likely to say that they were sure about which 2024 candidate they support. Just 5% of this group said they have not yet made up their mind, relative to 19% of moderate Republicans who were unsure of who they would vote for.

Younger support

Despite the 77-year-old Trump’s being more than three decades older than DeSantis, he enjoys significantly higher levels of support among younger Republicans.

About 53% of Republicans ages 25 to 44 said they support Trump, while just 9% of these people said they would vote for DeSantis. And 48% of even younger Republicans, ages 18 to 24, preferred Trump, as compared with 7% who support DeSantis.

In contrast, the gap between the two candidates is smaller among Republicans ages 65 and older. While 53% of this group supports Trump, 14% said they prefer DeSantis.

That said, Republicans ages 18 to 24 were significantly more likely than people in other age groups to select a candidate other than Trump or DeSantis, or to say they were not sure who they would vote for if the election were held today.

Members of the New York Young Republicans group rally for former president Donald Trump outside of the Manhattan district attorney’s office in May 2023. 

Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images

Hispanic and white voters

Trump has a large advantage over DeSantis across all racial and ethnic groups we surveyed, but especially among Hispanic and white Republicans.

We found that Trump has a 45-point advantage over DeSantis among Hispanic Republicans, who are more likely to support him than any other racial and ethnic group we investigated.

About 52% of white Republican people we polled, meanwhile, said that they support Trump, compared with 12.1% who preferred DeSantis. The gap in preference for Trump over DeSantis among other ethnic groups, including Asian Americans and Black people, was smaller.

No geographic or socioeconomic boundary

Trump has a commanding lead over DeSantis across all geographic areas, but his lead is particularly strong among Republicans in very rural communities.

Trump enjoys a massive 51-point lead over DeSantis among those who describe the area in which they live as “very rural.” Trump’s vote share among rural Americans increased from 2016 to 2020 and remains a strong base of his support leading into the 2024 primary.

Trump also holds a large lead over DeSantis regardless of socioeconomic status, but the gap widens among lower-income and less-educated Republicans.

Among Republicans with a college or graduate degree, for example, Trump led DeSantis by a 45-15 margin, which jumped up to 55-9 among those without a college degree. Trump holds a 47-point advantage among white respondents without a college degree, which shrinks to 29 points for white respondents with college degrees.
Trump’s legal woes aren’t a deciding factor

We randomly embedded an experiment into our survey in which we asked a series of questions about Trump’s recent indictment in the Mar-a-Lago classified document case before or after asking Republicans their preferred 2024 candidate.

Our goal was to test whether prompting them to think about the indictment affected respondents’ support for Trump.

Trump’s indictment has given some Republican voters pause, but this concern is not leading them to support DeSantis.

Republicans who saw Trump’s indictment as justified were significantly less likely to support Trump in the 2024 primary, but they were not more likely to support DeSantis as a result.

The effect of answering questions about Trump’s indictment immediately before, rather than after, asking about preferences for the 2024 primary was strongest among self-identified moderate Republicans, who make up 29% of the Republicans in our survey.

Among those moderate Republicans, answering questions about Trump’s indictment before the 2024 Republican primary candidate preference question decreased support for Trump by 6 percentage points.

Among the 18% of Republicans who felt that Trump’s indictment was justified, only 10% reported supporting DeSantis in 2024, compared with 25% who still backed Trump.

For conservative and very conservative Republicans, however, being prompted to think about Trump’s indictment immediately before answering the 2024 candidate preference question increased support for Trump by 3 percentage points.

This lends credence to the idea some Republicans have articulated that indictments could benefit Trump, but only among the most conservative Republicans.

The bigger picture

Our survey results show Trump with a commanding advantage over the field at this stage of the race for the 2024 Republican Party nomination.

That said, Trump’s support is not uniform across all Republicans – it is, for instance, notably higher among Republicans who identify with some of these characteristics – being less wealthy or educated, rural, older, Hispanic or white, or very conservative.

Moderate Republicans’ shift away from Trump after we reminded them about the classified documents indictment raises the possibility that additional indictments – such as the second one the Justice Department announced on Aug. 2, 2023, regarding attempts to overturn the 2020 election results – could negatively affect Trump’s campaign for the Republican nomination, particularly among moderate voters.

Of course, our findings also suggest that they may further invigorate his ideologically conservative base.

Overall, potential indictment effects notwithstanding, our findings represent a picture of overwhelming domination by Trump across virtually all facets of the Republican Party.

This article is republished from The Conversation, an independent nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. 

It was written by: Jonathan Schulman, Northwestern University and Matthew A Baum, Harvard Kennedy School.

Read more:

Voters are starting to act like hard-core sports fans – with dangerous repercussions for democracy

Donald Trump’s right − he is getting special treatment, far better than most other criminal defendants

Matthew A Baum receives funding from the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

Jonathan Schulman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

CONTEMPTABLE TRUMP

Trump special counsel Jack Smith files protective order over ex-president's threatening Truth Social post saying 'If you go after me, I'm coming after you', over fears of witness intimidation

Donald Trump on Thursday told the magistrate in Washington DC that he understood he could not make any threats to those involved in his case

On Friday, the 77-year-old wrote on his social media network: 'IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I'M COMING AFTER YOU!' - an apparent threat to those who may cooperate

Hours later, Jack Smith, the special counsel overseeing the prosecution, sought a protective order, citing Trump's post as evidence he may threaten witnesses

By HARRIET ALEXANDER FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

 5 August 2023

The special counsel overseeing a Donald Trump indictment has sought an emergency protective order just hours after the ex-president made a social media post viewed as threatening to witnesses.

Jack Smith entered Trump's post - saying 'IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I'M COMING AFTER YOU' - into evidence on Friday night, shortly after it was posted.

Smith says the post shows Trump cannot be trusted to keep confidential information disclosed to defendants ahead of a criminal trial confidential.

Trump - who's favorite to win the GOP's 2024 presidential nomination - also faces allegations of trying to intimidate witnesses being lined-up to testify against him. Defendants are provided with discovery - the evidence against them - but cannot publicize it.

Smith warned the post indicated Trump was determined to attack his critics by any means necessary.

'If the defendant were to begin issuing public posts using details - or, for example, grand jury transcripts - obtained in discovery here, it could have a harmful chilling effect on witnesses or adversely affect the fair administration of justice in this case,' Smith wrote.

Donald Trump is pictured on Friday speaking in Montgomery, Alabama. Shortly before the event he posted a threat on social media against those involved in the case

Trump had dinner with Melania, Fox's Maria Bartiromo after court date

Nancy Pelosi claims Trump looked like a 'scared puppy' in court

On Thursday, the judge in his case - which deals with Trump's efforts to overturn the election - reminded Trump it is a crime to intimidate a juror, bribe anyone or obstruct the administration of justice.

Asked if he understood the standard disclaimer, Trump responded that he did.

Yet on Friday, Trump posted a threat against those involved in the case, leading Smith to fear that Trump could use the discovery material against those involved.

Smith said the proposed protective order was not 'overly restrictive,' noting that it would still enable Trump to use discovery materials in his defense.

'All the proposed order seeks to prevent is the improper dissemination or use of discovery materials, including to the public,' Smith wrote.

'Such a restriction is particularly important in this case because the defendant has previously issued public statements on social media regarding witnesses, judges, attorneys and others associated with legal matters pending against him.

'And in recent days, regarding this case, the defendant has issued multiple posts - either specifically or by implication - including the following, which the defendant posted just hours ago.'

Smith then included a screenshot of the Truth Social post.

A Trump spokesperson said the post was 'political speech' and dismissed claims that it was threatening.

'The Truth post cited is the definition of political speech and was in response to the RINO, China-loving, dishonest special interest groups and Super PACs, like the ones funded by the Koch Brothers and the Club for No Growth,' they said.

Jack Smith, the special counsel, is pictured on August 1 explaining the decision to charge Trump on four counts relating to his attempts to overturn the 2020 election

Trump: Deranged Jack Smith. Doesn’t he look deranged? You’ve seen the pictures with the purple robe. He’s a deranged human being. This guy is a lost soul. Bad guy. He’s a deranged sick person pic.twitter.com/06mF1tJ7PE— Acyn (@Acyn) August 5, 2023

Smith has already requested a protective order in his other case, which deals with Trump's mishandling of classified documents.

Lawyers for Trump and his co-defendant Walt Nauta did not oppose the requested protective order, according to that filing: they are yet to respond to Smith's latest request.

After making his Truth Social threat, Trump on Friday night was on stage at a rally in Montgomery, Alabama, where he mocked Smith.

'Deranged Jack Smith. Doesn't he look deranged?' Trump asked the crowd.

'You've seen the pictures with the purple robe. He's a deranged human being.

'Somebody said you should treat him nicer, maybe he'd be nice. But let me tell you.

'This guy is a lost soul. Bad guy. He's a deranged sick person.'

DOJ asks judge to issue protective order after Trump posts apparent threat of revenge

August 5, 2023
The Associated Press


Former President Donald Trump gestures after speaking at a fundraiser event for the Alabama GOP on Friday.Butch Dill/AP

The Justice Department on Friday asked a federal judge overseeing the criminal case against former President Donald Trump in Washington to step in after he released a post online that appeared to promise revenge on anyone who goes after him.

Prosecutors asked U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan to issue a protective order in the case a day after Trump pleaded not guilty to charges of trying to overturn his 2020 election loss and block the peaceful transition of power. The order — which is different from a so-called "gag order" — would limit what information Trump and his legal team could share publicly about the case brought by special counsel Jack Smith.

Such protective orders are common in criminal cases, but prosecutors said it's "particularly important in this case" because Trump has posted on social media about "witnesses, judges, attorneys, and others associated with legal matters pending against him."

Prosecutors pointed specifically to a post on Trump's Truth Social platform from earlier Friday in which Trump wrote, in all capital letters, "If you go after me, I'm coming after you!"

Prosecutors said they are ready to hand over a "substantial" amount of evidence — "much of which includes sensitive and confidential information" — to Trump's legal team.

They told the judge that if Trump were to begin posting about grand jury transcripts or other evidence provided by the Justice Department, it could have a "harmful chilling effect on witnesses or adversely affect the fair administration of justice in this case."
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The latest Trump indictment lists 6 unnamed co-conspirators. Here's what we know

Prosecutors' proposed protective order seeks to prevent Trump and his lawyers from disclosing materials provided by the government to anyone other than people on his legal team, possible witnesses, the witnesses' lawyers or others approved by the court. It would put stricter limits on "sensitive materials," which would include grand jury witness testimony and materials obtained through sealed search warrants.

A Trump spokesperson said in an emailed statement that the former president's post "is the definition of political speech," and was made in response to "dishonest special interest groups and Super PACs."

The indictment unsealed this week accuses Trump of brazenly conspiring with allies to spread falsehoods and concoct schemes intended to overturn his election loss to President Joe Biden as his legal challenges floundered in court.

The indictment chronicles how Trump and his Republican allies, in what Smith described as an attack on a "bedrock function of the U.S. government," repeatedly lied about the results in the two months after he lost the election and pressured his vice president, Mike Pence, and state election officials to take action to help him cling to power.

5 things to know about the latest charges against Donald Trump

Trump faces charges including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and conspiracy to obstruct Congress' certification of Biden's electoral victory.

It's the third criminal case brought this year against the the early front-runner in the 2024 Republican presidential primary. But it's the first case to try to hold Trump responsible for his efforts to remain in power during the chaotic weeks between his election loss and the attack by his supporters on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

After his court appearance on Thursday before a magistrate judge, Trump characterized the case as a "persecution" designed to hurt his 2024 presidential campaign. His legal team has described it as an attack on his right to free speech and his right to challenge an election that he believed had been stolen.

Smith has said prosecutors will seek a "speedy trial" against Trump in the election case. Judge Chutkan has ordered the government to file a brief by Thursday proposing a trial date. The first court hearing in front of Chutkan is scheduled for Aug. 28.

Trump is already scheduled to stand trial in March in the New York case stemming from hush-money payments made during the 2016 campaign and in May in the federal case in Florida stemming from classified documents found at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

'I am coming for you', Trump tweets after Judge's warning on arraignment

ByVedanth Shinde

Aug 05, 2023 

Former President Trump released on terms, warned not to break them; next court hearing scheduled for Aug. 28. Trump slams back with a tweet lamenting threat.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Moxila A. Upadhyaya has permitted the former president to withdraw his second arraignment in court on Thursday with no limitations to his travel or financial security.

Magistrate Judge Moxila A. Upadhyaya warned Trump before he left court. Here's what stood out(REUTERS)

Trump immediately dropped a fiery tweet, making pointed and threatening remarks toward prosecutors, judges, and juries “IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU!”

Donald J. Trump(Twitter)

On Thursday, Upadhyaya let the former president leave his second arraignment in federal court without imposing any travel restrictions or a cash bond on him. But, she also reminded him of the terms of his release and warned him not to break them.

She also scheduled the next court hearing in the case for Aug. 28.

The terms of his release were similar to those set by a judge in Miami federal court.

Trump argued ‘not guilty’ to the allegations connected with claims of mishandling of classified documents recovered from his Florida resort.

The unprecedented arraignment of former President Donald J. Trump on charges linked with his apparent endeavors to have tampered with the 2020 official elections closed with a couple of customary cautions from the judge who led the session.

Refrain from conversing about the case with any witnesses

One who abstains from compelling witnesses receives additional consideration. The 45th US president was informed that he is denied from discussing the ongoing process of the case with any witnesses.

Upadhyaya mentions, Trump might actually speak with a witness about the situation within the sight of his lawyer.

Upadhyaya also reminds former President Trump that it is an offense to threaten a witness or endeavor to fight back against any individual who could provide testimony.

IT IS A CRIME TO TRY TO INFLUENCE A JUROR OR TO THREATEN OR ATTEMPT TO BRIBE A WITNESS OR ANY OTHER PERSON WHO MAY HAVE INFORMATION ABOUT YOUR CASE, OR TO RETALIATE AGAINST ANYONE FOR PROVIDING INFORMATION ABOUT YOUR CASE TO THE PROSECUTION, OR TO OTHERWISE OBSTRUCT THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE.

The board didn't find the witness; The New York Times revealed that witness Cassidy Hutchinson, Trump's helper, had gotten the contact, provoking the Jan. 6 board to climb the meeting highlighting her public declaration.

Why Jan. 6? Possible witness tampering to DOJ?

The Jan. 6 committee said it referred a possible case of witness tampering to the Justice Department. The committee’s vice chair, Liz Cheney, said a former Trump White House aide received a call from someone who tried to influence her testimony.

The witness, Cassidy Hutchinson, told the committee, “(A person) let me know you have your deposition tomorrow. He wants me to let you know that he’s thinking about you. He knows you’re loyal, and you’re going to do the right thing when you go in for your deposition.”

The committee did not name the caller, but The New York Times reported that it was former President Trump’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows.

The committee moved up Hutchinson’s public hearing after learning about the call.

ALSO READ: Donald Trump pleads not guilty to charges he tried to overturn election loss

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis ‘unsubstantiated’ Donald Trump’s election fraud theories in Iowa

As Trump hung over the table with his hands folded, The judge let Trump know that the main state of delivery is that he commits no offenses. In failing to do so, the former President could be revoked.

While Trump might actually confront his fourth indictment in Georgia with links to theinvestigation of electoral obstruction in the 2020 presidential race, criminal allegations in Georgia are probably not going to abuse the release conditions.

The warning given by the judge is likely to apply to criminal charges carried out after the trial, so an indictment in the state of Georgia wouldn't mean Trump neglected to consent to his terms of release.

Trump need not appear in federal court for his next hearing, which is to take place in Washington on August 28th. Upadhyaya told Trump his appearance would be waived at the next hearing if he was represented by his lawyer.