Donald Trump's legal team asked for clarity from Judge Arthur Engoron concerning his ruling Tuesday that the former president "persistently committed fraud by inflating the value of his assets," but has not received it, said his attorney, Alina Habba.
"We asked today for the court to give us some clarity on it, and we were not able to get an answer on that, which was concerning," Habba said Wednesday during an appearance on Newsmax's "Carl Higbie FRONTLINE."
"The order came down yesterday," she told to host Carl Higbie. "It was 35 pages. And, as you pointed out, one of the things they said was that Mar-a-Lago's net worth is $18 million.
"If that's the case, I think you and I should go in and buy it," she added.
"Let's also remember something: If the Trumps had sold Mar-a-Lago for $18 million to their kids, they would have been criminally charged for a fraudulent conveyance. It would have been a conveyance issue — a criminal charge, civil charges, that's what they do. So they can't cut it any way they want unless you're a Trump, and that's what they're doing here. ... They don't even understand, frankly, in my opinion, what they're doing."
Engoron ordered that some of Trump's business licenses be rescinded as punishment, making it difficult or impossible for the Trumps to do business in New York, and said he would continue to have an independent monitor oversee Trump Organization operations.
Trump, in a series of statements, railed against the decision, calling it "un-American" and part of an ongoing plot to damage his campaign to return to the White House.
"My Civil rights have been violated, and some Appellate Court, whether federal or state, must reverse this horrible, un-American decision," he wrote on his Truth Social site. He insisted his company had "done a magnificent job for New York State" and "done business perfectly," calling it "a very sad Day for the New York State System of Justice!"
Engoron found that Trump consistently overvalued Mar-a-Lago, inflating its value on one financial statement by as much as 2,300%. The judge also rebuked Trump for lying about the size of his Manhattan apartment. Trump claimed his three-story Trump Tower penthouse was nearly three times its actual size, valuing it at $327 million.
"A discrepancy of this order of magnitude, by a real estate developer sizing up his own living space of decades, can only be considered fraud," Engoron wrote.
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Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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