begin quote from:
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said he will not be deterred in pursuing the …
NY Attorney General: I Won't Back Off Trump 'Fraud' Case
Mike Groll/AP Photo
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said he will not be deterred in pursuing the state’s case against Donald Trump and Trump University, just because the defendant is campaigning to be President of the United States.
“We’re ready to go,” Schneiderman, a Democrat, told ABC News today. “We
sued him long before anyone thought he might run for President. This is
not a political case, it's just a straight-up fraud case.”
The New York state case against Trump University, brought in 2013, is
proceeding at the same time as a federal lawsuit unfolds in California,
both with essentially the same set of allegations -- that the real
estate seminars marketed by the famous real estate mogul cheated the
people who paid thousands of dollars to attend. As became clear today,
the cases are unfolding in a highly unusual climate for a civil cases.
Earlier in the year, during the Republican primary debates, the Trump
University controversy became an attack line against Trump. The case
surged back into public view on Friday, when United States District
Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel in California ruled that confidential documents
about the operation of Trump University should be made public, in part
because Trump’s presidential candidacy means “the public interest is
heightened in this case.”
Richard Drew/AP Photo
Trump interrupted his own remarks at a San Diego campaign rally to blast Curiel for ruling against him.
“I think Judge Curiel should be ashamed of himself,” Trump said. “I’m
telling you, this court system, judges in this court system, federal
court, they ought to look into Judge Curiel. Because what Judge Curiel
is doing is a total disgrace.”
Today the court released the documents,
some of which laid bare internal tactics, strategy and actual sales
scripts used by Trump University staff to persuade prospective students
to spend thousands of dollars on the seminars. The newly public
documents dominated much of the campaign news cycle. Trump held another
press conference to address questions about the case, along with other
issues swirling around his campaign.
He repeated his view that he "will win the Trump University case."
"I already am, as far as I’m concerned," he said.
Schneiderman told ABC News he is not worrying about the confluence of
the campaign and his case. The documents, he said only served to offer
further proof that the operation was aimed less at teaching students the
skills needed to buy and sell real state, and more about making money
for Trump.
“It was clearly a way to separate people who were desperate to make
money in hard economic times from their own cash and to get it into the
pocket of Mr. Trump and his cronies,” Schneiderman said.
No comments:
Post a Comment