Appeals Court Bails Trump Out of Having to Post Massive Fraud Bond

Donald Trump was supposed to have to post a $464 million bond by Monday or else the state of New York could begin collecting on the massive civil fraud judgment leveled against him earlier this year. An appeals court bailed him out, blocking collection of the judgment and giving the former president 10 days to post a drastically reduced $175 million bond.

The order is a huge win for Trump, whose assets were going to be subject to seizure if he couldn’t post nearly half-a-billion dollars by Monday. His lawyers said last week he wasn’t going to be able to come up with the money after 30 underwriters rejected him. The New York Times has reported that Trump is expected to be able to scrounge the new, reduced $175 million bond

Snapz,

Dianne T. Renwick, Anil C. Singh, Lizbeth González, Bahaati E. Pitt-Burke, and Kelly O’Neill Levy

What was their actual individual motivation?

lennybird, (edited )
@lennybird@lemmy.world avatar

Banks, mega corporations, (fake) rich people get bailed out — Republicans: Nothing.

Working-class doing public service get minor bailout with student loan forgiveness — Republicans: WHOA, NOW…

VintageTech,

He should have been forced to sell all of his properties prior to his presidency.

xenoclast,

If they started auctioning off and selling his properties to make money, it would turn over a lot of really dark stones full of other people’s criminal activities.

He’s being protected by the club he’s in, not because they like him but because they would be in trouble if they didn’t.

postmateDumbass,

That’s the basis of the system, mutually assurred corruption.

FenrirIII,
@FenrirIII@lemmy.world avatar

That’s why Epstein Epsteined himself

KeenFlame,

Wtf dude crime is no reason to do more crime

ItsMeSpez,

You only think that because you’re not a criminal.

VinnyDaCat, (edited )

More over, the precedent set here is beneficial to other wealthy individuals.

Other wealthy individuals, even those who sit on the complete opposite side of Trump politically benefit from the appeals court’s judgement. It really is just corruption all over.

xenoclast,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkoKLXcZbu0

This is a great story by a great Canadian wanted to fight the corruption. He was supposed by it ultimately.

But you can see a lot of parallels today.

natarey,

You know, it’s almost like the justice system has… I dunno. Problems or something.

wjrii,

This sucks, but a few points are at least worth mentioning:

  1. Of the five judges listed on the order, annoyingly slim as it is, three are Democrats and two are “nonpartisan” but with resumes in the public sector and public interest law.
  2. Most states actually have a cap on appeal bonds, often around $50 million or less. NY doesn’t have one, but all the same thinking, for good or for ill, that would lead to a statutory limit might influence the appeals court here. Among them is precluding additional litigation from forcing a fire sale.
  3. In an appeal like this, the court has to at least conceptually imagine that there’s some possibility of success, and that with a defendant who is leveraged AF and not nearly as liquid as he boasts, there is only one bite at the apple when seizing and selling the assets to satisfy the judgment. If the court is convinced that this amount, well into nine figures, will occupy the vast majority of his liquid assets and insure some plausible compensation for the plaintiff, and the other assets aren’t going anywhere, then it’s not insane to demand a bond more in line with the available liquidity.

Trump is definitely getting the “rich business owner with lots of lawyers” treatment here, and that’s certainly something you could criticize about the American legal system, but I don’t think we’re seeing some completely inexplicable abuse of existing civil procedure. The orange turd still gets the due process that a President Turd would deny to so many others.

TL;DR: it’s possible the only thing the Appeals Court is saying is that ol’ Donny really can’t get the bigger bond and that Trump Tower will still be there to seize later.

Maggoty,

I heartily disagree on these limits being to prevent a fire sale. They’re to protect the wealthy from a fire sale. You or I would be forced into a fire sale in a heartbeat for a million dollar judgement. And then into debtor’s prison when we turn out to be normal people who don’t have a million dollars of assets lying around.

billwashere,

And this is why I love Lemmy. Where else would you get a well reasoned explanation like this?

Lev_Astov,
@Lev_Astov@lemmy.world avatar

Five comments down, maybe, but I’ll take what we can get.

bostonbananarama,

I can’t say I’m surprised by this, and while I hate Trump, it’s not for the cynical reason. It’s going to be quite the nightmare unwinding those transactions. My understanding is that NY doesn’t have a right of redemption after a Sheriff’s sale. While this is judicious, I would prefer Trump be given no quarter.

drphungky,

Sigh. Evergreen:

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/1446dbbe-bf91-4e00-81fd-dfe59700eb5a.jpeg

ChonkyOwlbear,

How funny would it be if he can’t raise the $175 million either.

Darkassassin07,
@Darkassassin07@lemmy.ca avatar

He’s already recently stated he has the full half billion in cash on hand, just refuses to pay in cash, and bonds companies won’t touch him.

They didn’t give him a break because he can’t pay, they gave him a break because he refuses to.

guacupado,

They gave him a break because he put half the supreme court in there, which is all downwards pressure.

Darkassassin07, (edited )
@Darkassassin07@lemmy.ca avatar

Are there Supreme Court Justices in the New York court of appeals? (I haven’t taken the time to look) can they even serve both?

This particular one isn’t a federal case.

kent_eh,

He’s already recently stated he has the full half billion in cash on hand

He says lots of things.

Almost all of them are lies, and/or contradict other things he has said.

AbidanYre,

He’s also a well known liar. There’s no reason to believe he has the full amount in cash

Darkassassin07,
@Darkassassin07@lemmy.ca avatar

In a situation like this, he should be held to his word.

He’s the one that’s said he has the funds available; so why should he get a break?

It’d be different if that figure was pulled from thin air; but it was based off of his own valuations.

AbidanYre,

I’m not saying he should get any kind of break. If he can’t put up the money they should start seizing property. I’m just not convinced he has $400M lying around.

glarf,

Un fucking believable.

werefreeatlast,

Actually he can’t pay that much either!

Poor Trump!

Okay, I figured it out! How about all his republicans buy his golden shoes, I wash his car, and give him a personal back massage? Rob you fix up his fence, Stephen, you and Mary go and vacuum under all his beds. Frederick and Stacey will do the cooking for month.

How does that sound? And I also want to give him 5 bucks. Is that okay for bail?

But, but, but, I only like girls! , I couldn’t possibly! And my neck and knees hurt! Fine! Okay but only the top and only for a minute. Rob will take second turn when he’s done with the fence.

Darkassassin07,
@Darkassassin07@lemmy.ca avatar

And there goes every last shred of hope I had for America.

The country is fucking doomed, and it’ll drag the rest of the world into chaos with it. We’re all fucked.

xenoclast,

We were fucked long before this clown showed up. If anything we should be grateful that he shine the light on it by being so obvious about it.

Time to start dragging billionaires into the streets.

YarHarSuperstar,
@YarHarSuperstar@lemmy.world avatar

Yes; no, well maybe partly; yes. Respectively

xenoclast,

It hurts me that I wrote grateful… if I had considered my reply longer than I took to take a dump I wouldn’t have written it that way. My apologies

YarHarSuperstar, (edited )
@YarHarSuperstar@lemmy.world avatar

I understand what you meant, but I also think we shouldn’t be grateful to him for anything really.

Edited to add that I meant to begin by saying “apology accepted”.

SmackemWittadic,
@SmackemWittadic@lemmy.world avatar

You’re smarter while taking a dump than most people are while voting for who represents them, as well as being much more willing to rethink things when questioned.

DandomRude,
@DandomRude@lemmy.world avatar

What appeals court? I thought Trump had to post $464 million in order to even appeal. How did he manage that?

formergijoe,

He has to post the bond so they don’t start seizing his property during the appeal. It’s basically putting the fine plus interest in a separate account during the appeal to make sure you’re good for the money if you lose the appeal. Otherwise he could have gone on with the appeal, but could lose Trump Tower without the bond posted.

DandomRude,
@DandomRude@lemmy.world avatar

Ahhh, thanks. I’m from Europe, so it’s hard for me to even begin to understand the US legal system.

wjrii,

And specifically what he did here was appeal the order telling him to get his bond for the “main” appeals process.

kent_eh,

I’m from Europe, so it’s hard for me to even begin to understand the US legal system.

Beyond what they see on TV police/courtroom dramas, most Americans don’t understand it very well either.

chrishazfun,

Theres been a lot of shit over the last few years that really have put into perspective how if you have enough money in America you can get away with anything and this is maybe in the top 3, this guy should be in state prison and the management of the cases and responses have made it so he’s been a free man for nearly a decade, what the fuck.

PlantDadManGuy,

Pretty timely considering Boeing just executed their whistleblower with no consequences.

conditional_soup,

Oh, okay, cool, so the justice system cares if you say it’s unfair and you can’t afford the judgment now? Because I’m pretty sure that’s news to most people.

Maggoty,

We wouldn’t want to ruin his future. He has real potential!

Oh sorry, wrong case.

Mastengwe,

Seriously? This is surprising to people? How did you not see this coming?

MyTurtleSwimsUpsideDown,

It’s not surprising, but it’s still disheartening.

OhmsLawn,

It’s not surprising, just disappointing. I’ve learned never to get my hopes up.

Yawweee877h444,

Not surprised at all, but obviously dissapointed.

What does it say about our society and justice system if we’d be more surprised if he actually was held accountable, as opposed to getting off lightly.

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