Donald Trump’s lifelong penchant for self-aggrandizing will undermine his legal defense on tax charges levied against his company, according to several experts interviewed by The Daily Beast.
Trump’s lawyers intend to plead ignorance of the law. The tax code is indeed complicated and one former New York prosecutor told the outlet that “not knowing the law…. is one of the only defenses in a case like this.”
But there’s a problem. For years, Trump has bragged about his tax-savvy. He once declared, “I know more about taxes than any human being that God ever created.” On 60 Minutes, he blustered “Nobody knows the tax code better than I do… I’m like a student of the tax code.”
“I know every form of tax — believe me — from the [value-added taxes] to the fair tax to — every single form of tax,” he said in August 2015.
“My understanding of the tax code gave me a tremendous advantage over those who didn’t have a clue about it, including many of my competitors, who lost everything they had, never to be heard from again — never — they were never heard from again.”
Donald Trump in the New York Times
There are scores of similar claims – all they might all come back to haunt Trump.
“Those prior inconsistent statements will undermine his claim of lack of knowledge on cross-examination,” Carl Bornstein, a former New York prosecutor who now teaches at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, told The Daily Beast. They will be “devastating” for his defense, he added.
The Trump Organization and its longtime chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, were charged in a Manhattan court last week of crimes including a scheme to defraud, conspiracy, grand larceny, and falsifying business records. Prosecutors allege that Weisselberg received $1.7 million in untaxed perks. He, and the business, pleaded not guilty.
Under New York law, prosecutors have to show that defendants “willfully engaged” in tax fraud, which is a high bar. But last week’s indictment alleged that Weisselberg and the Trump Organization falsified records and kept an alternative spreadsheet that tracked perks Weisselberg received. That might help investigators prove intent.
The indictment also alleges that Weisselberg’s on-the-books compensation decreased as his perks increased, a correlation that points to an intentional scheme.
“You can’t get much better evidence than that,” Cohen told The Daily Beast.
