Will Trump and his family go to jail?
This is the question now that the Supreme Court of the United States, unanimously, has decided that Donald Trump must turn over his accounting documents to the district attorney for the southern district of Manhattan who is investigating his possible financial embezzlement and those of his family.
In 2019, prosecutor Cyrus Vance requested eight years of Trump's tax returns from his former accounting firm, Mazars USA.
Investigators will therefore receive Trump's tax records and financial statements since 2011, which he has been trying to hide from them for years. They will also be given the opinions of the accountants who prepared them and the underlying raw financial data and information, which could prove to be embarrassing.
About 20 criminal, civil and tax investigations are currently underway against Trump. It is highly unlikely that any will lead to a charge and conviction. His daughter and two sons could also be accused of complicity. Here are two lines of inquiry that could be completed fairly quickly.
"Legal fees" for a porn star
One is for payments in the 2016 presidential election to a pornstar who claimed to have had sex with Trump. His former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was sentenced to three years in prison in connection with the case.
Trump allegedly ordered Cohen to make the secret payment, which should have been declared in accordance with presidential campaign finance laws because it was made in order to help Trump win the election. Cohen said Trump gave the green light to a payment of $ 130,000 to the woman before the election, and then reimbursed her the agent, falsely billed as "legal fees."
Ivanka, Donald Jr, Eric, in trouble with daddy
New York prosecutors also suspect the ex-president of lying about the value of his property. Cohen sworn before a congressional committee that Trump often inflated the value of his assets when dealing with potential lenders or business partners, but deflated them when it benefited him for tax purposes.
Last fall, the New York Times revealed that Trump deducted $ 26 million in "consulting fees" as a business expense between 2010 and 2018, part of which was allegedly paid to his daughter Ivanka, an employee of the Trump Organization. The charges, which reduced Trump's taxable income, are the subject of the tax evasion investigation, as well as a separate civil investigation by New York State. Investigators are also trying to determine whether her two sons, Eric and Donald Jr., who were also employed by their father, also received such parallel "consulting fees" for the same reasons.
