Judgment in Trump’s New York fraud case rises to $502 million before inauguration

Quietly, just before the turn of the calendar to the new year, an already enormous debt, provisionally owed by President-elect Donald Trump and his co-defendants in his New York civil fraud case, reached a breathtaking, interest-accruing milestone: a half a billion dollars. .

Trump, two of his sons and a former executive at his company were ordered in February 2024 to pay $364 million in “ill-gotten gains” and millions more in interest dating back several years. This figure, which then stood at $464 million, continued to earn more than $114,000 in interest per day. The judgment is on appeal.

The total surpassed $500 million on Dec. 29 and stood at more than $502 million as of Thursday, a spokeswoman for New York Attorney General Letitia James confirmed.

Trump, who is personally owed about $490 million of that sum, is banking on a reprieve from the mid-level appellate division of New York’s First Department Court. During the September hearings, at least two of the appeals committee’s five judges seemed skeptical of the size of the judgment. One called it “huge” and “disturbing.”

But as the defendants await the panel’s decision, expected early this year, interest continues to grow. The court typically issues its opinions on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, and the Trump case was not among the batch released today.

That means Trump will likely be sworn in as president on Monday with a debt to New York state greater than the combined proposed 2025 budgets for New York’s sixth and seventh largest cities, Albany and New Rochelle.

Trump is furious about the debt and about the case, in which a judge concluded that he and his company manipulated spreadsheets provided to accountants to optimize valuations provided to banks and insurers. The result, according to James’ office and Judge Arthur Engoron, was that Trump and his company benefited from more favorable loan and insurance terms that they otherwise could not have obtained.

The growing total they may owe the state, known as restitution, is equal to the amount Engoron concluded they profited from this scheme, plus interest.

In a bench trial later in 2023, Trump was called to the barwhere he blamed his employees and external accountants, but said his books were compiled accurately. He claimed that, far from overestimating his assets and net worth, his company was “underestimating” them.

In addition to the half-billion owed in the New York civil case, Trump also owes more than $88 million to writer E. Jean Carroll, after 2023 and 2024 jurors found him liable for abuse sexual and defamation.

He denied all allegations in the New York and Carroll cases and appealed all three cases.