Former Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York said Friday that New York Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, should not have filed a civil fraud lawsuit against former President Donald Trump.
New York Judge Arthur Engoron ruled Trump liable for fraud in September 2023 and ordered him to pay a $354 million fine in February. Cuomo told HBO host Bill Maher that the lawsuit could not have been brought against anyone else. (RELATED: 'Below the criminal standard': Turley sounds alarm over key jury instructions being pushed by Alvin Bragg's team)
“The New York attorney general's lawsuit, frankly, should never have been filed. If his name wasn't Donald Trump, if he wasn't running for president, I say to you, I'm the former attorney general of New York, this lawsuit would never have been filed. And that's what makes people angry,” Cuomo said during a debate with Maher and former Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois on “Real Time with Bill Maher: Overtime.”
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James promised She was ordered to investigate Trump during his 2018 presidential campaign, during which she called him an “illegitimate president.” In September 2022, she filed a lawsuit alleging that Trump inflated the value of his real estate holdings to obtain loans.
The New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct is investigating a conversation between real estate lawyer Adam Lightman Bailey and Engoron in a Feb. 16 interview with NBC New York in which he allegedly urged him to “do it right.” report.
Former US president and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump appears for his criminal trial at Manhattan Criminal Court in New York City on May 29, 2024 (Photo by Doug Mills/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
Before Cuomo's comments on the civil fraud case, Maher criticized Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's indictment of Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records. Trump was convicted on all counts on May 30.
“I was always on your side in the New York hush money trial,” Maher told Cuomo, “I don't think they should have had that trial. It always looked like a sex case and people always looked at it that way.”
New York state targeted the National Rifle Association after the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, and financial regulators pressured banks and insurance companies to stop doing business with the Second Amendment organization. Governor Cuomo himself urged companies to “reassess” their relationships with the NRA in an April 20, 2018, speech. post He condemned the group on Twitter as a “terrorist organisation.”
On May 30, the Supreme Court unanimously allowed the National Rifle Association to bring a First Amendment lawsuit against the states.
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