Former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr blasted New York Attorney General Letitia James’s decision to slap former President Trump and his children with a lawsuit alleging business fraud.
As Spencer reported, James accused Trump of “engaging in years of financial fraud to enrich himself, his family, and the Trump Organization.” She also went after his three oldest children, Don Jr., Ivanka, and Eric Trump. James is seeking $250 million in civil penalties, a ban on the Trumps from doing business in New York, Justice Department involvement, and a ban on Trump and the Trump Organization from purchasing commercial real estate in New York for five years.
Barr said Wednesday on Fox News that by all accounts James’s move appears to be a “political hit job.”
“And this is a woman who campaigned for office saying that — promising she was going to go after Trump, which I think is a tremendous abuse of office to go head-hunting and targeting individuals," he said. "So, I think she was targeting Trump. And this is, after three years, a civil lawsuit, the gist of which is that when the Trump Organization borrowed money, Trump personally guaranteed those loans.”
“And to support that, she’s claiming that he inflated his assets on his financial statements. Now, I’m not even sure she has a good case against Trump himself," he continued. "But what ultimately persuades me that this is a political hit job is, she grossly overreaches when she tries to drag the children into this."
While Trump’s eldest children did have roles in Trump’s businesses, “this is his personal financial statement, prepared by the CFO, accounting firms were involved in it. … The children aren’t going to know the details of that, nor are they expected in the real world to do their own due diligence and have it reviewed independently.”
In the long run, the “overreach” by the New York Attorney General will “end up backfiring,” Barr argued, since it will only serve to “make people more sympathetic to Trump.”
Bill Barr on NY AG's lawsuit: "This is a political hit job. I think it's gonna back firing on them. For Trump this is another example of people piling on because of TDS." pic.twitter.com/TUZGsg8gQz
— Real Mac Report (@RealMacReport) September 21, 2022
The Trump family all fired back on Wednesday, with Don. Jr. calling it a "bullshit Dem witch-hunt" and the 45th president saying he "never thought this case would be brought - until I saw her really bad poll numbers."