New York prosecutors may have located a fresh avenue for intensifying pressure on the Trump Organization’s chief financial officer in an effort to secure his cooperation in a probe into former President Donald Trump and his company: his grandchildren’s education.
told WSJ that she and her ex-husband Barry had never paid their children’s tuition.
More than $500,000 of the students’ tuition was paid for with checks signed by either Weisselberg or Trump.
$500,000 is a lot of unreported income. Does it trip any statutory minimum sentences?
I’ll be very interested to see what a review of the corporate tax returns turns up with respect to these payments being characterized as charitable contributions and therefore deductible.
They just had to scam and grift at every opportunity.
Weisselberg is going to have to choose between protecting Donald Trump or spending possibly all of the rest of his life in prison. There is no way that the list of criminal acts by him on behalf of Orange Voldemort is shorter than a mile long. The Feds are doing it right, working their way up the ladder, the accountant more than anyone knows the details of the money laundering. This will just keep getting better and better. Which path will Allen choose?? We know what Donnie would do…
Well, now that TFG is of no more use to the russians, we can be fairly confident his path won’t be out a fifth floor window.
My theory: trump acknowledges the payments, they have him as a co-conspirator for tax evasion. Trump doesn’t acknowledge the payments, they have Weisselberg senior and junior for embezzlement, with tax evasion as the only defense.
More than $500,000 of the students’ tuition was paid for with checks signed by either Weisselberg or Trump. She understood the arrangement to be part of Barry’s compensation package for his work at the Trump Organization, she told the paper.
Hmm…a guy who paid a $7 Boy Scouts bill with funds from a charity is unlikely to have paid this from his own funds. Hell, he doesn’t even like his own kids let alone anyone else’s.
Abso-frigging-lutely love to see them playing hardball.
Squeeze harder.
I’m a little surprised that the bodies of potential persons of interest have not started piling-up yet
I don’t think you could squeeze any of these people too hard.
So if it were compensation, it would be deductible to the trump org. But then any kind of audit would notice that there was no corresponding number on W junior’s income statement. But. Let’s say that it was listed as a tax-exempt donation to the school. Then things would get even more interesting.
Seems to me it’s time to start charging Barry with falsifying his tax returns.
Look into the suicidal tendencies of his past bankers employed by Deutschebank.
I have trouble believing that Weisselberg hasn’t been preparing for this for a long time
No doubt in my mind that Weaselberg knows way more about the money than Trumpf. Donnie was a big-picture guy not a details guy. Weaselberg will flip faster than a Slinky.
I think it’s safe to say a person scrupulous enough to survive this kind of scrutiny unindicted would not be working for Donald Trump.
Felons, grifters, and broken things… that’s all you’ll ever find in Trump’s orbit. He won’t tolerate anything else, and, no normal, honest, self-respecting person would tolerate Don-Don for more than a heartbeat, or two.
Roll em up then lock em up!
The payer has to pay a gift tax too.
“The gift tax is a federal tax levied on a taxpayer who gives money or other items of value, such as property, to someone else. The gift tax ranges from 18% to 40%, depending on the size of the gift . For 2021, the annual gift exclusion is $15,000 per recipient; the lifetime exemption is $11.7 million for a single donor.”
Any unreported income is illegal.
Payments for tuition directly to the school are generally not subject to gift tax. However, “gifts” – especially substantial ones like this-- made by employers to employees may be reviewed with a critical eye – not for gift tax, but as payment to an employee disguised as a gift.