'This is Russia, this is China': Trump blames foreign adversaries and DOJ for fraud ruling
Former President Donald Trump gave an impromptu statement in Florida after a New York judge issued his bench ruling in his months-long civil fraud trial, blaming foreign adversaries without explanation for the actions of the court.
On Friday, Judge Arthur Engoron ruled that the 45th president of the United States had to pay in excess of $350 million in civil penalties for filing fraudulent financial statements to the state that artificially inflated the value of his real estate assets. Trump's adult sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric, both have to pay $4 million apiece in penalties for their role in the fraud scheme. And former Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg has been ordered to pay $1 million in penalties. Trump and his sons are also banned from holding officer or director positions in any New York-based company for the next three years.
"We'll be appealing, but more important than that, this is Russia, this is China, this is the same game, all comes out of the DOJ, it all comes out of Biden, it's a witch hunt against his political opponent, the likes of which our country has never seen before," Trump said. "You see it in third-world countries, banana republics, but you don't see it here."
READ MORE: Trump ordered to pay more than $350 million in New York fraud case
The former president also tore into New York Attorney General Letitia James as well as Judge Engoron on his Truth Social platform, calling it "Election Interference and tyrannical Abuse of Power."
"They are Crazed Lunatics who are destroying everything in their way," Trump wrote in a separate post. "It all starts with Biden’s attacks on his Political Opponent!"
Of course, Trump's claims of foreign governments or President Joe Biden's DOJ somehow causing the verdict are incorrect. Engoron was first elected to the New York City Civil Court in 2002 before being appointed as an acting justice to the Manhattan Supreme Court in 2013, and then was elected to a full term in 2015. As a member of the state judiciary, Engoron has no relationship with the US Department of Justice.
Engoron's judgment comes on the heels of a New York jury finding him liable for $88.3 million in damages in the defamation case brought by writer E. Jean Carroll, whom a separate jury found was sexually abused by Trump in a New York department store in the 1990s. Carroll was also awarded a $5 million verdict in 2023 specifically for sexual abuse.
READ MORE: Trump owes almost $450M in judgments. Here's how much he'd get for selling his properties
Watch the segment of Trump's speech below, or by clicking this link.
