NEW YORK: Donald Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr. is due to testify for a second day on Thursday about the family company’s financial statements that a New York judge has ruled were fraudulently inflated to mislead lenders and insurers.
Donald Jr. is one of four family members set to take the witness stand in a New York civil fraud trial that could hobble the real-estate empire that built his father’s reputation as a business mogul before he entered politics.
The former US president is due to testify on Monday — the latest in many courtroom appearances by the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.
New York Attorney General Letitia James is seeking at least $250 million in damages, as well as a permanent ban on Trump, Donald Jr. and his son Eric from running businesses in the state.
Judge Arthur Engoron has already ruled that the three defendants and the company fraudulently inflated the values of trophy properties and other assets to win favorable financing terms.
Engoron has ordered the dissolution of companies that control pillars of Trump’s real estate portfolio, including Trump Tower in Manhattan. That ruling is on hold while Trump appeals.
In testimony on Wednesday, Donald Jr. sought to minimize his involvement with the company’s financial statements, saying they were largely prepared by company accountants.
He drew occasional laughter in the courtroom with self-deprecating quips about his lack of financial acumen, in a contrast to the sharp-edged persona he has cultivated as his father’s political attack dog.
The trial is one of many legal troubles Donald Trump must contend with as he campaigns to retake the White House. He faces a total of 91 felony charges in four separate criminal prosecutions, including two cases stemming from his attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat.
Nevertheless, Trump holds a commanding lead over his rivals for the Republican presidential nomination to face Democratic President Joe Biden in the November 2024 election.
Trump has denied wrongdoing in all of his criminal and civil cases and has accused James and Engoron of political bias.
He has not faced sanctions for those attacks, but Engoron has fined him $15,000 for twice violating a limited gag order that bars him from speaking publicly about court staff.
He is also under a limited gag order for the federal election subversion trial in Washington. Trump has alleged that both violate his right to free speech.
Donald Trump Jr. to testify for second day in New York fraud trial
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Donald Trump Jr. to testify for second day in New York fraud trial
- Donald Jr. is one of four family members set to take the witness stand in a New York civil fraud trial
Sequestered Suu Kyi overshadows military-run Myanmar election
- Suu Kyi’s reputation abroad has been heavily tarnished over her government’s handling of the Rohingya crisis
YANGON: Ousted Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been siloed in military detention since a 2021 coup, but her absence looms large over junta-run polls the generals are touting as a return to democracy.
The Nobel Peace Prize laureate was once the darling of foreign diplomats, with legions of supporters at home and a reputation for redeeming Myanmar from a history of iron-fisted martial rule.
Her followers swept a landslide victory in Myanmar’s last elections in 2020 but the military voided the vote, dissolved her National League for Democracy party and has jailed her in total seclusion.
As she disappeared and a decade-long democratic experiment was halted, activists rose up — first as street protesters and then as guerrilla rebels battling the military in an all-consuming civil war.
Suu Kyi’s reputation abroad has been heavily tarnished over her government’s handling of the Rohingya crisis.
But for her many followers in Myanmar, her name is still a byword for democracy, and her absence on the ballot, an indictment it will be neither free nor fair.
The octogenarian — known in Myanmar as “The Lady” and famed for wearing flowers in her hair — remains under lock and key as her junta jailers hold polls overwriting her 2020 victory. The second of the three-phase election began Sunday, with Suu Kyi’s constituency of Kawhmu outside Yangon being contested by parties cleared to run in the heavily restricted poll.
Suu Kyi has spent around two decades of her life in military detention — but in a striking contradiction, she is the daughter of the founder of Myanmar’s armed forces.
She was born on June 19, 1945, in Japanese-occupied Yangon during the final weeks of WWII.
Her father, Aung San, fought for and against both the British and the Japanese colonizers as he sought to secure independence for his country.
