Donald Trump and two of his adult children allegedly participated in a tax fraud scheme, former Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg testified on Thursday.
CBS News reported, “Weisselberg said Donald Trump, or at times Eric Trump or Donald Trump Jr., signed checks to pay up to $100,000 for private school tuition for Weisselberg’s grandchildren. Weisselberg said he then instructed the company’s controller to deduct the $100,000 from his salary, allowing him to report a smaller income. Copies of some of the checks signed by the Trumps have been shown in court.”
Weisselberg and two Trump organizations are accused of more than a dozen counts of fraud, grand larceny and tax evasion.
The signed checks are evidence that they played a role in the fraud scheme, but not that they were behind it.
Weisselberg claims that the Trump family didn’t know what he was up to. Former President Trump is not a defendant in this case.
Michael Cohen replied to Wesselberg’s claims:
Not sure how he betrayed the Trump Family as they were intimately involved in the providing of the perk packages. I call bullshit!!! https://t.co/HbqYAkr1sc
— Michael Cohen (@MichaelCohen212) November 17, 2022
Yet, Weisselberg said “the practice of cutting executives’ bonuses via 1099 income started in the 1980s before he started working for Trump in 1986. He said he wasn’t sure who started the practice.”
As for the school payment checks signed by various Trumps, “Weisselberg stopped short of saying Trump or Donald Jr. knew about Weisselberg’s scheme to pay back the company through his paychecks to avoid taxes on the tuition.
He told Trump he’d pay him back for it but didn’t elaborate on how, according to Weisselberg.”
Weisselberg also said that the Trump Organization stopped several illegal tax practices around 2017 when Donald Trump took office.
“It was my own personal greed that led to this,” the former CFO said.
Weisselberg saying that his own greed led to this doesn’t explain why some of these practices were in place before he started working at the Trump organization.
Weisselberg pleaded guilty in August to illegal tax evasion crimes and is expected to serve several months in jail.
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