Trump On Trial Over Accusations of Inflating the Value of Mar-a-Lago | Crossroads

Good evening and welcome to Crossroads. Former President Donald Trump is standing trial yet again. And this time it's a civil case in New York City and he's accused of inflating the value of his real estate empire. The accusations are against Trump and his children and by this afternoon, according to Trump's lawyers, the judge had agreed that most of the case was already past the statute of limitations, which Trump says would dismiss about 80% of the case. But it's still ongoing. And even if it does cost a lot of money on paper, well, it could impact the integrity of Trump's business regardless. A week before the trial began, Judge Arthur Engeren ruled that Trump, his children and his company deceived banks, insurers and others by exaggerating his net worth. Trump had called out the determination earlier on in order to come to the conclusion, he says, the judge put the value of Mar-a-Lago at $18 million. Mar-a-Lago for $18 million. Trump claims otherwise and he alleges that, if anything, his properties may be undervalued. He argues that Mar-a-Lago is worth at least a billion, maybe $1.5 billion. I've been deployed to the judge that ruled that a building and a property is worth $18 billion, when in fact it's worth over a billion, probably a billion and a half, it may be worth anything. Now on paper, Trump has valued Mar-a-Lago as high as $739 million. The lawsuit claims this is based on a false premise, though, that the property could be developed and sold for residential use. The $250 million civil lawsuit from New York Attorney General Letitia James last year alleged that the home and club should be only valued at close to maybe $75 million. However, the judge on this case dropped this value even further and his claim on Mar-a-Lago's value was quick to draw a lot of criticism. Many people pointed to a Forbes article published around the time when the lawsuit was filed last year. Forbes noted that real estate brokers were saying the housing market is absolutely beyond on fire, meaning it's gone up, and so many properties are worth more. It noted that because of this, the Trump organization's value of it at $500 million at the time was somewhat reasonable. It said that brokers valued Mar-a-Lago between $200 million and $725 million. It argued a more conservative estimate, according to Forbes at least, would be around $350 million. And notably, this has many people questioning how the judge came up with the estimate of just $18 million. Now, back to today and what's happening with the civil case. A video of Trump sitting in the courtroom went viral. People, while Trump pleaded the Fifth, he declined to comment. The camera then pans to New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is shown staring at the back of Trump's head. And attention then shifts to the judge, who is seen grinning for the cameras. This was going around all over the place online. And outside the courtroom, though, Trump wasn't quiet. Trump made his case to the media, and he alleged the lawsuit is just another example of weaponization of justice meant to interfere with this 2024 presidential campaign. Watch. This is a continuation of the single greatest witch hunt of all time. We have a rogue judge who rules that properties are worth a tiny fraction, $1,100, a tiny fraction of what they actually are. We have a racist attorney general who is a horror show, who ran on the basis that she was going to get Trump before she even knew anything about me. She used this to run for governor. She failed in her attempt to run for governor. She had virtually no polling. She came back and she said, well, now I'll go back to get Trump again. And this is what we have. It's a scam. It's a sham. Trump's alleging there was no crime. He alleged again that the properties were undervalued rather than overvalued. And he said the banks were always paid on time. He pointed as well to the crimes in New York City that are largely going unpunished by the AG here, the revolving door in the criminal justice system currently. And he alleged as well that the Department of Justice under Joe Biden's administration is playing a hand in deciding to go after him. And it all comes down from the DOJ. They're totally coordinated. It's in Washington because I'm leading. I'm the leading candidate. I'm leading Biden by 10 points. And I'm leading the Republicans by 50 and 60 points. That's pretty much, they say, over. I never accept that, but they say it's over. This has to do with election interference, plain and simple. Now, one of the key witnesses in this case against Trump is also turning some heads. Guess who it is? It's former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, who likewise tested against Trump in the Stormy Daniels case. Representative Jim Jordan suggested on X that the use of Cohen in this really diminishes the credibility of this whole case. He wrote, Now, alongside the case, the Justice Department has been denying that the rolling charges against Trump, seeming one after another, they're saying it doesn't have anything to do with politics. Attorney General Merrick Garland had this to say in an interview with 60 Minutes. These prosecutions of the former president are happening during the campaign. You could make the argument that it's the worst possible time. The Justice Department has general practices about not making significant overt steps or charging within a month or so of an election. We are clearly outside that timeframe in these cases. Prosecutors, special counsel, they follow the facts and the law where they lead. When they've gotten the amount of evidence necessary to make a charging decision and have decided that a charge is warranted, that's when they bring their cases. The investigation itself has determined the timing. Yes, exactly right. Now, when he was pressed in the interview about election timing, A.G. Garland had this to say. Your critics say that it's time to ruin Mr. Trump's chances in the election. Well, that's absolutely not true. Justice Department prosecutors are nonpartisan. They don't allow partisan considerations to play any role in their determination. Now, Garland also denies that either he or President Joe Biden or anybody in the Biden administration, for that matter, are communicating on investigating Trump. As for President Joe Biden, though, he's showing a very different picture. Critics have suggested that Biden is communicating on the targeting of Trump. But regardless, he has been giving official White House speeches, and these are not campaign speeches technically, where Biden is framing Trump and the entire MAGA movement, Make America Great Again, as extremist threats against the United States. He has given several speeches like this. Remember the Fire and Fury red background one? And the most recent one was just a few days ago on September 28 in Arizona. Well, folks, that's it for YouTube. For the rest of the episode, come join us on Epic TV. We'll be talking to Kash Patel about the charges against Trump, the attempt to remove him from ballots using the 14th Amendment the Supreme Court just ruled on it or tossed it out, what that means, what it means going forward. It's also some important stuff going on as well with RFK Jr. We'll be talking about he's going to possibly run as an independent, the latest on that. Some important news, and again for that, join us on Epic TV, where you can watch the rest of this episode as well as our documentaries, movies, and other shows. That said, I will see you on Epic TV. People from 160 countries illegally cross the U.S.-Mexico border and give themselves up to Border Patrol. But what about the ones who evade Border Patrol? These are known as You can safely assume that anybody that went through the extra effort to avoid U.S. Border Patrol was not an asylum seeker by default. It may not be today, it may not be tomorrow, but somewhere down the road if somebody rapes and kills somebody and we find out that they came through here on my watch, that's unacceptable. These men had surrounded my house. They were banging on my back door. They were banging on my front door. You can't understand it unless you're out here seeing it every day. 21 dead bodies on the road. Code 3, respond. Is it wrong to ask people to come to your front door of your home? It's fine. Then why would it be wrong to ask people to come to the front door of our nation? Their primary goal is to circumvent the checkpoints, go undetected. People that do not want to surrender, those are going to be the potential terrorists, the criminals, the real threat to the U.S. We were hoping the federal government would step in and do something, but they didn't. We have no clue who they are or where they're going. That's the scary part.