Judge won’t block monitor to oversee Trump Organization
A New York appellate court has declined, at least for now, to stay a judge's order appointing an independent monitor to oversee former President Donald Trump's family real estate firm.
Trump and the New York Attorney General's office were supposed to begin submitting candidates for the monitor job this week.
The decision, issued Wednesday, said the Appellate Division's First Department would reconsider the matter at a later time.
"The application for an interim stay is denied pending determination of the motion by a full bench," the decision said.
Judge Arthur Engoron of State Supreme Court in Manhattan said the attorney general's investigators had made a "comprehensive demonstration of persistent fraud" within the Trump Organization in a $250 million civil lawsuit.
Trump's attorneys said the monitor was the state's attempt to "seize control" of his business but the judge said the monitor's job is to be narrow, overseeing the production of Trump's statements of financial condition and their dissemination to third parties.
As part of the lawsuit, the attorney general's office said past statements were misleading, inflated Trump's net worth and duped lenders and insurance companies into giving Trump better terms than he deserved.
Trump has denied wrongdoing and has called the lawsuit politically motivated.
New York Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, was reelected Tuesday for a second term.
