Judge orders Trump Organization’s tax firm to hand over some documents to NY attorney general

The supplemental order from Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoron was issued Friday

A New York State judge has ordered a tax firm that worked for the Trump Organization to hand over documents to New York Attorney General Letitia James related to her ongoing investigation into the business – even though the company had tried to keep them ‘privileged’.

The Friday supplemental order from Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoron is one of the first to come since Trump’s time as president officially came to a close, ending some of the legal protections he had.

In the court order, Engoron said he reviewed the documents from the firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP (‘Morgan Lewis’) and determined that there were some that needed to be sent to James’s office. 

The attorney general’s office had subpoenaed Trump and his son Eric Trump, along with the organization.

‘The Court finds that many of the communications Morgan Lewis marked as privileged were communications addressing business tasks and decisions, not exchanges soliciting or rendering legal advice,’ the judge wrote in his order to the firm. 

Letitia James’s office had subpoenaed Trump and his son Eric Trump, along with the organization

Morgan Lewis has been ordered to hand over ‘all documents marked “not privileged”‘ by Feb. 4

Morgan Lewis has been ordered to hand over ‘all documents marked “not privileged”‘ by Feb. 4.   

James began investigating potential fraud in Donald Trump’s business dealings in March 2019 after the president’s longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen told Congress that Trump had repeatedly inflated the value of his assets to obtain more favorable terms for loans and insurance coverage. 

After Donald Trump was elected president in November 2016, he announced that he would not be involved in day-to-day operations of the Trump Organization but would leave the responsibilities to his adult sons, Eric and Donald Trump Jr.

James began investigating potential fraud in Donald Trump’s business dealings in March 2019 after the president’s longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen told Congress that Trump had repeatedly inflated the value of his assets to obtain more favorable terms for loans and insurance coverage

Eric Trump was deposed in October as part of the ongoing civil probe into whether the value of Trump Organization assets were inflated to gain tax benefits.

The inquiry is a civil investigation, which could result in financial penalties but not jail time, according to CNN.

Trump has accused James and New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo, both Democrats, of ‘harassing all of my New York businesses in search of anything at all they can find to make me look as bad as possible.’