By Stephen Rae for AMLi
PROSECUTORS in Manhattan have interviewed Deutsche Bank executives and insurers working for President Donald Trump in recent weeks, The New York Times has reported today.
Observers say the interviews by attorneys are more signs of a deepening investigation into the president’s financial dealings.
According to the newspaper report Friday investigators from the Manhattan district attorney’s office have met with senior executives working for Trump’s primary lender, Deutsche Bank, and the president’s main insurer, Aon.
Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. launched the investigation into Trump’s business dealings two years ago and was initially focused on whether the Trump Organization violated state laws when it coordinated illegal hush-money payments before the 2016 election to two women who said they had affairs with Trump.
The Times said the payments are no longer the central focus of the investigation, and the inquiry has since broadened in scope, with Vance’s office subpoenaing eight years of Trump’s tax returns.
The president is currently fighting the subpoena in federal court after the Supreme Court rejected his claim earlier this year that he is “absolutely immune” from criminal investigation or prosecution while in office.
In November, the Manhattan DA’s office also issued new subpoenas to the Trump Organization, seeking information about payments made to “TTT Consulting LLC,” a tax write-off which the New York Times said may have gone Trump’s eldest daughter, Ivanka.
Trump has expressed significant concerns about the Manhattan DA’s investigation in the waning days of his presidency.
“Now I hear that these same people that failed to get me in Washington have sent every piece of information to New York so that they can try to get me there,” Trump said in a rambling 46-minute White House speech earlier this month. “It’s all been gone over, over, and over again.”
“They want to take not me but us down. And we can never let them do that,” he added.
Trump is also the subject of a parallel civil investigation from the New York State Attorney General’s office into his business dealings. Both the Manhattan DA’s criminal probe and the state attorney general’s civil probe would be beyond the scope of a presidential pardon, which does not apply to state-level offenses.
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