Trump moves for mistrial in Manhattan fraud case, claiming bias from the court

MANHATTAN (CN) — Donald Trump’s legal team on Wednesday asked a Manhattan court for a mistrial in the $250 million civil fraud case against the former president, his family and his namesake business.

In a 30-page motion that identified the suit as an “unprecedented case commanding worldwide interest and attention,” Trump’s team argued that the court was biased against him throughout the trial’s proceedings. Among their concerns was “the court’s improper co-judging” with Judge Arthur Engoron’s principal law clerk — the same one that Trump and his lawyers are barred from speaking about, thanks to a pair of gag orders.

“The principal law clerk is given unprecedented and inappropriate latitude,” Trump’s lawyers wrote. “While a justice of the court no doubt has ample discretion to consult with his or her law secretaries, this unprecedented arrangement exceeds the outer limits of such discretion.”

The defense team cited the clerk’s “head nods, eye rolls, notes being passed, comments,” and other actions that they believe are indicative of “tangible and overwhelming bias” against their case.

Trump had previously attacked the clerk in a now-deleted Truth Social post from last month, where he baselessly called her Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s “girlfriend” and accused her of “running this case against me.” The judge slapped Trump with a gag order after the stunt, which the former president has twice violated.

But defense lawyers also took aim at Engoron himself in their Wednesday motion. They accused the judge of sharing “disparaging” stories in his alma mater’s alumni newsletter, where he serves as editor.

“This court, in his capacity as a Wheatley School alumnus, has publicly posted links in the Wheatley newsletter he maintains to articles disparaging parties and counsel,” Trump’s lawyers claimed.

The New York attorney general sees the mistrial attempt as Trump’s latest effort to evade responsibility for his “years of fraud.”

“Once again, Donald Trump is trying to dismiss the truth and the facts, but the numbers and evidence don’t lie,” a spokesperson for the attorney general’s office said in a statement. “Donald Trump is now being held accountable for the years of fraud he committed and the incredible ways he lied to enrich himself and his family. He can keep trying to distract from his fraud, but the truth always comes out.”

The long-awaited move was weeks in the making. Defense lawyers teased the mistrial request after Trump’s fiery testimony earlier this month. It remains a longshot request, however. Engoron has already smacked down claims of bias from Trump’s legal team and has consistently defended the conduct of his chief law clerk.

Engoron held off on ruling on the mistrial motion on Wednesday, instead offering the attorney general’s office a day to gather a response to the defense’s request.

Given Trump’s busy impending court schedule, which includes a total of five other lawsuits both criminal and civil, it’s also unclear when this fraud case could be retried. He’s still the Republican frontrunner for the 2024 presidential race, adding to his already loaded calendar.

The fraud trial is expected to run through mid-December, barring the court granting a mistrial or a directed verdict in favor of the defense. On Wednesday, defense attorneys continued questioning their accounting expert Jason Flemmons, who testified as to who should have caught the massive inaccuracies on Trump’s financial documents.

During testimony that spanned nearly two full trial days, Flemmons meanderingly explained that Trump’s external accounting firm had a responsibility to check how his assets were valued on his financial statements.

“The accounting firm is obligated to understand the methods being used and consider the appropriateness of the methods being used for asset valuation,” Flemmons said Wednesday.

Flemmons added that the disclosures within Trump’s statements of financial condition likely covered any issues, acknowledging that there are multiple different ways to appraise an asset. It added to the defense’s claims that it was up to the banks and accounting firms to check their work, not Trump and his co-defendants.

But on cross-examination, Flemmons admitted that he didn’t even check all of Trump’s at-issue financial statements for “adequate” disclosures.

“I don’t believe I did that for all the disclosures,” Flemons told the court.

The judge already found Trump liable for the case’s top fraud count, ruling that he grossly inflated the value of his assets on those financial statements, regardless of their disclosures.

Attorney General Letitia James brought the suit last year against Donald Trump, his sons Eric and Donald Jr., the Trump Organization and the company’s former finance chief Allen Weisselberg. She claimed that the defendants, through years of widespread fraud, shorted banks and insurance companies out of hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue.

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