Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi is coming under fire for her decision to ask Donald Trump for a contribution around the same time her office was being asked about a NY investigation of alleged fraud at Trump University. Reichelderfer told the AP Bondi spoke with Trump “several weeks” before her office announced it was deliberating joining a lawsuit proposed by New York’s attorney general.
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After the check came in, Bondi’s office cited insufficient grounds to proceed in the case and decided not to sue Trump. Bondi also claimed that she had no knowledge of the complaints against Trump University despite the more than 20 complaints filed with the Florida’s Attorney General’s office.
That $25,000 check was far from the only cash the Trump family flooded into Florida Republican Party politics. Nancy Watkins, a Tampa accountant for the committee that received the donation, said that Trump refused to take the money back and instead sent a personal check.
Four days before the donations occurred, Bondi chose to join the NY investigation into Trump University, citing complaints by residents regarding the widely criticized “school”.
“When I want something, I get it”.
The emerging details of Trump’s dealings with Bondi and Abbott-who both support his presidential campaign-align neatly with his own description of his relationship with politicians. The AP previously reported that then-Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott received a $35,000 donation from Trump to fund his gubernatorial campaign.
A government-watchdog group is calling for an audit of Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi’s actions regarding Trump University.
Unfortunately, Ms. Bondi has never really shown that her office is above partisanship in pursuit of justice: She sat on her hands rather than launch a criminal investigation into Republican lawmakers’ deceptive process of redistricting.
Trump has questioned the federal trial judge’s Mexican heritage, drawing charges of racism from his opponents as well as his GOP supporters. But she did acknowledge in March that the money should have never come from a Trump charity account, saying that was an “error” on Trump’s part. I can’t. And you know what?
Requests to interview Berlin on Tuesday June 7th were rebuffed by the office of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican.
A spokesman for Abbott, now the Texas governor, said the case was dropped after Trump’s organization agreed to stop offering his namesake real-estate seminars in the state.
In contrast, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, a Democrat, filed a still-pending lawsuit in 2013 alleging that Trump University bilked students out of $40 million.
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“It had to be political in my mind because Donald Trump was treated differently than any other similarly situated scam artist in the 16 years I was at the consumer protection office”, Owens told the AP on Friday June 3rd.
