A USA judge on Tuesday rejected Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s pretrial bid to throw out a lawsuit brought by Trump University students who said they were defrauded by its real-estate seminars.
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Trump has repeatedly denied the allegations of fraud levied against him and argued that the claims against Trump University come from a small group of disgruntled students and that overall, the company’s interaction with students led them to believe that the vast majority were satisfied with the education they received from courses carrying tuition upwards of $35,000. Trump’s lawyer actually compared Trump University to Hamburger University in an attempt to illustrate that Trump U was more of a “corporate university” as opposed to an accredited educational constitution.
A federal judge has ruled that videotaped depositions of Donald Trump in a court case alleging fraud by Trump University will not be made public.
In response to Trump’s motion, Judge Curiel wrote “Plaintiff points to evidence in the record that Defendant’s statements in the Main Promotional Video, as well as TU’s “Marketing Guidelines”, encouraged TU students to associate TU with accredited universities rather than so-called corporate ‘universities'”.
On the video issue, Curiel said in his written ruling that “while there is a degree of legitimate public interest in the demeanor of the defendant in the deposition videos”, it did not outweigh the potential harm the ongoing media scrutiny of the footage could do to the case.
Mr Trump’s lawyers had argued that the release of the videos could add to a “media frenzy” around the case and affect a jury.
Separately, Curiel rejected an effort to make public video of Trump testifying under oath, which will protect the the White House candidate from having it included in attack ads.
Trump has called Curiel “a very hostile judge” and a “hater of Donald Trump”.
U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel in a ruling Tuesday denied the request from news organizations that wanted full transcripts and video of Trump’s recent depositions. In May, Judge Curiel ordered the release of previously sealed documents, including testimony from former managers calling Trump University a “lie” and a “scheme”.
While the instructors were advertised as being “hand-picked” by Donald Trump, Curiel said that there was significant evidence that Trump had not personally met, interviewed or selected Trump University instructors.
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The case is set to go to trial in late November-after the general election. He said the Indiana-born judge’s Mexican heritage and membership in a Latino lawyers association posed a conflict with Trump’s positions on illegal immigration and promise to build a wall on the Mexican border.
