New York’s attorney general is investigating the Donald J. Trump Foundation to make sure the organization is complying with state laws governing charities.
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New York’s attorney general says he is investigating Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s foundation over suspected “impropriety”.
“I regulate the nonprofits in NY state”.
“We’ve inquired into it”, Schneiderman told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “The Lead“. “I didn’t make a big deal out of it or hold a press conference”, he continued.
The start of a NY investigation into Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s charitable foundation is an attempt by Democrats to distract attention from their nominee, Hillary Clinton, and attack her rival, executive director of the Council for the National Interest and former CIA intelligence officer Philip Giraldi told Sputnik.
The Post also found other irregularities, including that Mr Trump spent US$20,000 (S$27,000) of money that had been set aside for charitable purposes to buy a 1.8m painting of himself. Senior Vice-President of the Trump Foundation Jeffery McConney said the donation was an “unintentional mistake”.
A new Hillary Clinton ad blasts Trump for making the “pay-to-play donation” to Bondi while running through the allegations.
After Bondi received the donation, she opted not to join the legal action.
The Trump campaign has repeatedly declined to provide evidence to show that Trump has donated as much to charity as he claims.
The investigation comes after a series of reports in the Washington Post that Trump has used the foundation in ways that are unusual and appear to defy tax law.
Late Tuesday, Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller dismissed Schneiderman’s inquiry as politically motivated.
The correspondence begins with a June 9 letter from the attorney general’s office to both Trump’s presidential campaign and his foundation.
Schneiderman’s office is also leading one of three separate lawsuits against Trump University, which he has called “straight up fraud.”
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“This fact pattern indicates that these payments may have influenced Mrs. Bondi’s official decision not to participate in litigation against Mr. Trump”, the Democrats wrote. He then makes donations under the Trump Foundation name without giving the original donors credit, the Post reported. Charities are forbidden under USA tax law to make political donations and the foundation was fined $2,500.
