Trump asks judge to reject NY AG Letitia James’ contempt request

Former President Donald Trump questioned a judge to reject New York Legal professional Normal Letitia James’ bid to keep him in contempt for allegedly failing to comply with a subpoena as section of a civil investigation into his organization.

A law firm for Trump argued in a courtroom submitting Tuesday that the previous president complied with James’ subpoena when his authorized group informed her that he won’t have any of the documents she requested.

“Just after conducting a diligent research and critique, Respondent’s counsel identified that Respondent was not in possession of any files responsive to the Subpoena and that all possibly responsive documents had been in the possession, custody or management of the Trump Corporation,” Trump’s legal professional Alina Habba wrote.

James is investigating allegations that the Trump Organization misstated the values of some of its genuine estate assets to get better fiscal terms when applying for loans and insurance and for tax uses.

New York Supreme Courtroom Judge Arthur Engoron in February denied requests by Trump, Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr. to toss out subpoenas issued to them by James.

Engoron also requested Trump to “comply in entire” with a subpoena for him to generate extra files and information to the investigators.

James on April 7 urged the judge to keep Trump in contempt of court docket, accusing the former president of violating the court’s get. She also asked Engoron to slap Trump with a good of $10,000 each working day until finally he turns more than the documents.

“The judge’s buy was crystal obvious: Donald J. Trump need to comply with our subpoena and transform around suitable paperwork to my office environment,” James explained in a statement at the time.

“Instead of obeying a courtroom purchase, Mr. Trump is making an attempt to evade it. We are looking for the court’s immediate intervention because no a single is above the legislation,” James said.

Engoron is scheduled to listen to oral arguments about the contempt dispute Monday afternoon.

In the court docket filing Tuesday evening, Trump’s lawyer speculated that the lawyer general’s office environment submitted the contempt movement “seemingly in an work to switch this make any difference into a community spectacle.”

Habba wrote that Trump followed the subpoena’s directions. She argued that Trump was not demanded to supply any documents to the investigators that were being in the Trump Organization’s possession, if all those data had previously been produced to James’ workplace.

“This provision is significant given that the Trump Business has independently created a extensive range of paperwork to the [attorney general’s office] all through the system of the subject matter investigation,” Habba wrote.

She also accused the attorney general’s place of work of refusing “to engage in very good-religion conversations to address the problems at hand.”

Specified that “recalcitrant behavior, it is honest to concern [the attorney general’s] motive in bringing the prompt application, which appears to be tiny a lot more than a contrived publicity stunt,” Habba wrote.