The Trump Organization is blasting a grand jury criminal indictment against executive Allen Weisselberg and the organization for tax-related charges, chalking it up to a “scorched earth” attempt to damage former President Trump politically.
“Allen Weisselberg is a loving and devoted husband, father and grandfather who has worked at the Trump Organization for 48 years,” a spokesperson for the Trump Organization said on Thursday. “He is now being used by the Manhattan District Attorney as a pawn in a scorched earth attempt to harm the former President. The District Attorney is bringing a criminal prosecution involving employee benefits that neither the IRS nor any other District Attorney would ever think of bringing. This is not justice; this is politics.”
Weisselberg, who worked for Trump for decades as his top financial officer, turned himself in to authorities on Thursday morning after being indicted following a criminal tax investigation by the office of Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance Jr. (D).
The allegations against Weisselberg center on whether he and other top executives at the company paid taxes on benefits such as car leases, apartment rent and private school tuition totaling thousands of dollars.
Several news outlets have reported in recent weeks that prosecutors have attempted to get Weisselberg to comply with a broader investigation into the Trump Organization’s financial practices.
The former president is not expected to be charged on Thursday. He has said little about Weisselberg’s case publicly but also decried broader investigations into his company as politically motivated.
“They leak, they lie, and they campaign based on information that has already been gone through in other of the many investigations I have put up with,” Trump said in a statement. “Now they just leaked that we were given one day, today, to make our case about things that are standard practice throughout the U.S. business community, and in no way a crime. They also know that no matter how strong our case, they will work hard to embarrass us and the Republican Party.”