Every discovery of deception, tax fraud, missing cash, and old-fashioned bribery may not wake the crickets at the New York Times (Quick! Put two more reporters on the critical “does Hillary use cherry or mentholyptus” beat.), but David Fahrenthold’s tireless work has certainly stirred up interest where it really counts.
Not only are House Democrats pushing the Justice Department to step in when it comes to the Trump Foundation’s extremely conveniently timed donation to Florida AG Pam Bondi …
Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee are asking the Justice Department to investigate the circumstances surrounding a $25,000 donation the Donald J. Trump Foundation made to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi at a time when her office was considering whether to open a fraud investigation of Trump University.
But now New York AG Eric Schneiderman is moving on his own to look at the details of the Trump Foundation.
Separately, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said on CNN Tuesday that his office was “concerned that the Trump Foundation may have engaged in some impropriety” and had “been looking into the Trump Foundation to make sure it’s complying with the laws that govern charities in New York.”
Schneiderman would be the AG who didn’t roll over when Trump waggled cash, and in fact, Trump used his foundation to attack Schneiderman.
Donald Trump’s charitable foundation gave $100,000 in 2014 to a conservative activist group that was used to help finance a federal lawsuit against New York state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman — the same public official who was suing the real estate mogul for fraud over the operations of Trump University.
One big rule of going after an attorney general for political reasons? If you don’t knock them out of office, you better be sure that you crossed every ‘t’ and dotted every ‘i’ when you made your play.
Trump? Didn’t.
As you might expect, Trump communications adviser Jason Miller (as we sure he’s not just Trump?) had a perfectly reasonable statement.
“Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is a partisan hack who has turned a blind eye to the Clinton Foundation for years and has endorsed Hillary Clinton for President. This is nothing more than another left-wing hit job designed to distract from Crooked Hillary Clinton’s disastrous week.”
Which can also be boiled down to: Look over there! Notably missing from this statement is any defense of actions from the Trump foundation.
The push by Democrats to the Justice Department is just centered on the Trump — Bondi connection, but Schneiderman’s writ is much bigger. He’s peeking into Trump’s mischaracterization of political spending as charitable giving. He’s also looking into Trump’s propensity for using the foundation’s money to buy gifts for himself. And Trump’s recording gifts to charities who say they never received a payment.
Could some other AG’s possibly loan Schneiderman a few spare attorneys? It would be embarrassing if this investigation took more than, say, eight weeks.