A Calm Ivanka Trump Takes the Stand

She says she can't recall many details
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 8, 2023 12:27 PM CST
A Calm Ivanka Trump Takes the Stand
Ivanka Trump exits courtroom for lunch break during a civil fraud trial against former President Donald Trump at New York Supreme Court, Wednesday, Nov. 8, 2023, in New York.   (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

Ivanka Trump testified Wednesday in the New York civil fraud trial against her father and the family business—and the atmosphere was a lot calmer than it was on Monday, when Donald Trump repeatedly clashed with Judge Arthur Engoron. The BBC reports that she "remained composed" while answering questions about her work at the Trump Organization. She said she hadn't worked for the Trump Organization since January 2017, when her father took office. Like brothers Donald Jr. and Eric, she testified that she had little knowledge of her father's financial statements, the AP reports. Unlike her brothers, she is not a co-defendant in the case. Donald Trump didn't attend the trial Wednesday.

When asked about the financing of Trump properties including the Doral golf course, Ivanka Trump repeatedly said she couldn't recall details, the New York Times reports. During her time at the Trump Organization, she was the "point person" in dealing with Deutsche Bank's private wealth management arm, the AP reports. The bank loaned the company hundreds of million dollars but required Trump to submit financial statements. The state lawsuit alleges Trump inflated the value of his assets to get favorable loan terms.

Lisa Rubin at MSNBC writes that while Ivanka Trump has said little that will help New York AG Letitia James' case, "she is a vehicle through which documents can be admitted into evidence." Rubin writes that one particularly "damning" document is a 2011 email in which she discussed a Deutsche Bank loan offer, saying "it doesn't get better than this." In his response, Trump Organization lawyer Jason Greenblatt said a requirement for Trump to show a net worth between $2 billion and $3 billion, excluding the value of his brand, could be "a problem." Ivanka Trump testified that she couldn't recall details of the correspondence. (More Trump New York fraud trial stories.)

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