Trump fined $355 million in fraud trial, banned from NY business

A New York judge has ordered Donald Trump to pay $355 million over fraud allegations and banned him from running companies in the state for three years in a major blow to his business empire and financial standing.

Trump — almost certain to be the Republican presidential nominee this November — was found liable for unlawfully inflating his wealth and manipulating the value of properties to obtain more favorable bank loans or insurance terms.

As the case was civil, not criminal, there was no threat of jail time. But Trump said ahead of the ruling that a ban on conducting business in New York state would be akin to a “corporate death penalty.”

Trump, who faces 91 criminal indictments in other cases, has seized on his legal woes to fire up supporters and denounce his likely opponent President Joe Biden, claiming that court cases are “just a way of hurting me in the election.”

The extent of the order by Judge Arthur Engoron threatens to shatter his personal wealth and ability to earn in the future.

The “defendants’ refusal to admit error — indeed, to continue it, according to the Independent Monitor — constrains this Court to conclude that they will engage in it going forward unless judicially restrained,” Engoron writes in his scathing order.

“Indeed, Donald Trump testified that, even today, he does not believe the Trump Organization needed to make any changes based on the facts that came out during this trial.”

It was as a property developer and businessman in New York that Trump built his public profile which he used as a springboard into the entertainment industry and ultimately the presidency.

The judge’s order was a victory for New York state Attorney General Letitia James. She had sought $370 million from Trump to remedy the advantage he is alleged to have wrongfully obtained, as well as having him barred from conducting business in the state.