Cohen was saying it last year.. Gotta wonder about forbes rankings as well.........
Updated 6:20 PM ET, Thu February 28, 2019
(CNN)Michael Cohen's depiction this week of how the Trump Organization manipulated figures to change the value of the company opened up the possibility that Donald Trump's strategy of using the illusion of vast wealth as an ego- and image-enhancing measure might also have been a crime.
In his public congressional testimony on Wednesday, Cohen indicated that his former client potentially committed a variety of financial crimes from bank to tax fraud in order to secure loans and even to move up in Forbes magazine's rankings of the very rich.
It's not clear whether Cohen's claims are being pursued by criminal investigators, but top Democratic Rep. Elijah Cummings, chair of the House Oversight Committee, said Wednesday that congressional committees are already divvying up the revelations for further investigation.
"We got a lot of information that I think will be -- we may not look into it in our committee, but one of the five or six committees will, and that's one of things that we have to discuss to figure out," Cummings told reporters.
Cohen testified that, in 2014 when Trump was making a play for the Buffalo Bills football team, he provided financial statements to his long-time lender that his former attorney now claims were inflated.
Among the documents that Cohen provided to Congress were Trump's financial statements for the years 2011, 2012 and 2013. The documents showed a near doubling in Trump's net worth from $4.26 billion in 2011 and $4.56 billion 2012 to $8.66 billion in 2013. The leap was attributed to $4 billion in "brand value."
"These documents and others were provided to Deutsche Bank on one occasion when I was with him in our attempt to obtain money so that we can put a bid on the Buffalo Bills," Cohen told the House Oversight Committee.
A lawyer for the Trump Organization declined to comment to CNN Thursday
More @ source
Updated 6:20 PM ET, Thu February 28, 2019
(CNN)Michael Cohen's depiction this week of how the Trump Organization manipulated figures to change the value of the company opened up the possibility that Donald Trump's strategy of using the illusion of vast wealth as an ego- and image-enhancing measure might also have been a crime.
In his public congressional testimony on Wednesday, Cohen indicated that his former client potentially committed a variety of financial crimes from bank to tax fraud in order to secure loans and even to move up in Forbes magazine's rankings of the very rich.
It's not clear whether Cohen's claims are being pursued by criminal investigators, but top Democratic Rep. Elijah Cummings, chair of the House Oversight Committee, said Wednesday that congressional committees are already divvying up the revelations for further investigation.
"We got a lot of information that I think will be -- we may not look into it in our committee, but one of the five or six committees will, and that's one of things that we have to discuss to figure out," Cummings told reporters.
Cohen testified that, in 2014 when Trump was making a play for the Buffalo Bills football team, he provided financial statements to his long-time lender that his former attorney now claims were inflated.
Among the documents that Cohen provided to Congress were Trump's financial statements for the years 2011, 2012 and 2013. The documents showed a near doubling in Trump's net worth from $4.26 billion in 2011 and $4.56 billion 2012 to $8.66 billion in 2013. The leap was attributed to $4 billion in "brand value."
"These documents and others were provided to Deutsche Bank on one occasion when I was with him in our attempt to obtain money so that we can put a bid on the Buffalo Bills," Cohen told the House Oversight Committee.
A lawyer for the Trump Organization declined to comment to CNN Thursday
More @ source
