An attorney for President-elect Donald Trump requested New York Attorney General Letitia James to drop the civil case in which he was found liable for fraud and ordered to shell out a massive multi-million dollar payment.
An appellate attorney Trump selected to become the nation’s next solicitor general penned a letter to James requesting the case’s dismissal in the interest of ending “partisan strife.”
“In the aftermath of his historic election victory, President Trump has called for our Nation’s partisan strife to end and for the contending factions to join forces for the greater good of the country,” attorney D. John Sauer wrote. “This call for unity extends to the legal onslaught against him and his family that permeated the most recent election cycle.”
Sauer asserted that now that he is Trump’s nominee for solicitor general, he has also been personally victimized by “partisan division” and said James has the “singular opportunity to help cure this division.”
New York Judge Arthur Engoron found Trump and the Trump Organization liable for fraud in September 2023 after James alleged in a lawsuit that the president-elect falsely inflated the net worth of his assets and properties to advance his business needs. This February, following a months-long bench trial to determine penalties, Engoron ordered Trump to pay $464 million with interest, a ruling that Trump has appealed.
Sauer also cited the criminal cases that have been dropped since Trump’s re-election to bolster his argument that James should also dismiss the civil case.
Special Counsel Jack Smith recently abandoned the federal election interference and the classified documents mishandling cases against Trump, noting in a court filing that the dismissal has nothing to do with the case’s strength or merits but the Justice Department’s position “that the Constitution requires that this case be dismissed before the defendant is inaugurated.”
A New York judge also indefinitely postponed the Nov. 26 sentencing in a case in which Trump was found guilty of 34 felonies for falsifying business documents to pay hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels. Trump’s attorneys are also working to dismiss the president-elect’s felony conviction altogether before his return to the White House in January.
In his letter, Sauer argued against the findings of the civil fraud case, challenging the allegations spelled out in the suit and including figures to defend Trump’s valuations of his Mar-A-Lago estate in Florida. He also stated that James’ complaint “vindicates no public purpose,” and that its continued pendency raises “grave and doubtful constitutional questions.”
Sauer encouraged James to invoke a “spirit of unity” and dismiss the case with prejudice, referencing the Thanksgiving Proclamation President Abraham Lincoln signed in 1863 to establish the yearly holiday.
Neither James nor her office have commented on Sauer’s request.
Shortly after Trump won the election, James pledged to fight any political attacks that Trump might launch at her office as retribution for the civil fraud case.
Trump has vowed on several occasions that, if he were re-elected, he would punish several of his political opponents, James included. The president-elect said the New York attorney general should be “prosecuted” for bringing the civil case forward. He and his followers attacked her on numerous occasions and deemed that the case was part of a political witch hunt against him.
