I mean, you should probably use a crest white strip. [00:00:15] I don't know about makeup, but he's looking a little yellow there Don Jr.. That was Don Jr. in his day to test testify in the New York civil trial against the Trump Organization. Again, this is about overinflation of assets and committing fraud. [00:00:33] And so going over the highlights of this first day with the first of three of Trump's children who are going to be testifying, Baron and Tiff narrowly escaped. Don Trump Jr. struggled, he struggled specifically to answer why the former [00:00:48] CFO of the Trump Organization, Allen Weisselberg, resigned the way he did. He said, because of some legal issues he got himself into. Yeah, sure, associated with whom, Trump Jr. said, declining to offer specifics about Weisselberg's guilty plea on tax evasion charges last year, [00:01:05] previously giving lengthy answers to questions about his background and even smiling with the judge. Trump Jr. appeared tense on the witness stand as he answered questions about Weisselberg. The specific event was he was indicted. Cool, we knew that. [00:01:21] He was also indicted because of all of the gifts that he received from the Trump family, the penthouses, the college tuitions being paid for, etc. He, however, Trump Jr. distanced himself from the main question, [00:01:37] which is, what was your role in overinflating your family's assets, specifically between 2016 and 2021? He signed a bunch of financial statements. I was like, yes, this is accurate. But he said, I might have signed it, but I just kind of skimmed it. [00:01:54] He said, quote, I was not involved in the compilation of the statement of financial condition placing responsibility on his accountants. Did you work on the statement of financial condition for June 30, 2017, state attorney Colleen Faherty asked. I did not, the accountants worked on it, that's what we paid them to do, [00:02:10] Trump Jr. said. Assistant attorney general, that's Colleen Faherty narrowed in however on these licensing development deals on financial statements, specifically a $246 million valuation attached to those licensing deals. [00:02:25] Trump Jr. said he might have talked about the deals, but he did not add that evaluation to it. He said, quote, I didn't give them a value of 246 million. I could have sat there and gone through each one of the deals individually with Allen Weisselberg, Jeff McConney, Donald Bender, lovely name, and given them [00:02:42] an idea of what I believe cash flow coming from those deals would have been worth. Not even knowing it was for the purposes of this, I could have very well been involved in inferring that number. But not knowing it was for that purpose, what I might have been involved. [00:02:57] I could have been involved unbeknownst to me, I know numbers two, four, and six. I didn't put them together. I didn't add million after them. So this is sort of a denial, but kind of a walkback. He's covering his entire ass in this. [00:03:15] But obviously, Eric Trump Jr. or Eric Trump, there's no senior that we know of, and Ivanka will be testifying next. But, Ray, what do you make of this, the idea of a sort of branch off franchise that these [00:03:34] kids really are tucking, that's what they need. That's what they need. If Trump doesn't get reelected, they need to be able to have business deals, perhaps in New York, so they can keep making money and cheating people out of their money. [00:03:50] >> Speaker 2: I really enjoyed this, because the first thing I learned in law school is ignorance of the law is a defense. It's the best defense, in fact. And that's what Donald Trump Jr. is raising at this trial. I mean, at the end of the day, he had to sign off on these financial documents, [00:04:07] right? He had to sign off on the accuracy of these financial statements. So trying to write off responsibility onto the accountants is total and utter BS, you can't do that. You, at the end of the day, were supposed to inspect the documents, [00:04:24] ensure their accuracy, and you signed your name on the bottom of the sheet. You can't now just say well, I didn't read them, your Honor. I didn't actually see what was written in the financial statements. I just put my name on the line where they told me to. [00:04:40] And however much cocaine contributed to his not caring enough to go over the documents, I can't be certain. I'm sure that it was not no cocaine. >> Speaker 1: We can be sure. >> Speaker 2: Right, it's completely silly. [00:04:55] It's a non argument, and he's obviously scared, he's very scared. And his demeanor between shifting between when he was deposed to now being on the stand is evidence of that. >> Speaker 2: Yeah, should I have worn makeup? Yeah, he's super scared. This has been televised, and yeah, [00:05:12] I think the other big scary thing is, is your dad gonna flip on you, because if you're the one signing this document, the buck does stop with you. You can blame accountants, but at the end of the day, you just admitted you hired those accountants. [00:05:29] I don't know, Ray. Doesn't it seem that your legal responsibility is the person who signed their name on these overvaluations? >> Speaker 2: Absolutely, that is literally, he holds legal responsibility. He could in effect sue the accountants or try to show that the accountants [00:05:46] were grossly negligent in compiling the documents, but it's only gonna reflect back on him because he was involved in the evaluation of the assets. He was directly involved. So he's not gonna do that. He doesn't want them to look further into that because it's only gonna further [00:06:02] implicate him. But at the end of the day, yeah, you're exactly right. He signed off on them, the responsibility does rest with him. >> Speaker 1: And it's interesting because we know that from Michael Cohen's testimony in this case, that Trump senior would come in with a number, [00:06:17] and that accountants and everyone else, project managers would just have to reach that number in the paperwork. Okay, we're just going to 300 million, great. Let's somehow fudge the numbers to get you your 300 million or whatever x amount you're worth so that you finally will [00:06:36] be back on the Forbes list, which is all you care about. [MUSIC]