Donald Trump is set to attend his New York civil fraud trial on Thursday, where an accountant will testify to try to boost the former US president’s case that his family company did not manipulate the values of its holdings.
Trump is not set to testify in the case until Monday and has been gagged from attacking the judge’s staff. Ahead of his arrival at court, Trump once again attacked Judge Arthur Engoron and the New York attorney general, Letitia James.
“Heading to a Witch Hunt with a Crooked Judge and a Bats.. t CRAZY (and Racist!), A. G. This case was decided against me before it even started” he wrote on Truth Social.
On Thursday the court will hear from Eli Bartov, an accounting professor at New York University, the defense’s second-to-last witness in a trial over a lawsuit brought by James accusing Trump, his adult sons and family company of inflating his net worth by billions of dollars to dupe lenders and insurers.
Trump has denied wrongdoing and said James, an elected Democrat, is biased against him.
James has said Trump, his adult sons and 10 of his businesses manipulated financial statements to dupe banks and insurers into providing more favorable loan and insurance terms.
The trial largely concerns damages, because Engoron has already found that Trump’s financial statements were fraudulent.
Engoron imposed gag orders in the case restricting Trump and his lawyers from speaking publicly about court staff after Trump published a photo of the judge’s main law clerk with the Democratic US senator Chuck Schumer on social media and falsely called the clerk Schumer’s “girlfriend”.
Engoron said the post left the court “inundated” with threats from Trump supporters. Trump is appealing the gag orders.
James is seeking $250m in penalties, and wants Trump banned from New York state real estate business.
Over the past several weeks, bankers and others who did business with the Trump Organization have testified for the defense that they did not rely solely on Trump’s valuations in deciding deal with his company.
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Trump faces four unrelated federal and state criminal indictments, including two over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
He has pleaded not guilty in all of those cases.
None of them have dented his commanding lead in the Republican race to challenge President Joe Biden in next November’s election.
Trump is set to testify in the case for the second time on Monday. This week his lawyers attempted to delay his appearance but were denied by Engoron. “Absolutely not. No way. No how. It’s a nonstarter,” Engoron told Trump’s lawyer Christopher Kise.
Reuters contributed to this story