Two separate investigations are looking into whether Donald Trump may have engaged in tax fraud by overvaluing a little-known property owned by the former president and claiming a higher tax deduction on it than what he actually deserved.
Both Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. and New York Attorney General Letitia James are conducting investigations into the Trump property.
The 50,000-square-foot mansion in Westchester County, New York, built in 1919 by former Federal Reserve Chair Eugene Meyer (who also once owned The Washington Post), features 60 rooms, 15 bedrooms and three swimming pools on 230 acres surrounded by “nature preserves,” according to the Trump Organization website.
Trump bought the property in 1996, with the intention of developing it into something more than just a vacation retreat for himself and his family, including possibly turning it into a golf course or a high-end residential area. But resistance from several localities where the property sprawls across has stymied those efforts, resulting in the former president, prior to taking office, deciding to turn more than 150 acres of the property into an easement for a conservation land trust.
The move came with some financial benefit for Trump, as he received a $21 million tax deduction on the property based on a professional appraisal from December 2015 that valued Seven Springs being worth $56.5 million, The Associated Press reported. However, that appraisal value was much higher than the $20 million value of the property that local government assessors had suggested Seven Springs was worth that year.
The tax deduction Trump claimed from the easement would have been significantly reduced, had the lower-priced assessment had been used instead.
Vance’s and James’s investigations are looking into the property and the possibility that Trump may have benefited from overvaluing Seven Springs at a higher price when he used it as a write-off.
Vance, who is conducting a criminal inquiry into Trump regarding the possibility he engaged in tax, banking and insurance fraud, won an important legal battle last month after the Supreme Court refused to hear challenges from the former president’s lawyers to the Manhattan district attorney’s subpoena for Trump’s financial records. On the same day the high court announced it wouldn’t hear those challenges, Mazars USA, Trump’s accounting firm, handed tax and other financial documents over to Vance’s office.
Vance began the inquiry after revelations that Trump had allegedly made hush-money payments to adult film actor Stormy Daniels during the presidential campaign. The district attorney sough to determine whether such payments had violated state tax law.
The investigation expanded, however, particularly after Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen testified before Congress that the former president had often inflated and deflated his assets to manipulate his tax filings and loan applications.
“It was my experience that Mr. Trump inflated his total assets when it served his purposes and deflated his assets to reduce his real estate taxes,” Cohen said in February of 2019.
The lowest criminal offense related to tax fraud in the state of New York is a misdemeanor charge, and can be punishable by up to one year in prison if a person is found guilty.
It’s unclear what types of charges Vance may seek against Trump, if any, following the conclusion of his criminal inquiry. No former president in U.S. history has ever been charged with committing a crime, let alone found guilty of such charges.
Help us Prepare for Trump’s Day One
Trump is busy getting ready for Day One of his presidency – but so is Truthout.
Trump has made it no secret that he is planning a demolition-style attack on both specific communities and democracy as a whole, beginning on his first day in office. With over 25 executive orders and directives queued up for January 20, he’s promised to “launch the largest deportation program in American history,” roll back anti-discrimination protections for transgender students, and implement a “drill, drill, drill” approach to ramp up oil and gas extraction.
Organizations like Truthout are also being threatened by legislation like HR 9495, the “nonprofit killer bill” that would allow the Treasury Secretary to declare any nonprofit a “terrorist-supporting organization” and strip its tax-exempt status without due process. Progressive media like Truthout that has courageously focused on reporting on Israel’s genocide in Gaza are in the bill’s crosshairs.
As journalists, we have a responsibility to look at hard realities and communicate them to you. We hope that you, like us, can use this information to prepare for what’s to come.
And if you feel uncertain about what to do in the face of a second Trump administration, we invite you to be an indispensable part of Truthout’s preparations.
In addition to covering the widespread onslaught of draconian policy, we’re shoring up our resources for what might come next for progressive media: bad-faith lawsuits from far-right ghouls, legislation that seeks to strip us of our ability to receive tax-deductible donations, and further throttling of our reach on social media platforms owned by Trump’s sycophants.
We’re preparing right now for Trump’s Day One: building a brave coalition of movement media; reaching out to the activists, academics, and thinkers we trust to shine a light on the inner workings of authoritarianism; and planning to use journalism as a tool to equip movements to protect the people, lands, and principles most vulnerable to Trump’s destruction.
We urgently need your help to prepare. As you know, our December fundraiser is our most important of the year and will determine the scale of work we’ll be able to do in 2025. We’ve set two goals: to raise $81,000 in one-time donations and to add 1250 new monthly donors by midnight on December 31.
Today, we’re asking all of our readers to start a monthly donation or make a one-time donation – as a commitment to stand with us on day one of Trump’s presidency, and every day after that, as we produce journalism that combats authoritarianism, censorship, injustice, and misinformation. You’re an essential part of our future – please join the movement by making a tax-deductible donation today.
If you have the means to make a substantial gift, please dig deep during this critical time!
With gratitude and resolve,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy