Washington:
Former President Donald Trump on Monday sued the New York Attorney General in an attempt to shut down her years-long civil investigation into his business dealings, a court file shows.
The lawsuit filed in a federal court in New York state alleges Letitia James, a Democrat, violates Trump’s constitutional rights with a politically motivated investigation.
“Its mission is guided solely by political zest and a desire to harass, intimidate and retaliate against a civilian whom it considers a political opponent,” the statement said.
James is investigating whether the Trump organization may have illegally reported false values on his properties, possibly to gain banking and tax benefits.
In a statement released Monday, James described Trump’s lawsuit as “an attempted side attack” on the investigation.
“Our investigation will continue undaunted, because no one is above the law, not even someone named Trump,” she said.
Trump’s lawsuit comes after the Washington Post reported earlier this month that James had asked him to testify in person at her office on Jan. 7.
She launched the investigation in March 2019 and suspects the Trump organization fraudulently overestimated the value of certain properties when seeking bank loans, and later reported much smaller values when declaring assets so it could pay less in taxes.
Trump’s son Eric, who is an executive vice president of the Trump Organization, was interviewed by James’s office on the matter in October 2020.
The former president is under pressure from several legal investigations.
He was questioned for more than four hours on Oct. 18 as part of a trial by a group of protesters who claim his guards attacked them six years ago.
The Trump Organization is also under investigation by the Manhattan District Attorney for possible financial crimes and insurance fraud.
In July, the Trump Organization and its long-serving financial chief, Allen Weisselberg, pleaded not guilty to 15 charges of fraud and tax evasion in a New York court.
That trial will begin in mid-2022.
Meanwhile, Trump is fighting to keep his tax returns from being released to prosecutors for years.
And in Washington, he’s trying to prevent a congressional investigation into the January 6 attack by his supporters on the Capitol from accessing White House data related to that day.
(This story was not edited by DailyExpertNews staff and was generated automatically from a syndicated feed.)