The New York attorney general will be able to seize former President Donald Trump's properties if he doesn't pay his $450 million fraud judgment, a legal expert has said.
Greg Germain, a law professor at Syracuse University in New York, said that Letitia James, who brought the civil case against Trump, would be able to "levy and sell" Trump's property to pay for the judgment.
"The properties would probably be sold whether Trump wants to sell or not, unless he could come up with the cash to pay the judgment in full," Germain said.
He said that Trump's business assets would not be exempt from the judgment.
"A judgment creditor can go after whatever assets the creditor wants to, unless they are exempt from execution, and business assets are not exempt from execution. Usually creditors go after the most liquid assets first," he said.
Germain said that Trump also faces the difficulty of having to get permission from a court-appointed monitor before selling some of his key assets.
Last September, the judge in Trump's fraud trial, Arthur Engoron, appointed retired judge Barbara Jones to oversee Trump's business interests in New York. She will appoint a business manager who will have ultimate say over whether Trump is allowed to sell business assets.
"The new business manager has the ultimate decision-making authority on operating or selling property. Trump could ask for sale, but he wouldn't control the decision. If Trump wanted to sell, I suspect the business manager would go along with it," Germain said.
Germain added that Trump will likely seek a bond to pay for the lawsuits before launching an appeal. If Trump doesn't have the resources to do so, he may be in trouble, Germain said.
"If he is not able to meet the requirements for obtaining a stay pending appeal, then his financial situation would be in serious jeopardy. So I would expect him to [then] consider a bankruptcy filing to stay enforcement while he pursues his appeal," he said.
Newsweek contacted Trump's attorney by email on Wednesday, outside normal business hours, to comment on this story.
On February 16, Engoron ruled that Trump will have to pay roughly $355 million in penalties for overinflating the value of his assets.
The judgment is backdated to include interest earned. James' office said in a statement that the total amount will come to about $450 million.
Trump's sons Donald Jr. and Eric Trump were each ordered to pay more than $4 million.
Trump, the GOP frontrunner in the 2024 presidential election, has maintained his innocence in the case and claimed it was politically motivated.
Update 02/21/24 09:56 a.m ET: This article was updated to clarify the monitor's role in appointing a business manager.
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Sean O'Driscoll is a Newsweek Senior Crime and Courts Reporter based in Ireland. His focus is reporting on U.S. law. ... Read more
