Trump agrees to shut down his charity amid allegations he used it for personal and political benefit
By David A. Fahrenthold December 18 at 10:57 AM
President Trump has agreed to shut down his embattled personal charity and give away its remaining funds amid allegations that he used it for his personal and political benefit, the New York attorney general announced Tuesday.
New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood announced that the Donald J. Trump Foundation is dissolving as her office pursues its lawsuit against the charity, Trump and his three eldest children.
The attorney general’s suit, filed in June, alleged “persistently illegal conduct” at the charity and sought to have the foundation shut down. Underwood is continuing to seek more than $2.8 million in restitution and has asked a judge to ban the Trumps temporarily from serving on the boards of other New York nonprofits.
Underwood said Tuesday that her investigation found “a shocking pattern of illegality involving the Trump Foundation — including unlawful coordination with the Trump presidential campaign, repeated and willful self-dealing, and much more.”
“This is an important victory for the rule of law, making clear that there is one set of rules for everyone,” she added in a statement.
The shuttering of Trump’s charity comes after The Washington Post documented a series of apparent lapses at the foundation. Trump used the charity’s funds pay off legal settlements for his private business, to purchase art that decorated one of his clubs and to make a prohibited political donation.
Trump denied that the organization had done anything wrong. In late 2016, he said he wanted to close the foundation, but the New York attorney general blocked that move while its investigation continued.
The settlement with Underwood’s office represents a concession by Trump to a state investigation he decried as a partisan attack. The case is one of numerous legal inquiries into Trump organizations that have proliferated during his White House tenure.
more:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-agrees-to-shut-down-his-charity-amid-allegations-he-used-it-for-personal-and-political-benefit/2018/12/18/dd3f5030-021b-11e9-9122-82e98f91ee6f_story.html?utm_term=.5829cdbf9271
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