Uh-Oh: Eric Trump Stumbles in Key “Gotcha” Moment in Fraud Trial

Eric Trump got a little testy on the stand Thursday—moments before he was caught lying about his knowledge regarding his father’s financial statements.

After claiming that he had “never worked” on the Trump Organization’s statement of financial condition and wasn’t aware of it until the bank fraud trial “came to fruition,” the taller Trump brother admitted he was in fact aware of it dating as far back as 2013.

The “gotcha” moment has big implications for how the rest of this case will unfold.

Trump’s sons Eric and Don Jr. spent the majority of Wednesday and Thursday on the stand, where they conveniently seemed to have forgotten many details about serving as the Trump Organization’s top executives.

The brothers have largely skirted specifics, blaming their faulty memories for the total lapses. Don Jr. claimed he could not remember the period in 2021 in which he was removed and then reinstated as a trustee of the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust, couldn’t remember if his father was a trustee, had no idea why his father added himself back as a trustee during his presidency, and claimed he could not recall if he had worked on his father’s statement of financial condition.

Instead, the brothers’ testimony has attempted to divert most of the responsibility regarding the faulty financial statements onto the companies’ accounting team, including former CFO Allen Weisselberg, as well as their accounting firm, Mazars USA.

Yet Eric’s contradiction to his own deposition also shines a light on the prosecution’s strategy, which has been to question his credibility without outright calling him a liar. Essentially, Eric has already revealed that his claims of having no knowledge were “at best, based on a very faulty memory and at worst, constituted deliberate falsehoods,” reported NBC News.

Both Donald Trump and his two sons are defendants in the $250 million New York bank fraud trial in which the trio stands accused of deceiving banks and insurers by massively overvaluing the elder Trump’s net worth.

That figure was sometimes off by as much as billions of dollars, the president’s former fixer, Michael Cohen, revealed last week.

So far, Judge Arthur Engoron has ruled that Trump and his sons committed fraud and has stripped the Trump Organization of its business certificates. Trump is also fighting hard to appeal that decision.

Trump and Ivanka are set to testify next week, though the heiress is working to appeal Engoron’s ruling that she must participate.

Nancy Mace may say she fights for the people, but it seems that all she really cares about is being famous, the internal handbook for her congressional staff shows.

In a report published Thursday, The Daily Beast examined the South Carolina representative’s staff handbook and interviewed several of her former staffers. The main message was clear: All eyes should be on Mace at all times.

“Are we in a P.R. firm, or working for a member of Congress?” a former senior aide said they repeatedly asked themselves while working for Mace.

The handbook, which Mace reportedly wrote herself, includes clear instructions for making sure the congresswoman gets the most attention possible.

Staffers are also expected to book Mace at least 15 television appearances per week: a minimum of nine spots on national channels (between one and three times a day) and six or more times on local outlets. And to get on television, she’ll pull stunts—like strip the House speaker of his gavel.

Former staffers criticized Mace’s decision to vote to oust former Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Mace later used her vote to cast herself as a maverick, fundraising aggressively off the move.

But according to a former senior aide, she didn’t actually care all that much. “She saw the votes on the board and said, ‘Fuck it, I’m just gonna vote for it just so I can go on TV and talk about it.’”

Mace also has other staff metrics with the hope of getting her on television. Staff are required to send out at least one press release per day, an unusually high rate.

Mace also set the highly unrealistic goal of filing 25 new bills per year. She expected 10 of those bills to pass the House per year and one to be signed into law annually. It’s incredibly rare for almost any member to see a major bill that they wrote become law. Mace has introduced 62 bills since she took office in 2021, and only one—renaming a local post office in her South Carolina district—has actually become law.

The Daily Beast reviewed other internal documents from Mace’s office, including her office budget. She has dedicated more than a third of her office’s annual $500,000 budget for “marketing,” a word almost unseen on Capitol Hill.

“It is not normal for a member to prioritize media and comms over actual legislation like that,” a second former Mace staffer told The Daily Beast. “In my experience with and in other offices, comms serves to promote what the member is doing legislatively. In Mace’s office, legislation served to get her more media opportunities.”

Mace has already shown how willing she is to grab the spotlight. She calls herself a moderate and advocates for more “centrist” approaches to issues such as abortion, but she appears on far-right outlets and votes against abortion protections.

It was a battle of the extremes on Thursday as Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene went full meltdown mode on Twitter, hours after losing her bid to censure Palestinian-American Representative Rashida Tlaib.

In a frantic string of tweets, Greene threw daggers at several of her former far-right allies, including “vaping groping Lauren Boebert” and “CNN wannabe Ken Buck.” One representative took most of the heat in the MAGA feud, however: Representative Chip Roy, who voted against the censure effort.

“Tell her to go chase so-called Jewish space lasers if she wants to spend time on that sort of thing,” Roy told The Hill’s Mychael Schnell, early Thursday.

But Greene wasn’t having any of that, wasting no time before returning the dig, via her official congressional account on X (formerly known as Twitter).

“Oh shut up Colonel Sanders, you’re not even from Texas, more like the DMV,” Greene posted, referring to the D.C. metropolitan area. “Chip Roy’s career exist of working for politicians, working for campaigns for politicians, and being a politician himself. Unity Party all the way! Which is why you will never hold anyone accountable.”

Hours after the vote, Roy’s office issued a press release condemning Tlaib’s remarks toward Israel but described Greene’s effort to silence the Michigan Democrat as a “feckless resolution.”

It made “legally and factually unverified claims, including the claim of leading an ‘insurrection,’” Roy wrote.

That set Greene off, who accused the Texas representative of hating Trump over his vote to certify the 2020 presidential election.

“You hate Trump, certified Biden’s election, and could care less about J6 defendants being persecuted,” Greene said.

In total, 23 House Republicans voted alongside Democrats to table the resolution to censure Tlaib, who participated in an October 18 Jewish-led protest demanding a cease-fire in Gaza.

Nikki Haley had some decent advice for her fellow presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis: If you’re going to wear high heels, then just walk tall.

DeSantis has for weeks sparked theories that he’s wearing lifts inside his cowboy boots to make himself appear taller. Internet sleuths point to the weird way his boots fit and his apparent struggle to walk in them. But the Florida governor’s campaign team has denied the accusations.

During a Wednesday night interview on The Daily Show, guest host Charlamagne tha God asked Haley if she planned on wearing heels to the upcoming Republican primary debate so she can appear taller than DeSantis.

“I don’t know. We’ll have to figure that out,” Haley quipped back. “I can tell you I’ve always talked about my high heels. I’ve never hid that from anybody. I’ve always said, ‘Don’t wear ’em if you can’t run in ’em,’ so we’ll see if he can run in ’em.”

The former U.N. ambassador has never shied away from making jokes about her high heels, even if they are a little cringe. In 2012, she said the news media is “a little frightened of women” because she wears heels “for ammunition.”

In her campaign announcement, she said, “I don’t put up with bullies, and when you kick back, it hurts them more if you’re wearing heels.”

But her advice for DeSantis is pretty good: If the shoe fits, wear it—and wear it proudly. And then focus on actual issues.

Senator Dick Durbin is officially the first U.S. senator to call for a cease-fire in Gaza—26 days into a brutal airstrike campaign by the Israeli military which, as of Thursday, has killed over 9,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to Palestinian health officials.

During an interview with CNN’s Poppy Harlow on Thursday morning, the second-highest-ranking Democrat in the Senate was asked if he believed there should be a cease-fire.

“Is a cease-fire needed now?” Harlow asked.

“I think it is,” Durbin said. “At least, under the context of both sides agreeing.”

The Illinois senator described what would need to be a “good faith” effort by both Hamas and Israel, leading to the immediate release of Israeli hostages by Hamas and “conversation between the Israelis and the Palestinians.”

“Let’s face it, this has gone on for decades. Whatever the rationale for the beginning, it has now reached an intolerable level,” Durbin said.

Durbin said he has not yet communicated his beliefs to President Biden, whose administration is actively avoiding calls for a cease-fire. Durbin joins the ranks of 23 members of Congress who have expressed the need for a cease-fire.