Former President Donald Trump said he invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self incrimination and did not answer questions during a deposition on Wednesday with New York Attorney General, Letitia James’ office.
In a lengthy public statement, Trump lambasted James as a “failed politician” and accused her of having “intentionally colluded with others” in her three-year probe of the Trump Organization, calling the inquiry a political fishing expedition against his family.
“I once asked, ‘If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?'” Trump said in his statement Wednesday.
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“Now I know the answer to that question. When your family, your company, and all the people in your orbit have become the targets of an unfounded, politically motivated Witch Hunt supported by lawyers, prosecutors, and the Fake News Media, you have no choice.”
The statement continued: “If there was any question in my mind, the raid of my home, Mar-a-Lago, on Monday by the FBI, just two days prior to this deposition, wiped out any uncertainty. I have absolutely no choice because the current Administration and many prosecutors in this Country have lost all moral and ethical bounds of decency.”
“Accordingly, under the advice of my counsel and for all of the above reasons, I declined to answer the questions under the rights and privileges afforded to every citizen under the United States Constitution,” it said.
James is wrapping up an aggressive three-year probe into a decade-long pattern of alleged financial wrongdoing at the Trump Organization, the multi-billion-dollar conglomerate for which Trump is the sole owner and beneficiary.
James has signaled that after her investigation wraps up, her office will bring a several-hundred-page lawsuit against Trump and his business that could seek millions in fines and even the dissolution of the company itself.
Trump has previously indicated through his lawyers that he was strongly considering invoking the Fifth Amendment in James’ wide-ranging investigation.
The legal upside to taking this route is clear; Trump wouldn’t incriminate himself during his sworn and taped testimony. That’s especially important given that the Manhattan district attorney’s office’s criminal investigation into his businesses, while stalled, is still ongoing.
That said, there are downsides to Trump pleading the Fifth.
If James’ eventual lawsuit against Trump lands before a jury, Trump’s taped deposition, in which he repeatedly pleads the Fifth, would be played in open court. Under New York law, the judge would then instruct jurors that they are allowed to draw what’s called an “adverse inference” from the tape.
In other words, unlike in a criminal case, the jury would be able to hold Trump’s refusal to answer questions against him as an indication of guilt.
Wednesday’s highly anticipated deposition came after a months-long legal fight during which the Trump family unsuccessfully tried to get a New York court to invalidate subpoenas for testimony from James’ office.
Trump’s two eldest children, Donald Jr. and Ivanka, were deposed last week, and Trump was seen arriving at James’ office Wednesday morning.
Wednesday wasn’t the first time Trump invoked his constitutional rights against self-incrimination. In 1990, he pleaded the Fifth in response to questions about adultery during his bitter divorce proceedings with first wife, Ivana.
But Trump adopted a different stance during the 2016 election, suggesting that staffers who had worked for then Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton had something to hide when they invoked their Fifth Amendment rights during a congressional investigation into her use of a private email server as secretary of state.
“The mob takes the Fifth,” he said at a September 2016 campaign rally. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?
