Former Mob Prosecutor Monitoring Trump Organization’s Finances Granted Sweeping Powers To Run Company After Trump Lawyers Slam Her Performance

Retired Judge Barbara Jones, who was appointed last November as the independent financial monitor of the Trump Organization, has been given sweeping new powers to run the troubled company, much to its lawyers’ chagrin.

After Judge Arthur Engoron‘s ruling last month, Jones, a former mob prosecutor, is effectively running the company after Trump and his sons Eric and Don Jr. were barred from running companies in New York for a fixed period.

The judge ordered Trump and his company to pay $355 million in restitution for decades of business fraud.

The company is now appealing the bans and fines.

Jones was assigned to serve as the Trump Organization’s independent monitor by Judge Engoron at the recommendation made by New York Attorney General Letitia James in September 2023.

Trump’s lawyers have quickly turned on Jones as she has amassed ever-greater power over the company.

In particular, the lawyers attacked Jones’ recent progress report mentioning that the Trump Organization has been cooperative, applied some changes and issued required corrections to financial statements.

However, this report also outlines many errors and misstatements observed by Jones during her 14 months as the company’s monitor.

“It is important to note that the Trump Organization acknowledged the disclosure issues described after I brought them to its attention and has been open to recommendations to improve accuracy and transparency,” the monitor wrote in her report.

“It does not appear that there are adequate accounting and presentation standards, procedures, or training associated with the preparation of financial disclosures,” Jones said. “To the extent adequate standards and procedures do exist, they do not appear to have been followed across the organization.”

In her report, Jones explained what kind of financial inaccuracies she noticed.

“My role has been limited to assessing the accuracy of the information provided to me by the Trump Organization,” she wrote. “During my review, however, I have identified certain disclosure deficiencies that, from the recipient’s perspective, could be considered material inaccuracies in the presentation of financial information”

“In general, my observations fall into three categories: (1) incomplete disclosures [like the loan agreement for Trump Plaza]; (2) inconsistent disclosures [including expenses relating to the management fees for 40 Wall Street]; and (3) errors in disclosures [such as the math error in the calculation of handling profit before depreciation and exceptional items for the 2021 and 2022 values in the 2022 Audited Financial Statements for Trump Turnberry],” the former judge continued. “In addition, I am also providing the Court with my observations regarding Defendants’ compliance with the terms of the Monitorship Order.”

Trump attorney Clifford S. Robert criticized Jones’ report in a letter he wrote to Judge Engoron.

“The Monitor now twists immaterial accounting items into a narrative favoring her continued appointment, and thereby the continued receipt of millions of dollars in excessive fees,” Robert wrote.

He also argued that the report represented an “unacceptable level of disingenuity.”

Robert pointed out that Jones’ report simply rehashed problems already resolved by the Trump Organization. He stated that many items such as unfinished disclosures, clerical mistakes, and other issues were “immaterial discrepancies and simple math errors.”

“The Monitor was not appointed to identify math errors or otherwise sensationalize minor and inconsequential accounting discrepancies scattered throughout the financial reports of the over 400 companies comprising the Defendants’ global enterprise,” Robert wrote.

The attorney claimed that the report did not identify fraud, misconduct or suspicious activity which support the continuing oversight of the Trump Organization.

Robert believed that Jones’ role as a monitor serves “no demonstrable purpose going forward.” He argued that the former Judge’s report included an “unabashedly self-serving statement” that “misstatements and errors may continue to occur,” in order to excuse her continued monitorship.

Comparing Jones to Inspector Javert, the main antagonist from Les Misérables, Robert claimed that her role has added up to “expensive and meaningless ongoing oversight.”

“Further oversight is unwarranted and will only unjustly enrich the Monitor as she engages in some ‘Javert’ like quest against the Defendants,” Robert declared.

Chris Kise, another Trump attorney, accused Jones’ report of exaggerating immaterial problems in the Trump Organization’s finances to “fill the gaping hole in the Attorney General’s case” and justify the $2.6 million in fees she collected.

“This is truly a joke,” Kise stated. “Indeed, it is shocking that President Trump has been forced to pay millions for a Monitor to prove what he has said from the outset, namely, there is no financial reporting misconduct, no fraud and simply no basis for this abusive process to continue.”

While attending a hearing in his civil fraud trial in December 2023, Trump stated how happy he was that his daughter, Ivanka Trump, was not a defendant in this case but also repeated the inaccurate claim that he “won” the case in an appeals court.