Eric Trump claims judge undervalued Mar-a-Lago in fraud ruling

Eric Trump railed against a judge’s valuation of his father’s Mar-a-Lago resort in a New York fraud case, claiming the Florida property could be worth over a billion dollars. 

“In an attempt to destroy my father and kick him out of New York, a judge just ruled that Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach Florida, is only worth approximate ’18 Million dollars’…Mar-a-Lago is speculated to be worth we’ll over a billion dollars making it arguably the most valuable residential property in the country. It is all so corrupt and coordinated,” Eric Trump wrote Tuesday in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. 

In a court filing Tuesday, Justice Arthur Engoron ruled Trump committed fraud in building his real estate empire through falsely valuing multiple of his properties, including the Mar-a-Lago resort and Trump Par Avenue in New York. 

Engoron found Trump consistently overvalued Mar-a-Lago, inflating its value on one financial statement by at least 2,300 percent. The ruling pointed to a Palm Beach County Assessor’s appraisal from 2011-2021, which estimated Mar-a-Lago’s value between $18 million and $27.6 million. 

In another post on X, Eric Trump posted an unverified screenshot of home listings in Palm Beach, Fla. which appear to have market values of over $35 million. 

“These homes are about 1/30 the size of Mar-a-Lago, not on the beach (let alone the beach and intercostal), don’t span from once side of the Palm Beach Island to the other…it is a travesty of justice and embarrassment to the court,” the younger Trump wrote.  

The ruling comes as part of New York Attorney General Letitia James’s lawsuit against Trump, the Trump organization, Eric Trump and Trump’s other son, Donald Trump Jr., over more than a decade of alleged fraud. 

The $250 million lawsuit alleges Trump’s company sought lower taxes and better insurance coverage by falsely inflating and deflating the value of its assets. 

Trump previously claimed in sworn testimony that the values on his financial statements did not matter because the forms have a disclaimer saying they shouldn’t be trusted, according to the Associated Press (AP). 

Engoron further wrote in the decision that Trump’s arguments over the deposition numbers with the New York attorney general’s office were “wholly without basis in law or fact.”

Engoron’s ruling also takes away some of Trump’s business licenses and ordered an independent monitor to continue oversight of the Trump organization. 

The ruling rejects Trump’s last-minute attempt to get the entire case tossed and allows the remaining elements to proceed to a trial, which is slated to begin Monday.