True: The Trump tax fraud investigation in New York involves millions of dollars paid to Ivanka.

By: Varun Kumar
December 18 2020

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According to The New York Times report, Donald Trump appears to have paid his daughter, Ivanka Trump, $747,622 in consulting fees.On Oct. 27, 2020, The New York Times reported that in 2016 and 2017, Trump had paid $750 in federal income taxes citing business loss. Trump has also not paid any federal income tax for 11 years in the past 18 years. He has been involved in a decade-long audit with the Internal Revenue Service over a $72.9m tax refund he claimed and received, after declaring huge losses. A ruling against him could cost him more than $100m, the Times reported. It also reported that Trump's tax records show that he paid almost no federal income tax on the forgiven debts partly due to large losses in other businesses. The Trump Organization's chief legal officer Alan Garten said that the company and Trump appropriately paid for all taxes due on the forgiven debt. On Nov. 19, 2020, the Times report revealed that some amount of the tax write-offs appeared to have been paid to Ivanka Trump. In a 2017 disclosure, the presidential adviser included payments from a consulting company she co-owned, totaling $747,622, exactly equaling consulting fees claimed as tax deductions by the Trump Organization for hotel projects in Hawaii and Vancouver, British Columbia. It said that the subpoenas were focused on fees paid to the firm on her disclosures, TTT Consulting LLC, and accounted for a portion of the $26 million. The payments were made in Ivanka Trump's name, serving as an executive officer of the Trump companies. Also, she appears to have been simultaneously treated as a consultant. President Trump had filed a lawsuit to block the investigation's subpoena for his tax returns, stalling the probe. The case was brought forth before the Supreme Court. Cyrus Vance Jr., the Manhattan District Attorney, is overseeing a criminal investigation that targets the U.S. president for possible indictment and prosecution. As part of the inquiry, Cyrus served a grand-jury subpoena on a custodian of the President's records, demanding nearly ten years' worth of the President's financial papers and tax returns. The subpoena combines two warrants issued by Congress committees and is almost a word-for-word copy. The President's counsel had argued the President was immune to judicial process and claimed that the Executive Branch's independence within its sphere. On July 9, 2020, the Supreme Court had rejected the President's assertion that he is immune from the law's requirements and issued rulings concerning Trump's tax returns. By a majority, the judges declared that Cyrus could examine details of President Trump's finances and his tax returns. However, the court ordered that congressional Democrats not gain access to years of records from Trump's accountants and bankers, and they must wait on lower courts' judgments.