The Trump Foundation will dissolve and its funds be disbursed to other charities, as New York pursues a lawsuit over its ‘wilful self-dealing’
US President Donald Trump has agreed to shut down his embattled personal charity and to give away its remaining money amid allegations that he used the foundation for his personal and political benefit, New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood announced Tuesday.
Underwood said the Donald J. Trump Foundation is dissolving as her office pursues its lawsuit against the charity, Trump and his three eldest children.
The suit, filed in June, alleged “persistently illegal conduct” at the foundation, which Trump began in 1987. Underwood’s office is continuing to seek more than US$2.8 million in restitution and has asked a judge to ban the Trumps temporarily from serving on the boards of other New York non-profit organisations.
Underwood said Tuesday that her investigation found “a shocking pattern of illegality involving the Trump Foundation – including unlawful coordination with the Trump presidential campaign, repeated and wilful self-dealing, and much more”.
“This is an important victory for the rule of law, making clear that there is one set of rules for everyone,” she added in a statement.
The shuttering comes after The Washington Post documented apparent lapses at the foundation. Trump used the charity’s money to pay legal settlements for his private business, to purchase art for one of his clubs and to make a prohibited political donation.
Trump denied that the organisation had done anything wrong. In late 2016, he said he wanted to close the foundation, but the New York attorney general’s office blocked that move while it investigated.
The settlement with Underwood’s office represents a concession by Trump to a state investigation he has decried as a partisan attack. The case is one of numerous legal investigations of Trump organisations that have proliferated during his presidency.
In a court filing in New York, Underwood said the foundation’s remaining US$1.75 million would be distributed to other charities approved by her office and a state judge.
Alan Futerfas, an attorney for the Trump Foundation, issued a statement criticising Underwood for “politicising” the agreement.
