Comments from Eric Trump concerning his father Donald Trump’s bond payment from his civil fraud ruling sparked ridicule online Sunday.
The former president was hit with a massive penalty after being found liable in a civil fraud trial brought against him and The Trump Organization by New York Attorney General Letitia James, which accused him of a long-term scheme to inflate his net worth and the worth of his assets in order to secure more favorable business loans. With interest, the penalty is now over $450 million, and James has begun the process to allow the seizure of Trump’s real estate assets if he’s unable to pay or post an appeal bond before Monday. The former president, meanwhile, has maintained his innocence.
Although Trump can appeal the ruling against him without a bond or paying the cash, he would be required to post a bond of slightly more than the amount of the penalty against him to stop the collection of his assets. In a court filing from last week, Trump’s legal team admitted that he has been unable to secure the bond amount after asking dozens of surety entities, which all turned him down due to the size of the bond. The filing called the possibility of posting the amount in time a “practical impossibility.”
Among the co-defendants in the civil suit were the former president’s older adult sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump. On Sunday, Eric Trump made an appearance on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures where he discussed the difficulties that his family had securing such a sizable bond payment. Court filings from last week mentioned over 30 sureties that declined to provide the bond.
“No one’s ever seen a bond this size,” he said. “Every single person when I came to them saying, ‘Hey, can I get a half-billion-dollar bond?’ Maria, they were laughing. They were laughing.”
Spencer Platt/Getty Images
A segment from the appearance in which Eric Trump made that remark was shared to X, formerly Twitter, by the popular cable news clip aggregator, Acyn, and promptly became the subject of mockery for many users.
“Yes, Slow Eric. They were,” Rick Wilson, co-founder of the anti-Trump political action committee The Lincoln Project, wrote in a post.
“They know a bad investment when they see it,” lawyer Bradley P. Moss wrote.
“Watch Eric Trump moan and whine for three solid minutes because his father is being held accountable for something,” former NBCUniversal executive Mike Sington wrote, sharing a longer version of the clip.
“No one’s seen a bond this size!” Watch Eric Trump moan and whine for three solid minutes because his father is being held accountable for something. (Video: Fox News) pic.twitter.com/MYrK3tQ8ne
— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) March 24, 2024
“Can we all agree that Eric Trump is a complete idiot and crybaby?” user @realXanderXjork asked, while X user @FordJohnathan5 posted, “I’m laughing now.”
Newsweek reached out to The Trump Organization via email on Sunday evening for comment.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.