Trump Organization, CFO Indicted on Tax Crimes

As expected, a New York grand jury has indicted the Trump Organization and its chief financial officer, sources tell media outlets including NBC News, CBS News, and the Washington Post. The charges are expected to be unsealed Thursday afternoon, so the specific alleged crimes are not yet clear. The tax-related allegations are said to involve an alleged plot by the organization to offer perks to its CFO, Allen Weisselberg, "off the books." Weisselberg is accused of avoiding taxes on corporate benefits, and other organization employees may have allegedly done the same. Neither Weisselberg nor the organization have publicly commented since the indictment news broke, but former President Trump on Wednesday night told Sean Hannity on Fox News that the whole investigation of the organization is "nonsense."

"New York radical left prosecutors come after me—you gotta fight," he said. While neither Trump himself nor anyone else close to him is expected to be charged imminently, sources tell the Post prosecutors hope Weisselberg will offer to testify against Trump in order to diminish his own risk. These are the first criminal charges to arise out of New York's yearslong probe into the organization. "The district attorney has had all these years, all this time to do this investigation thoroughly from top to bottom," Trump's lawyer told CBS on Tuesday. "And what they've come down with is this indictment which they've told us is going to be on fringe benefits for some unnamed employees. For cars, apartments, and I don't know what else." He added that the DA's office has no evidence the organization was involved in "this minimal tax evasion by individuals, which was never charged and has never been charged by the IRS." (More Trump Organization stories.)