Letitia James filed a ‘notice of exception to the sufficiency of the surety’ seeking more information about Knight Specialty Insurance Company
Donald Trump’s $175m bond in his New York civil fraud case has been thrown into doubt by New York Attorney General Letitia James after she filed a notice asking for evidence that the out-of-state firm that underwrote it really has the money to pay up.
Ms James’s office submitted a “notice of exception to the sufficiency of the surety” on Thursday asking for further proof that California-based Knight Specialty Insurance Company (KSIC) has the capital to proceed on the former president’s behalf.
KSIC is not regulated by New York state, which means that it is not authorised to issue surety bonds in the Empire State and therefore cannot obtain a certificate from the New York Department of Financial Services, which is customarily part of any bond package.
It feels like you are pushing the burden of finding out a person is lying to the lender, but the law says you have to tell the truth (and you sign saying the presentation is the truth) when presenting collateral. Lying about valuations is part of the root of the 2008 financial collapse, and it’s disheartening to hear people say “so what” less then a generation later. The government is fulfilling its role of oversight the way it would have been great to see in the 2000’s before the collapse.