Anderson Cooper Struck by Trump Family’s Testimony: No One ‘Claims to Actually Be Running the Company’
CNN anchor Anderson Cooper said he was “really struck” how no one in former President Donald Trump’s family “really claims to be running the company” on Friday, amid Trump’s civil fraud trial.
Speaking to New York Times senior political correspondent Maggie Haberman, Cooper said:
I’ve been really struck just how no one in the Trump family really claims to actually be running the company and responsible for any of the financial statements. I mean, the two sons certainly talked a big game in the past about their important roles running the company in the absence of their dad, and, you know, Ivanka Trump was, you know, pushing shovels into, you know, groundbreaking ceremonies. They’re all— the buck certainly doesn’t stop with them when it comes to financial statements, apparently.
Haberman replied, “There was a little more pressure on Eric Trump on that front when he was on the stand. Don Jr. truly, as I understand it from all of my reporting and other people’s reporting, is less involved in running the company than Eric Trump is.”
She concluded, “But you are correct that there is an M.O., which is, you know, distancing and pushing it off on staff, or on advisers, or on lawyers, and what have you. You know, we saw that with Trump, although Trump did acknowledge making some suggestions about these financial statements. But it is a family-owned company that is largely run by staff, and that has always been the case.”
During the same segment, Haberman also told Cooper that Trump had been spending “an enormous amount of energy” to show that he is “fine” amid his legal troubles and that nothing is “bothering him.”
Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump denied in court any involvement in her father’s business statements this week. Trump’s son Eric Trump — the executive vice president of the Trump Organization — made similar claims, insisting, “I had no involvement and never worked on my father’s statement of financial condition.”
Watch above via CNN.
