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New York Attorney General Letitia James has asked a state court to compel real estate services giant Cushman & Wakefield to comply with subpoenas her office issued in its civil investigation of former President Donald Trump.
The attorney general's office said in a Manhattan court filing on Friday that the company, which formerly did business with Trump but severed its ties with him in the wake of the attack on the U.S. Capitol, is wrongfully challenging demands for records.
"While Cushman initially expressed its desire to comply with OAG's subpoenas, the company nonetheless withheld hundreds of responsive documents and instructed four witnesses not to answer numerous questions based on meritless privilege assertions by the Trump Organization," the filing said.
James has been investigating The Trump Organization since 2019, focusing on whether the company misstated the values of real estate assets to obtain tax deductions and favorable loan terms.
James is seeking to determine whether Cushman & Wakefield's appraisals of those properties were fraudulent or misleading and issued the subpoenas as part of that inquiry.
The AG said in the filing that Cushman & Wakefield had conducted appraisals for a number of Trump Organization properties, specifically the Seven Springs estate in Westchester County, New York, 40 Wall Street in Manhattan and Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles. The company denies any wrongdoing in appraisals of those properties.
"Any suggestion that Cushman & Wakefield has not responded in good faith to the Attorney General’s investigation is fundamentally untrue," Cushman & Wakefield said in a widely reported statement. "We stand behind our appraisers and our work."
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