Trump gloats as New York golf club tax investigation dropped: ‘When do I get my reputation back?’

Former President Donald Trump got some good legal news on Thursday when the Westchester County, New York district attorney confirmed that a two-year investigation into the Trump Organization’s valuation of a golf club there has been closed and will not result in any criminal charges.

News of the closure of the investigation was first reported by Insider on Wednesday.

The news that Mr Trump will not be charged in the case comes days after he became the first former president to ever be federally indicted. Mr Trump was arraigned on 37 felony charges relating to his handling of classified documents after leaving the presidency in Miami on Wednesday. He has also been indicted in New York for his alleged role in a hush money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

In a post on social media on Thursday, the former president heralded the end of the investigation into the Trump Organization in Westchester County as the “honorable thing to do” and asked when the other cases against him would be dropped.

“THIS WAS THE HONORABLE THING TO DO IN THAT I DID NOTHING WRONG, BUT WHERE AND WHEN DO I GET MY REPUTATION BACK? WHEN WILL THE OTHER FAKE CASES AGAINST ME BE DROPPED? ELECTION INTERFERENCE!!!” Mr Trump wrote in a post on the platform Truth Social.

The closure of the Westchester County investigation brings to a conclusion a years-long dispute between the county and the Trump Organization over what its tax burden should be.

In 2015, Ossining’s valuation of the worth of the Trump Organization’s club was 90 per cent higher than the Trump Organization’s own valuation. In July of 2021, however, the town and the club reached a deal in which the town agreed to pay the club about $875,000 and cut its property assessment by nearly 30 percent.

Over the course of the Westchester County investigation, which was led by a special prosecutor, the district attorney’s office subpoenaed records from the Trump National Golf Club Westchester and the small town of Ossining where the club is located to see whether the club took any steps to reduce its reported value.

It was a particularly intriguing investigation given that, in a lawsuit filed last year, New York Attorney General Letitia James accused Mr Trump of overstating the value of the club to inflate his net worth. CBS News noted the connection.

The Westchester County case may now be closed, but there are still more investigations into Mr Trump that may result in additional charges — including multiple investigations into his attempts to overturn the result of the 2020 presidential election.