Two Russian state TV hosts have jokingly offered to buy Donald Trump’s Florida resort and set aside a guesthouse for the former president on the premises.
Mar-a-Lago has been at the center of widespread speculation after a county assessor appraised it at between $18 million and $27.6 million despite Trump’s claims that the value “could be worth among 100 times that amount.”
The value emerged as part of a $250 million civil lawsuit New York Attorney General Letitia James launched against the former president and the Trump organization for allegedly overvaluing properties.
As Trump headed to court three times this week to defend himself from the claims, Russian presenters Vladimir Solovyov and Dmitry Drobnitsky discussed the ongoing case and offered to buy the property and house Trump for free on the premises.
“Can I buy it for $18 million? The guys and I will go in on it if this can be bought for $18 million,” Solovyov asked in a clip shared on social media by Russian media watcher Julia Davis.
He then joked Russia could open a new Russian consular mission at the Florida resort.
“The guys and I need it. We will open a Soviet, a Russian consular mission there with a villa for the embassy,” he said, “We’re ready to buy it.”
Joining in the joke, Dobnitsky said: “We will allocate one little house for Donald Trump to drink tea with him there.”
Solovyov then suggested Russia could hire the former president as a golf teacher considering his passion for the sport.
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“We’ll hire him to teach people how to handle golf balls,” he added, “He loves golf, he can be an instructor.”
Trump denies any wrongdoing.
The trial comes as he leads the race for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, and the stakes are high for him and the real estate empire that launched him into public life.
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The pretrial ruling that’s now under appeal could cost him control of Trump Tower and some other properties. At the trial, James is seeking a $250 million penalty and a prohibition on Trump doing business in New York.
At the heart of the case are the “statements of financial condition,” yearly snapshots of Trump’s wealth that were given to banks, insurers and others.
James says the statements were wildly inflated. His Trump Tower penthouse was claimed as nearly three times its actual size, for example, and his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida was hugely overvalued at as much as $739 million, she says.
Trump maintains that the statements actually underestimated the worth of luxury properties. He also emphasizes that the documents came with disclaimers that he characterizes as saying the numbers shouldn’t be trusted and lenders should do their own homework.
But accountant Donald Bender, who prepared the financial statements for years, testified Tuesday that the Trump Organization didn’t always supply all the information needed to accurately produce the documents.
Another accountant, Camron Harris, testified Wednesday that his work on the 2021 statement involved checking information provided by Trump’s company for “obvious errors” and formatting it for presentation.
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