Trump’s Financial Statements Are So Full Of Lies That His Accountants Put a Warning Label on Them

During his 72 years on Earth, Donald Trump has told something like 2,936,880 lies, based on my back-of-the-envelope calculations. (According to The Washington Post, the president has told at least 9,179 whoppers just since taking the oath of office—so, you do the math.) Sometimes, the lies are big, like the one he told about seeing “thousands” of supposed terrorist sympathizers “cheering” from New Jersey as the World Trade Center towers collapsed on 9/11. Other times, the lies are small and largely pointless, like his claim that he didn’t call Tim Cook “Tim Apple” when he 100 percent did, on-camera, in a room full of people. Frequently, the lies revolve around his net worth, including its origin (his father) and how big it is (a lot smaller than he claims). As we learned from Michael Cohen’s congressional testimony last month and a New York Times exposé last week, Trump’s lies about his wealth haven’t been confined to bragging about it on TV, but have also allegedly manifested in financial statements sent to banks and insurance companies, in which the ex-real-estate developer inflated his assets in order to obtain loans. And now, thanks to documents obtained by the Post, we have some fun examples of his most absurd financial claims, many of which are now under scrutiny.

In a 2011 document known as a “Statement of Financial Condition,” Trump purported to own 55 home lots ready to sell for at least $3 million apiece at his Southern California golf course. Yet, in reality, he’d only been zoned for 31, thereby overstating his future revenue by a cool $72-odd million. In a document from 2012, he tacked on an extra 800 acres to the size of his roughly 1,200 acre Virginia vineyard. In 2013, in an attempt to bolster his bid for the Buffalo Bills, a two-page “Summary of Net Worth” conveniently omitted his ownership of two hotels, in Chicago and Las Vegas, meaning, per the Post, “that some of Trump’s actual debt load was hidden from anyone reading the statement.” In perhaps the most brazen, Trumpian “exaggeration,” he invented an extra 10 stories at Trump Tower, claiming that the building was 68 stories when, in actuality—you can literally look at the building and count them—there are 58.

In a sign of just how ridiculous these statements were, the accountants who prepared the documents literally put a disclaimer on them, effectively stating that Trump was full of shit:

When compiling these statements of financial condition, those accountants have said they did not verify or audit the figures in the statements. Instead, when Trump provided them data, they wrote it down without checking to see whether it was accurate . . . The documents begin with two-page disclaimers, warning of various ways in which the statements don’t follow normal accounting rules. The accountants note that Trump is the source of many buildings’ valuations—and that, contrary to normal accounting rules, he had inflated them by counting future income that wasn’t guaranteed.

“Users of this financial statement should recognize that they might reach different conclusions about the financial condition of Donald J. Trump” if they had more information, the statement concludes.

The accounting firm said Wednesday—the same day the House Oversight Committee requested 10 years of Trump’s financial statements—that it “believes strongly in the ethical and professional rules and regulations that govern our industry, our work, and our client interactions.” Earlier this month, the New York State Department of Financial Services subpoenaed records from Aon, Trump’s longtime insurer.

While the Post notes that Trump is “far from the first real-estate developer to inflate his projects or wealth,” it also notes that there are these things called “laws,” some of which Trump may have broken by “defrauding insurers and lenders with false information.” (The White House declined to comment.) Experts say the question of whether or not Trump will face legal consequences likely hinges on whether he “intended to mislead,” or if “the misstatements caused anyone to give him a financial benefit.” If the errors were “systematic and it’s across the board, and it’s all in one direction, that’s where you have a problem,” Kyle Welch, an assistant professor of accountancy at George Washington University, told reporters David A. Fahrenthold and Jonathan O’Connell. And, incredibly, the fact that the “errors” were so brazen may work out in Trump’s favor: