Summary
New York Attorney General Letitia James lays out a fraud case against Trump and three of his adult offspring, accusing them of years of tax cheating and fraud. President Biden urges allies to hang tough, as Putin calls up another 300,000 reservists to backstop his invasion of Ukraine. An unprecedented wave of protests break out in Iran after a woman dies in police custody.
Transcript
ARI MELBER, MSNBC HOST: You can search Melber January 6. You will get the report when it comes out and my new original piece on the coup conspiracy. And if you already did it from last night, we noticed, and thank you.
That does it for me.
THE REIDOUT WITH JOY REID starts now.
JOY REID, MSNBC HOST: Tonight on THE REIDOUT:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LETITIA JAMES, NEW YORK ATTORNEY GENERAL: Claiming you have money that you do not have does not amount to the art of the deal. It`s the art of the steal.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: New York Attorney General Letitia James lays out a massive fraud case against Trump and three of his adult children, accusing them of years of tax cheating and fraud.
The lawsuit makes clear that the family`s claims of tremendous wealth was always a myth, which Trump himself busted by entering the world`s biggest fishbowl by becoming president of the United States.
And that is where we begin tonight with the blockbuster announcement from New York Attorney General Letitia James, who`s throwing the book at Donald Trump, his three eldest adult children, Donald Jr., Eric and Ivanka, as well as their company, suing them all for years and years of vast financial fraud.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES: The pattern of fraud and deception that was used by Mr. Trump at the Trump Organization for their own financial benefit is astounding, inflating the values of assets by whatever means necessary to increase Mr. Trump`s purported net worth.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: The 220-page civil lawsuit alleges that the Trumps and the Trump Organization produced more than 200 instances of false and misleading valuations of assets in financial statements from 2011 through 2021.
The suit accuses the former president and his business of tax, bank and insurance fraud and seeks to recover more than $250 million for the state of New York. A.G. James` lawsuit also seeks to effectively run the former president and his grown children out of town as far as business is concerned, permanently barring them from serving as an executive in any company licensed in the state of New York.
It caps off a three-year investigation by Tish James sparked, as she noted today, by congressional testimony from Trump`s former personal attorney Michael Cohen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. WILLIAM LACY CLAY (D-MO): To your knowledge, did the president or his company ever inflate assets or revenues?
MICHAEL COHEN, FORMER ATTORNEY/FIXER FOR DONALD TRUMP: Yes.
REP. ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ (D-NY): To your knowledge, did the president ever provide inflated assets to an insurance company?
COHEN: Yes.
CLAY: And was that done with the president`s knowledge or direction?
COHEN: Everything was done with the knowledge and at the direction of Mr. Trump.
OCASIO-CORTEZ: Do you think we need to review his financial statements and his tax returns in order to compare them?
COHEN: Yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: But, critically, this is a civil lawsuit, meaning there is no potential for jail time here, although, in her highly anticipated news conference today, James announced that her office is also referring her findings to federal prosecutors in Manhattan and to the IRS.
And there was another wrinkle today that might get the Trumps scrolling through their little phones, looking for whatever lawyers are leftover from all the other investigations that they`re facing, well, I mean, the ones who will still return their calls or aren`t themselves seeking representation.
After months of silence and seemingly backing away from the case, Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg issued a statement following Tish James` press conference stating that the criminal investigation in his office is active and ongoing.
Former Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, also named in today`s suit, has already pleaded guilty to tax fraud charges in that case. For her part, Attorney General James stressed that no one is above the law.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAMES: White-collar financial crime is not a victimless crime. Everyday people cannot lie to a bank about how much money they have in order to get a favorable loan to buy a home or to send their kid to college. And if they did, the government would throw the book at them. Why should this be any different?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Joining me now is Tristan Snell, former assistant attorney general for the state of New York, Tali Farhadian Weinstein, a former federal and state prosecutor and an MSNBC legal analyst, Charles Coleman Jr., civil rights attorney, former prosecutor and MSNBC legal analyst,and David Fahrenthold, investigative reporter for "The New York Times," an excellent panel.
I`m going to start with you, Tristan, though.
I have been following you on the Twitters all day. And you have been -- you have been fiery today. You have had a lot to say.
(LAUGHTER)
REID: So I want to let you go off here and talk about this.
I want to put on the screen what the civil suit against Donald Trump entails, what they want. That`s repaying $250 mil in what they`re saying is illegally obtained money, barring the family from serving on corporate leadership in New York, banning the family from doing business in New York, banning the family from buying real estate in New York for five years, banning the family and the business from applying for loans for five years, and appointing an independent financial monitor for no more than five years.
[19:05:18]
And I`m going to put up all the properties that are at issue and just let you talk. How significant is this? And does Trump have any defense here? Because this seems like he was doing this in the open for a really long time.
TRISTAN SNELL, FORMER NEW YORK ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: It really looks like the Trump family was running a fraud business with a sideline in real estate, as opposed to the other way around.
Like, it actually might have been -- like, disparities in the valuations of their properties may have actually been their biggest source of paper revenue or assets. Like, this is insane. The disparities that we`re talking about here are not just 10 percent. It`s not rounding up. It`s not saying, oh, this is worth $147 million. We`re going to say it`s worth $150 million.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no. This was 1000 percent bigger, 3300 percent bigger. If any of us did this, we wouldn`t just be liable for fraud. We`d be headed to jail.
REID: Yes.
SNELL: This would be the equivalent of an American saying that their houses -- the appraisal says your house is worth $300,000, and then you turn around and say, oh, it`s actually worth $30 million, it`s actually worth $100 million, and thinking you`re going to get away with that.
So, yes, I mean, I could go on for quite a long time about all of this. But the question that you had about, like, exactly what defense does he have here, the problem is that that escape hatch is really gone, because he had to plead the Fifth.
The fact that he pled the Fifth to 440 different questions means that he doesn`t really have any legs to stand on here, because anything that he might say in defense, the A.G.`s office is going to be able to say, well, you already basically admitted to it, because every time he said, "I plead the Fifth," substitute the words: "I did it. It was me. I confess."
And then that`s how you...
REID: Wow. And...
SNELL: Yes.
REID: No, go on. Finish your sentence. Finish your thought.
SNELL: No, that was it.
I mean, it -- really, it cuts off the escape hatch there. There really isn`t a whole lot of room for him to wiggle his way out of this. That`s why he tried to settle it.
REID: Yes.
SNELL: He tried to settle this matter. So...
REID: And that is another little nugget that came out today that I thought was very interesting, that there was a settlement offer, Charles Coleman, that was put on the table by the Trump side, which the attorney general said, no, we rejected that. She`s like, my door is always open. We weren`t trying to settle.
And I just want to just amplify what Tristan was saying. This is the -- this is -- it`s long. It`s 200 and some odd pages. I`m not through it all yet, but I just want to go to this nugget here that`s inside of this -- of this filing.
Donald Trump lives -- one of the places he lives, Charles, is in Trump Tower, the one that everybody knows, the one on Fifth Avenue. This thing was built in the `80s, like 1987. This is an old building. It`s a 30 plus- year-old building. He claimed that his apartment in Trump Tower, which is old, is 10,000 -- that -- which is 10,996 square feet -- that`s what we know.
And he claimed that the apartment was 30,000 square feet and worth $327 million. And that would be $29,738 per square foot. And this -- she says this. The filing says this. That price was absurd, given the fact that, at that point, only one apartment in New York City, one, had ever sold for even $100 million at $10,000 a square foot.
And to make it worse, there`s a -- there`s a building on 57th Street, that tall, tall, tall, super tall building, one of the most expensive apartments in that building, my incredible hairdresser just pointed out to me earlier today -- I will give Coco (ph) the credit for it -- that`s priced at $250 million now.
How could he have possibly gone to any institution, financial institution, and said, no, no, no, no, my old apartment is worth $320 million, Charles? Well, how could he defend himself, possibly?
CHARLES COLEMAN, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST: Well, Joy, he doesn`t have very strong avenues for defense here. There is creative imagination, and then there`s criminal belief. And I think that we`re looking at the latter in a case like this.
I want to point out that it was me on this program before when we had another conversation where I said, it may not necessarily be the violent acts or the insurrection or the voter tampering that ends up getting Donald Trump. It may very well be, a la Al Capone, something along the lines of wire fraud, tax evasion or something of that nature.
It`s not as sexy as some of the other crimes that he`s being investigated for, but it is very solid. And I think what we`re seeing is Tish James doing what prosecutors do. She noted that this investigation was over the course of three years. She talked to over 60 different witnesses.
This is fraud that is alleged to have occurred over the course in just this complaint of 10 -- of 10 years. We`re talking about an entire decade of misleading federal and state entities around the valuation of his properties and his personal finances.
[19:10:02]
And so, when you talk about a legal defense, trust and believe that there is nothing that is in this complaint which has not been thoroughly vetted and checked and investigated, and that`s why she could stand up and make the proclamation that she did today in announcing this complaint.
And so there is not much that he has to do in terms of wiggle room, further supported by the fact that he tried to settle it, because he also understands that, despite the myriad criminal investigations that he`s facing, this is a serious issue that he does not have the firepower to continue.
REID: And, Tali, what was also intriguing today was the referrals.
So you do have this now referral, not just to the IRS, but to the feds. And that`s interesting. But what I also found interesting was the response from the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, who we will all recall -- we did the story on this show -- a couple of his prosecutors quit because he seemed to be backing away from essentially the same case.
And to the point that`s been made, I think, by both of your fellow guests here, this is known behavior. Donald Trump has been getting away with this for a decade, at least. No one`s ever done anything about it. The person who logically you would think would have done it is the current and previous Manhattan district attorney, who never did anything about it for all those years.
What do you think -- what kind of pressure is now on Bragg`s office? Because he did put out a statement saying, no, no, no, our investigation is still ongoing.
TALI FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST: Well, indeed, Joy, this is awkward, because it says pretty much on the first page of this complaint that Trump and his associates and his family committed a host of crimes under state law, and then it drops a footnote and says, the federal prosecutors who have jurisdiction here too might want to look into it.
I read that as A.G. James saying that she does not expect the Manhattan district attorney`s office to be looking into it. And I think it`s important to say that the order of things usually is that you bring the criminal case first, and then the civil case is either a chaser or a parallel proceeding, because the kind of accountability that you get in a criminal prosecution is much more important, severe, resonant with what has happened than civil accountability.
And so she reaches that conclusion. And, as you reported, we have known that pretty much the same facts were presented to the Manhattan district attorney, those prosecutors who left might say on a silver platter, and here it is again on a golden platter. And the question is, is he going to do anything about it?
It is true that the Trump Organization is about to go on trial. But that`s not for this set of facts. That`s a prosecution that is redundant with what Allen Weisselberg already pled guilty to, the fringe benefits case that is contained, different and limited, and doesn`t really contribute to the answer that you are looking for, which is, what`s going to happen here?
Is he going to start a new grand jury, which is a complicated thing to do, and redo everything that he had already put aside and rejected?
REID: Well, I know Michael Cohen has been jumping up and down screaming that there should be a prosecution here. He didn`t understand how there wasn`t.
And, David Fahrenthold, I want to bring you in here, because you have done a lot of the really fantastic reporting that`s brought out a lot of just the fundamental fraud of Donald Trump`s whole origin story, that he is the self-made man with -- that took a mere million-dollar loan from his father and built it into a billion dollars.
Not true, not true, not true, not true. Let`s put the properties back up again. In your reporting, are any of these properties, Trump Tower, 40 Wall Street, Mar-a-Lago, Doral, on and on, all of the golf clubs, et cetera, is any of it profitable?
DAVID FAHRENTHOLD, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: Well, that`s a good question.
The Trump Organization is private, so we have never really been able to get a great look at its financials. I do believe that Mar-a-Lago is profitable. Its revenue has gone up over the last few years, as more and more people who wanted to be close to the president and former president have flocked there.
But Trump Hotel, there were a number of properties that were not profitable. The Trump Hotel in D.C. famously lost money for years until he sold it. I -- if I had to look at all those things and say what was profitable, probably, I would say Las Vegas, Doral, and Mar-a-Lago certainly are.
Now, what does that all add up to it? Is it all profitable if you add in all the losses and gains? I don`t know that. I wish I did, but I don`t.
REID: And in terms of the valuations, though, because what he`s doing is, he`s levering them up at -- you know what? I`m going to hold this until after the break. I`m going to come back to David on the other side of the break, because everybody is staying with me.
So, up next, much more on tonight`s breaking news, Trump, Don Jr., Ivanka, Eric all accused of massive fraud by the attorney general of New York.
THE REIDOUT continues after this, and I`m going right to David.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:19:28]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAM BARR, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: What ultimately persuades me that this is a political hit job is, she grossly overreaches when she tries to drag the children into the -- this.
Yes, they had roles in the business, but this was his personal financial statement. The children aren`t going to know the details of that and be able -- and nor are they expected in the real world to do their own due diligence.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(LAUGHTER)
REID: I mean, they`re not 12.
And as an actual attorney general, Tish James, laid out in her civil suit, as executive vice president, these three -- quote, unquote -- "children," who are grown adults in their 40s, were intimately involved in the operation of the Trump Organization`s business. They were aware of the true financial performance of the company, indeed, the Trump Organization, took extensive steps to keep them all up to date on the company`s operations.
[19:20:14]
Back with me, Tristan Snell, Tali Farhadian Weinstein, Charles Coleman, and David Fahrenthold.
And I promised to go to you first, David, but I -- give me, just from your reporting and understanding of how this organization worked. Barr is trying to claim that, the poor children, how would they know what was going on? Weren`t they not only vice presidents, but involved in every single part of the operation of these properties?
FAHRENTHOLD: They were.
They were really important parts of the Trump Organization, at least in the last 10 years, Don Jr. focused on commercial leasing. Ivanka developed hotels, like the ones that Doral and D.C. And Eric focused on golf courses. So, all of them are important here, not only because they played a role in the business, but for another reason.
They were often the ones who are connecting with the outside world, with the appraisers, with the folks who are getting lawyers, the people who are telling them what a sort of more realistic appraisal of their properties might be.
And so that`s an important fact to know, because if they were getting input from neutral observers that their properties were valued at X, that sort of takes away a defense they might use, which is, yes, we had a really very sky-high evaluation for that, but that`s just because we love it. We really believe in this property. We didn`t know any better. It was just -- it was just a sort of salesmanship.
But if you have got an objective appraisal, and you`re choosing to ignore it, and go three, four, 10 times higher, that`s really important. Another thing about the kids is, they use e-mail, and so they produce a paper trail that their father doesn`t.
REID: And just really quickly, it`s also a very small organization. It`s not as if the Trump Organization is hundreds or thousands of people. It`s really small, right?
My -- I was told once by somebody who knew Trump it`s like 14 people and a marketing firm. It`s like a little 14-person marketing firm, basically.
FAHRENTHOLD: It`s tiny, yes. It`s an extremely small number of people who have any power, basically Trump, Weisselberg, this guy Jeff McConney, who was also named, who was the controller, and Trump`s three children.
All of the decision-making went through that group, and really came from Trump down to the other level and then out to the world, a very small company at the very top.
REID: Yes. Yes. Well, Bill Barr is going to Bill Barr.
Let me go back to you, Tristan, because I think people need to understand that this is not -- explain, because you did work in this office, not contemporaneously with Tish James, but you worked there.
Why is this civil? And does this office have the capability of handling a criminal case of this nature? Why is it cordoned off as civil?
SNELL: The statute that they brought it under is a statutory civil fraud statute called Executive Law 6312. Generally speaking, the A.G.`s office, most of their prosecutions are civil. Generally speaking, most criminal matters are brought at the county DA level.
And this is true not just in New York, but in pretty much every state I know of. The A.G.`s office does have a criminal unit. They do, do white- collar crime. They do public corruption cases. They are, I think -- in a vacuum, they are able to bring these kinds of criminal cases.
I think that there had been the understanding that Cy Vance was basically in on this with Tish James and that the two of them were both going to be bringing this prosecution. One was going to bring a civil case, one was going to bring a criminal case, doing slightly different things.
And then, all of a sudden, the Manhattan DA`s office was no longer involved. So could this still change? Could we see James` office get in there? I mean, we will see. We will see what happens.
Clearly, referring to the feds was meant to be kind of a passing of the baton to some degree, and that there`s enough federal crimes there for them to start going after some stuff. It`s going to be interesting to see what happens there.
REID: Yes, very interesting.
And, Charles, I will ask you that question. I mean, it does feel like a message sort of to go around at the Alvin Bragg office, the former Cy Vance office, because, again, Cy Vance was in office a really long time and did nothing about what we knew was -- Trump was doing.
What`s left now for the Manhattan DA to do, since he didn`t seem to do anything before?
COLEMAN: Well, Joy, that is an interesting question on a number of levels, not just for Alvin Bragg and the Manhattan DA`s office, but also for federal prosecutors, as well as the IRS, because what Tish James has done...
REID: Yes.
COLEMAN: ... with this complaint has basically said, listen, this was going on for a decade, and none of you all did anything about it, and you all had it happening right under your noses.
And so what they can do and what they should do and what I suspect will likely happen is that they`re going to go back and review the additional information. It could very well be that there are witnesses that Letitia James was able to cultivate during the course of her investigation that provided information that was not previously available, and now that it is, they may seek to move forward with a prosecution.
But they do have to at least make the effort of going back and looking at whatever information they did know, whatever they have seen before, and trying to see, what can we make out of this that perhaps was not there before?
[19:25:01]
REID: Yes.
And, Tali, then that brings us to the place you -- shop you worked at. You clerked for Merrick Garland.
What might he do? There`s a lot now on his plate vis-a-vis Trump, everything from stealing documents and keeping them in his bedroom that were national security-related, to potentially trying to overthrow the election. And now there`s this that could then also wind up in the Justice Department`s purview.
What do you anticipate happening there? Is this one of those situations where they let it play out and then maybe take action? What do you think?
FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN: Well, he is really busy.
But the Southern District of New York, which A.G. James makes the referral to, of course, work for Attorney General Garland.
REID: Yes.
FARHADIAN WEINSTEIN: He supervises and controls all federal prosecutors.
And I think everyone is kind of catching up here, because there was the understanding, public and private, for a really long time that the Manhattan DA was going to take care of this one, and that the crimes described here are both federal crimes and state crimes, and that that investigation was so far along -- they had gone to the Supreme Court, and they had gotten Trump`s tax returns, which was an important piece of evidence in putting together a criminal case -- that others were just not going to do it.
I do think it`s important, as we think about the scope of things in front of the attorney general, to say that this is really different from the other crimes that you have described, because these crimes occurred before Donald Trump became president.
Some of them continued after he became president. But this was his way of conducting himself even before. And if the principle that all of us are equal under the law means anything, it has to mean that becoming president doesn`t create a force field around you, so that everything you did before that was so blatantly criminal, cheating and stealing from the IRS, from banks, from the people of New York, has to have accountability.
And I think that, as they`re weighing prosecutions that may have more political dimensions, that`s something to think about.
REID: Indeed, if fairness is a thing that`s real.
Tristan Snell, Tali Farhadian Weinstein, Charles Coleman, David Fahrenthold, couldn`t have had a better panel to start us off. Thank you very much.
And still ahead: Who would have thought that repeatedly lying to the IRS would land you in hot water with the authorities? Oh, yes, that`s right, everybody, except, apparently, this guy.
We will be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:32:18]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I mean, I have built up one of the greatest companies, and I`m very proud of it. And there`s probably nothing like it.
Everything I touched turned to gold.
I built an unbelievable business, a great, great business, some of the greatest assets in the world.
I built a company that`s worth more than $10 billion, OK?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: None of that is true.
(LAUGHTER)
REID: Donald Trump just loves to talk about how rich and successful he is.
The myth about his wealth is what inspired his reality show "The Apprentice," and he rode those lies all the way to the White House and into becoming an actual cult leader.
But the reality about the former president is, as the New York A.G. laid out today, that he is nothing but a grifter. In fact, accusations of Trump`s financial impropriety go back decades. According to an investigation by "The New York Times," in the 1990s, Trump helped his parents dodge taxes and increase his own wealth, when, according to "The Times," he and his siblings set up a sham corporation to disguise millions of dollars in gifts from their parents.
He also helped formulate a strategy to undervalue his parents` real estate holdings by hundreds of millions of dollars on tax returns, sharply reducing the tax bill when those properties were transferred to him and his siblings.
There are also hundreds of accusations that Donald Trump refused to pay contractors and workers dating back to the 1980s. Then you have Trump`s charity foundation. And, according to "The Washington Post," Trump spent more than a quarter-million dollars from that charity to settle lawsuits involving his own for-profit businesses.
And, of course, who could forget about Trump University, which, spoiler alert, was not a real university at all. The weeklong seminar school was designed -- designed to teach students the secrets of real estate investing, turned out to be just a massive scam. Even a former employee called it a fraudulent scheme, which seems to be the general theme of Donald Trump`s entire career.
And the real kicker is, he probably would have gotten away with most of it, if not all of it, if he had never become the president of the United States.
Joining me now is David Cay Johnston, co-founder and editor of DCReport.org and the author of "The Big Cheat: How Donald Trump Fleeced America and Enriched Himself and His Family."
What a perfect title, David.
You and I have talked about this for years. When he was running, I remember you being on my weekend show, and we talked about the fact that Donald Trump snookered the whole country, including, let`s be honest, the media. He would -- he`s been on -- he used to be on "Larry King" talking about his billions. He got himself an "Apprentice" show.
This whole conceit that he was a self-made billionaire never was true. It was always a lie. How did he run this game financially against the state of New York for so long?
DAVID CAY JOHNSTON, INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST: Well, in this case, where you`re dealing with his bank loans, the insurance companies, and tax people, Donald took advantage of the fact that we are not serious in this country about enforcing white-collar crimes.
[19:35:07]
REID: Yes.
JOHNSTON: You rob a bodega with a water pistol, we will see to it that you go to prison.
But you steal the way Donald and his family do, and they are a white-collar crime family, then you get away with it, because there`s no effort, no serious effort to say to the bankers, are you really complying with the rules, to the insurance companies, how well are you managing those assets that you hold in trust, in effect, for the people who pay premiums to you?
And in the case of the property taxes, we have made the system overly complicated, and we don`t provide money for governments to direct -- address when someone like Donald Trump values something for lending purposes at one price and then pennies on the dollar when he appears for a property tax appeal.
REID: Yes.
I mean, and he`s -- and this is a family tradition. I mean, his father was a tax cheat. He was a tax cheat, inherited this money, changed the value of the properties, so that they could inherit money without paying the property taxes.
And here`s his children now. These are -- this is just about his kids from "The New York Times." Since the three -- the older ones -- Tiffany and Barron are apparently the lucky and smart ones, because they ain`t got nothing to do with nothing.
"Since the three joined the business shortly after each graduated from college, lines have a way of blurring. When Donald Trump Jr.`s investment in a concrete paneling business in South Carolina faltered in recent years, leaving him personally responsible for a loan of more than $3 million, the Trump Organization helped bail him out. Before Eric Trump, who oversees Trump golf courses and a Virginia winery, faced questioning in a lawsuit from aggrieved club members in Florida, his father signed a letter saying the unhappy patrons would be -- would be out.
"Ivanka Trump has used the Trump Organization`s payroll, information technology and human resources for her separate brand. Her Web site`s domain was registered by the Trump Organization lawyers."
I could go on, David .They`re all grifters.
JOHNSTON: Right.
Well, this goes back, in fact, even further. Donald Trump`s grandfather was a draft dodger from Germany. He wasn`t -- he built a hotel for what were called sporting ladies on land he didn`t own. In other words, he was basically a pimp. And his father ripped off taxpayers.
This is a family where they believe it`s OK, whatever they do, because they`re special. And what Letitia James has done here that`s very important is, she has said all throughout the suit, Trump knew, Trump directed, Trump went to this meeting, because Donald has traditionally said, I just did what my experts told me to do.
And she then shows, here`s what the experts told you. This building`s worth $200 million. You then claimed it was worth $527 million and said the experts have told you that.
She puts this in a place where he cannot deny this. That`s why he took the Fifth Amendment when he was questioned, what is it, 500 times, something on that magnitude.
REID: He also -- I mean, he said -- I mean, William Barr, who we already know is -- I will just say, in my opinion, he seems to be quite corrupt, and corruptly tried to help the president when he -- Trump was president, going out and saying, leave the children alone.
Trump -- here`s Trump handing his business over to his kids. This is 2017. This is January 2017.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: My two sons, who are right here, Don and Eric, are going to be running the company. They are going to be running it in a very professional manner. They`re not going to discuss it with me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Oh, a professional manner?
In the spring of 2012, prosecutors in the Manhattan DA`s office had been building a criminal case against Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr. for misleading prospective buyers of units in Trump SoHo, a hotel and condo development that is failing to sell. The evidence included e-mails from the Trumps making clear they were aware that they were using inflated figures about how well the condos were selling to their buyers.
They`re all cheats.
JOHNSTON: Yes.
And, in that case, Joy, the profits that Trump got disappeared into an Icelandic bank that was under the control of a Russian oligarch. This is a family enterprise. And we`re not talking about some 18-year-old duped into something. These are middle-aged children. Or at least the oldest son is certainly middle age.
And you either have responsibility or you don`t. I mean, Donald has tried to suggest that, well, my children, they`re young, they`re being beaten up on welfare. Well, if it was Barron, I would be with him, but not on this.
REID: Or if it was Tiffany, because she doesn`t even -- she didn`t even have respect.
(LAUGHTER)
JOHNSTON: Yes. Right.
REID: She gets nothing.
JOHNSTON: Right.
REID: And she`s probably very lucky. She should think her stars that she gets nothing, because being not involved is excellent for you, Tiffany. Trust.
David Cay Johnston, thank you very much.
Before we go, we do have some breaking news in the Trump Mar-a-Lago investigation. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has lifted the hold barring the Department of Justice from using the classified material seized in their investigation.
[19:40:02]
Still ahead: President Biden urges allies to hang tough, as Putin calls up another 300,000 reservists to backstop his crumbling invasion of Ukraine.
Stay right there.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
REID: This morning, the world woke up with a renewed threat of nuclear war from Russian President Vladimir Putin, humiliated, losing in his violent bid to absorb Ukraine into a new Soviet empire.
[19:45:00]
Putin appeared on Russian national television and announced a partial mobilization of up to 300,000 reserve troops, a move he promised he would not make and that Russia has not made since the Second World War.
"The Washington Post" is reporting that individuals in four separate cities have already received their summons, which could explain why Russian media is reporting a spike in demand for plane tickets out of Russia in an apparent scramble to leave.
During that national address, Putin warned NATO allies that he wasn`t bluffing when he said he would use various means of destruction to protect Russia and Russian territory. On Friday, Russian-backed separatists plan on expanding that territory by holding four sham referendums in occupied territories on annexation to Russia.
In New York today, at the United Nations General Assembly, world leaders pummeled the Russian president and doubled down on their support for Ukraine. President Biden took direct aim at Putin, with the goal of isolating him on the world stage.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This war is about extinguishing Ukraine`s right to exist as a state, plain and simple, and Ukraine`s right to exist as a people.
The United States wants this war to end on just terms, on terms we all signed up for, that you cannot seize a nation`s territory by force. The only country standing in the way of that is Russia.
So we, each of us in this body, who is determined to uphold the principles and beliefs we pledged to defend as members of the United Nations, must be clear, firm and unwavering in our resolve.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Just last week, Putin faced pushback from allies, including India, China and Turkey, who publicly and privately expressed concerns about the invasion.
Late this afternoon, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, speaking by video, told the General Assembly that Russia`s warmongering should be punished and insisted that his country would ultimately prevail.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT: A crime has been committed against Ukraine. And we demand just punishment.
We didn`t provoke this war. We can return the Ukrainian flag to our entire territory. We can do it with the force of arms. But we need time.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Joining me now is former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine William Taylor, now vice president for Russia and Europe at the U.S. Institute of Peace.
Ambassador Taylor, always good to talk with you.
Let`s talk about what`s happening, not at the U.N., but actually in Russia. We`re actually seeing something very unusual. We have seen a little bit of it before, but we`re seeing protests in the streets, people getting arrested for protesting against the war, chanting, "No more war."
Meanwhile, the leadership and Russia are -- let`s put the -- there`s stories about the Wagner Group going into prisons and recruiting prisoners, doing this massive call-up, essentially a draft, to force people to fight, and people hopping onto planes to get out of the country.
What do you make of what seems to be a destabilizing home front for this war in Russia?
WILLIAM TAYLOR, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO UKRAINE: Joy, you`re exactly right. President Putin has big problems at home.
His people are starting to figure out that they`re not winning this war. They`re starting to figure out it`s actually a war. He`s not been able to say that. He wants his people to think it`s a special military operation. But it`s clearly a war. And the people are starting to understand it. And they don`t like it. They don`t support this.
He`s also got problems from his right. He`s got -- he`s got nationalists who want him to be tougher, to kill more civilians. So he`s in a difficult position right now, Joy.
REID: Well, and also internationally.
I mean, he went on this sort of friend tour, friendship tour, thinking that he could get Turkey, even Kurdistan, even China, and they didn`t seem to give him a ringing endorsement for what he`s doing. They seemed to be rather chilly.
TAYLOR: Very chilly, even in public.
The Chinese, they elicited from Putin the confession. Putin said, I know, President Xi, that you`re not satisfied. I know that you have got questions and concerns about what I`m doing in Ukraine.
So that was that. And then you had the Indian president, President Modi, who said -- you said: I have constantly told you. And Putin said: I know you have constantly told me that. I`m trying to.
So he`s gotten this pushback from both Indians and the Chinese.
REID: Yes.
Let`s talk about what`s happening at the U.N. So we did see Volodymyr Zelenskyy speak by video, President Biden, a really strong speech condemning what Russia was doing.
But, yesterday, we spoke with our ambassador to the United Nations about what it means for the Russians to still be in the Security Council, because that`s one of the things that Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, is that they shouldn`t be, that they should be ousted from that body.
[19:50:01]
And here`s what our ambassador to the United Nations said to us on this show last night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LINDA THOMAS-GREENFIELD, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS: But we have used the Security Council, we have used the General Assembly to isolate Russia, to condemn Russia, to kick Russia off of the Human Rights Council.
They are a permanent member of the Security Council. That is something that we cannot change, but we will not continue to allow them to use that perch to terrorize the world with their actions.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield there.
But is it true that there`s nothing that can be done by the world body to kick them out? I mean, they were kicked out of the G8.
TAYLOR: They were kicked out of the G8.
And, as Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield just mentioned, they were also kicked off of one of the human rights organizations within the U.N. So they can do that by vote. It`s very difficult. She`s, of course, right that it`s very difficult to take any of the five permanent members with veto rights over anything that goes on in the Security Council, it`s hard to get them off.
So I think Linda Thomas-Greenfield is right. It`s very tough. That said, there are some things that can be done. She`s made some very good points about increasing transparency. So, if Russia uses its veto, it would be required, under a new reform, to go to the General Assembly, where they don`t have a veto, and explain why they vetoed it in the Security Council, which they don`t have to do right now. And they don`t.
So there are things that can be -- that can make the Russians -- hold them to account.
REID: Yes. And I think the president also today made some -- gave support to expanding the number of people who are on that permanent Security Council, that small group of people, which -- and adding more countries from around the world, including Africa and other countries -- and other parts of the world, rather than Europe, which I think is important as well.
And I guess that`s sort of the big kind of exit question. Does the destabilization that we`re seeing inside Russia, plus the condemnation of the world, at some point, in your view, force Putin to stand down in this war, because he`s now threatening nuclear war?
TAYLOR: It might, Joy. It might. It might force him to stand down.
And what will really force him to stand down and to look for a way out is continued Ukrainian success on the battlefield. And President Putin is trying to change the subject. He`s trying to call up 300,000 troops and rattle the nuclear saber again. He`s failing in Ukraine.
The key -- the key place is on the battlefield in Ukraine, where he is losing, and his troops are not doing well.
REID: Yes.
TAYLOR: So that`s where -- that`s where he can be forced to back down.
REID: Ambassador William Taylor, always a pleasure, sir. Thank you very much. We appreciate you.
TAYLOR: Thank you, Joy.
REID: And we will be right back.
Cheers.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:57:20]
REID: In Iran, an unprecedented wave of protests have broken out after a woman died in police custody after she was arrested for allegedly failing to fully cover her hair.
Joining me now from Tehran is NBC News correspondent Ali Arouzi -- Ali.
ALI AROUZI, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Joy.
That`s right. For the sixth consecutive night, protesters have now clashed with violence security forces across Iran, as palpable anger continues to boil over the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who was on holiday in Tehran. She was arrested by the morality police because they deemed that the trousers she was wearing under her compulsory loose-fitting gown were too tight.
And, Joy, with each passing day, the demonstrations seem to be getting bigger, while they`re engulfing more and more of the country. As the protesters grow, the government keeps shrinking the Internet. The bandwidth here is -- isn`t working at all.
All these apps are now blocked right now, like WhatsApp, Twitter, Telegram, Instagram, so people can`t mobilize each other. They can`t upload videos of the violence and the brutality that`s going on and to try and quell the protests. But it hasn`t worked.
More and more people are coming out. And it`s interesting to note, Joy, that most of the protesters are Generation Z. These are teenagers or young men and women in their 20s that have grown up with social media, the touch screen generation, and they`re the most suffocated in this country.
They`re very tired of very repressive rules governing how they dress, what they watch, who they socialize with. And it`s spilled out into these massive protests that we`re seeing now. But the crackdown is also becoming harsher and harsher as the protests grow and go on for longer.
There are more security forces coming out. But, Joy, I have been in Iran for a long time. I have seen a lot of protests in this place. I have never seen the youth in this country this angry, this determined to reach their rights and to face off so violently with the police.
Now, this may be all over in the next few days as the crackdown ensues, but the genie is out of the bottle, and something has changed here, and the Islamic Republic is now facing a very serious problem that they haven`t faced in 43 years.
REID: Ali Arouzi, it`s so valuable to have you in our organization.
And I appreciate you, my friend. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you so much. Really appreciate you.
All right, that`s NBC`s Ali Arouzi in Tehran.
And before we go, once again, this breaking news tonight: The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals -- here it is -- they have lifted the hold barring the Department of Justice from using the classified materials that were seized in their investigation of documents from Mar-a-Lago, Trump`s home in Florida.
We will have much more on that tomorrow, big news, though.
"ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES" starts right now.