Donald Trump Storms Out of Trial

Former President Donald Trump stormed out of his $250 million civil fraud trial on Wednesday after a judge denied a directed verdict in his favor.

The trial stems from a lawsuit New York Attorney General Letitia James filed in 2022 alleging that Trump and top executives at The Trump Organization conspired to increase his net worth by billions of dollars on financial statements provided to banks and insurers to make deals and secure loans.

Following a cross-examination of ex-Trump attorney Michael Cohen, in which Cohen was asked if Trump directed him to inflate the numbers, Trump's legal team requested a directed verdict based on his testimony. Clifford Robert, part of the former president's legal team, said that "the state's key witness" just countered their entire case. "I can't think of anything more appropriate now," he said.

However, Judge Arthur Engoron denied, prompting Trump to leave the New York courtroom.

"At that point, Trump stood and left the courtroom, mumbling: "Unbelievable. Unbelievable." He was followed by Secret Service and his son Eric," Adam Klasfeld, senior legal correspondent at The Messenger, wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

After leaving the courtroom, Trump told reporters, "The witness just admitted that we won the trial and the judge should end this trial immediately. Thank you."

Trump's abrupt response followed Cohen's return to the stand on Wednesday for the second day of testimony, as Cohen testified that he did not recall if Trump had asked him to inflate the values of his assets on financial records at the heart of the civil case, which prompted Robert to ask for a directed verdict.

During Cohen's first day on the stand, he accused Trump of directing him and another Trump Organization executive to falsely inflate the values of his assets on financial statements.

Trump "would look at the total assets and say, 'I'm actually not worth $4.5 billion. I am really worth more like $6 billion,'" Cohen testified.

In response, Trump and his legal team had spent much of the first day targeting Cohen's criminal history, attempting to paint him as a "serial liar" whose word could not be trusted.

The former president's departure is only the latest clash in the case after Engoron questioned Trump about a comment made to reporters on Wednesday during a break of the trial and subsequently finding his testimony "not credible" during a hearing about whether he violated a gag order. He fined the former president $10,000.

Update 10/25/23, 4:53 p.m. This article was updated with further information.