Donald Trump and his co-defendants were in talks with insurance giant Chubb for a $464 million appeal bond in the former president’s civil fraud case, but the company backed out — days after it raised eyebrows for giving Trump a bond in a separate case, according to a Trump lawyer.
Chubb was one of more than 30 companies that refused to craft a bond that would put the massive business fraud judgment on pause, attorneys for Trump said in a New York appeals court filing Monday.
The attorneys in that filing asked the appeals court to “put the brakes” on the judgment before New York Attorney General Letitia James can start to collect on it — a process that could begin as soon as next week. James has said she will seize Trump’s assets if he cannot pay the judgment.
A panel of judges on that court has yet to rule on Trump’s request to pause the judgment without him having to post a fully secured bond.
Alan Garten, a lawyer for the Trump Organization, said in that filing that Chubb was the only company willing to consider underwriting an appeal bond secured by a blend of liquid assets and real property.
The other companies — which included Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, Liberty Mutual, Allianz, and Travelers — wanted only cash or other liquid assets.
Appeal bonds aim to prevent the loser of a court judgment from using the appeals process to delay or avoid paying their penalties. The bonds also ensure that, if the appeal is unsuccessful, the plaintiff can quickly receive their award.
Chubb was “actively negotiating” with Trump and his co-defendants, Garten said. But “within the past week,” he said, Chubb reversed course and “notified Defendants that it could not accept real property as collateral.”
“Though disappointing, this decision was not surprising given that Chubb was the only surety willing to even consider accepting real estate as collateral,” Garten said.
Garten’s statement came more than a week after it was revealed that a Chubb subsidiary gave Trump a…
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