New York General Attorney, Letitia James, subpoenaed two of former President Donald Trump's children, Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump Jr, to testify as part of ongoing fraud investigations. 

 

The request was made known on Monday, Jan. 3, through a court document filed by the judge in the case outlining a timetable for handling a dispute that has arisen over subpoenas for both the former president and his children.

 

The subpoenas for Trump, his son Donald Jr. and daughter Ivanka stem from an investigation "into the valuation of properties owned or controlled" by the former president and his company, the Trump Organization.

 

The Trumps are expected to file their own documents with the court in an attempt to block the subpoenas, which will create a legal dispute similar to one last year after James' office issued subpoenas for Eric Trump.

 

He was questioned in October 2020 in the same case, shortly before the presidential election his father lost.

 

Trump sued James last month seeking to put an end to it after the prosecutor requested that he come to testify on Jan. 7. Trump's lawsuit, filed in federal court, alleges that the probe into matters including the appraisal of his company's assets has violated his constitutional rights in a "thinly veiled effort to publicly defame Trump and his associates."

For more than two years, James has been investigating whether the Trump Organization misled banks and tax officials about the value of its assets, overstating them to get favorable loan terms or minimizing them to save taxes.

 

In a December statement, James noted that "the Trump Organization has continually attempted to delay our investigation into its corporate business dealings, and now Donald Trump and his eponymous company have filed suit as an attempted collateral attack on that investigation."

 

The investigation, however, is civil, so in any event, it could not bring criminal charges against the Trumps.