When it comes to the investigation into the Trump Organization, Allen Weisselberg, the company’s longtime chief financial officer, is a critically important figure.
As Rachel has explained on the show, Weisselberg has been directly involved in everything from possible payments to the president’s former alleged mistresses to the scandal-plagued Trump Foundation to helping prepare Trump’s tax returns. Weisselberg has also been described as the most senior person in the organization whose last name isn’t Trump.
NBC News’ Katy Tur spoke to a former Trump Organization employee who added that Weisselberg “knows where all financial bodies are buried within the Trump Organization.”
Naturally, this makes Allen Weisselberg someone of great interest to investigators in New York who are scrutinizing the former president’s controversial business. But just as notable are those who know what Weisselberg knows.
NBC News reported last month that the CFO’s ex-wife, Jennifer Weisselberg, has spoken “multiple times” with investigators from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and has “turned over documents.”
The Washington Post added yesterday that the same district attorney’s office, acting on a grand jury subpoena, has also taken possession of financial records thanks to Allen Weisselberg’s former daughter-in-law (who, coincidentally, is also named Jennifer Weisselberg).
Jennifer Weisselberg was married to Barry Weisselberg — the son of Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg — from 2004 to 2018. She has previously said that she had seven boxes of financial records from both her ex-husband and his father, some of which were obtained through divorce litigation. On Thursday, she loaded three boxes and a laptop computer onto a valet cart and wheeled them from her building to a black Jeep with dark-tinted windows that was waiting outside.
The article went on to note that these developments reinforce the obvious fact that Allen Weisselberg is “a key focus” of District Attorney Cy Vance’s “ongoing criminal probe into former president Donald Trump’s financial dealings.”
The New York Times reported last month that the increased focus on Allen Weisselberg “could step up pressure on him to cooperate with the investigation if the prosecutors unearth evidence of wrongdoing on his part.” Or as the Post put it yesterday, Vance is working to “flip” him.
Three years ago, Donald Trump complained to Fox News about suspected criminals in his orbit who, to his dismay, end up cooperating with law enforcement. “I have had many friends involved in this stuff,” the then-president said. “It’s called ‘flipping’ and it almost ought to be illegal.”
It’s a quote I find myself thinking about from time to time.
To date, prosecutors in this case have not formally accused Weisselberg or Trump of wrongdoing. Watch this space.
