Trump posts $175M bond to stave off seizure of his assets while he appeals civil fraud verdict

NEW YORK — Former President Donald Trump posted a $175 million bond Monday to stop collection of a half-billion dollar judgment in the civil fraud case against him, preventing state authorities from seizing his assets while he appeals the verdict.

Trump’s posting of the bond comes after a panel of appellate judges last week ruled that he could post a bond in a significantly smaller amount than the $454 million he owes as a result of the verdict. That decision came after Trump’s lawyers said he lacked the cash to cover the full amount of the penalty and had been rejected by dozens of insurance companies for a bond for the full amount.

According to a court filing, the $175 million bond he and the other defendants posted Monday was provided by Los Angeles-based Knight Insurance Group. The filing didn’t specify which assets Trump used as collateral for the bond.

Knight’s president, Amit Shah, didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking information about the collateral.

Because Trump and the other defendants, including his adult sons and their business associates, posted the bond, he won’t have to immediately come up with the cash to pay the judgment. He’ll have to pay only if appeals courts eventually uphold the judgment — a process that could take months or years.

If he hadn’t posted the bond, New York Attorney General Tish James, who brought the lawsuit, could have begun freezing his bank accounts or seizing his property while the appeals process played out. But the bond blocks those collection measures.

Trump’s scramble to avoid — or at least delay — paying the massive verdict began in February after Justice Arthur Engoron found that the former president orchestrated pervasive business fraud by falsely inflating his net worth to obtain favorable rates from banks and insurers. Engoron fined Trump $354.8 million, but that figure ballooned to $454 million with interest, and it continues to climb.

Though the civil fraud verdict poses the biggest financial threat to Trump, other court cases threaten to shrink his wallet. Last month, Trump posted another bond of $91.6 million in a civil defamation case. That bond will prevent the writer E. Jean Carroll from enforcing an $83.3 million verdict while Trump appeals that case. In that instance, the bond was higher than the verdict because it covers interest.