Ivanka Trump said she could not remember property deals she handled at her father’s firm, as she testified in a civil fraud case that threatens his business empire.
A judge has already found Donald Trump and two adult sons, Eric and Donald Jr, liable for fraud, ruling they inflated assets to secure favourable loans.
Ivanka Trump, 42, was initially a co-defendant, too, until an appeals court ruling in her favour this year.
She fought hard to avoid testifying.
The mother-of-three had argued she could not leave her children in Florida during a school week.
But a New York judge and appeals court ruled she must take the stand as a witness.
This is a non-jury trial, in which the judge will decide on allegations of falsifying business records, insurance fraud and conspiracy.
Mr Trump – the former US president and Republican frontrunner for next year’s White House election – could be stripped of prized assets like Trump Tower. He and his sons deny wrongdoing.
New York Attorney General Letitia James, whose office filed the lawsuit, is seeking $250m (£204m) in fines and severe restrictions on how the Trump business operates in the state.
During four hours of testimony in the New York Supreme Court in lower Manhattan on Wednesday, Ms Trump spoke softly into the microphone, sitting upright with her hands in her lap, at times smiling brightly.
In composed and succinct responses, she repeatedly said she did not recall specifics, or was not aware.
Like her two brothers in their testimony last week, Ms Trump distanced herself from documents central to the case – her father’s financial statements, in which assets were allegedly inflated to secure better loan deals.
“I wasn’t involved in his statement of financial condition,” Ms Trump said. “That would have been the company.”
As they did with her brothers, lawyers for the state attorney general’s office showed Ms Trump a series of emails meant to bolster their case, asking if she recognized the messages.
They pressed her on her role in securing loans from Deutsche Bank for the Trump National Doral Miami, the Old Post Office in Washington DC and Trump International Hotel & Tower Chicago.
At one point state attorneys produced an email she wrote to then-Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg about a loan.
“It doesn’t get better than this,” she wrote.
She said she did not remember that message.
Her responses frustrated Louis Solomon, the state lawyer questioning her.
By BBC
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