No. of Recommendations: 13
NY has set an unreasonable condition in order for a defendant to pursue an appeal.
No, they haven't.
At this point, the plaintiffs have won their civil case against Trump. They have secured a judgement for $464 million. Trump gets to appeal, but unless a stay is issued he owes the money now. This was a final judgement, and it is enforceable immediately. Right now, it is the plaintiffs' money. The purpose of the bond is to make sure that no matter what happens over the time that the appeal might take, the plaintiffs' money will be safe.
Trump, as the losing defendant, doesn't get to decide that the plaintiff's money will remain invested in commercial real estate (much less in the specific properties that Trump chooses) in order to minimize the consequences to the defendant. The plaintiffs can't be forced to take that risk, especially since the plaintiffs don't get any upside to having their money invested in a riskier asset.
Again, what Trump is arguing about is justification for a stay - an argument that he has a decent chance to prevail on appeal, and that therefore the status quo should not be disturbed. He's lost that argument at the trial court and at the appellate court. So the status quo is disturbed, and Trump has to pay the judgment now. He has the option to pay the judgement to the court, rather than the plaintiffs, in order to protect his ability to get the judgement back if he wins on appeal - but that's it.
He lost his case, and he lost his requests to stay the judgement. The consequences for being found guilty of fraud start now. And that's not unreasonable.
