Testimony from three former employees in class-action lawsuit lambasts school that ‘preyed upon the elderly and uneducated’

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Some of the harshest critics of Trump University have been revealed to be former employees of the now-defunct university majority-owned by Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican US presidential candidate.

Trump University 'playbooks' offer glimpse of ruthless business practices Read more

In sworn testimony, three former staff members have described the real estate school as “a facade, a total lie” and a “fraudulent scheme” that “preyed upon the elderly and uneducated to separate them from their money”.

In extracts from their evidence to a class-action lawsuit against the school, made public this week, the former staff tell the inside story of the “front-end high-pressure speaker scam” at Trump University.

Ronald Schnackenberg, who worked at Trump University’s headquarters on Wall Street between 2006 and 2007, said he felt compelled to resign because he thought the company was “engaging in misleading, fraudulent and dishonest conduct”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Ronald Schnackenberg’s testimony. Photograph: Zeldes & Haeggquist LLP

Schnackenberg said the “primary goal of Trump University was not to educate students” but to “make money, as quickly and easily as possible”.

In his experience, he said, “virtually all students who purchased a Trump University seminar were dissatisfied with the program they purchased” and he was not aware of “a single consumer who paid for a Trump University seminar program [who] went on to successfully invest in real estate based upon the techniques that were taught”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Ronald Schnackenberg’s testimony. Photograph: Zeldes & Haeggquist LLP

Corrine Sommer worked as manager of the events department at Trump University in 2007. She said that the university worked to “lure consumers into the initial free course based upon the name and reputation of Donald Trump” and then “try and up-sell consumers to the next course using high-pressure sales tactics”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Corrine Sommer’s testimony. Photograph: Zeldes & Haeggquist LLP

Sommer said Trump University staff regularly advised prospective students to “max out their credit card” to pay for the course and said some instructors were trained to ask students in introductory seminars to “call their credit card companies and raise their credit limits two, three or four times”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Corrine Sommer’s testimony. Photograph: Zeldes & Haeggquist LLP

Jason Nicholas, worked as a sales executive for Trump University in 2007, said he was forced to read from a script that told customers they would “work with Donald Trump’s real estate experts”. He said most of the teachers were “a joke”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Jason Nicholas’s testimony. Photograph: Zeldes & Haeggquist LLP

The testimonies were released by US district court judge Gonzalo Curiel alongside Trump University “playbooks”, which instructed staff in how to sell courses costing up to $34,995 to prospective clients.

Judge Curiel released the documents and depositions, which are central to a class-action lawsuit against Trump University in California, despite sustaining repeated public attacks from Trump, who had fought to keep the details secret.

Curiel ruled that the documents were in the public interest now that Trump is “the front-runner in the Republican nomination in the 2016 presidential race, and has placed the integrity of these court proceedings at issue”.

Trump hit back, calling Curiel a “hater”, a “total disgrace” and “biased”. “I have a judge who is a hater of Donald Trump. A hater. He’s a hater,” Trump said at a rally near the courthouse in San Diego. “His name is Gonzalo Curiel. And he is not doing the right thing … [He] happens to be, we believe, Mexican.”

Curiel, who is Hispanic, is American and was born in Indiana.

Lawyers for Trump disputed the former staff testimonies, describing them as “completely discredited”.

A Trump spokeswoman said: “Trump University looks forward to using this evidence, along with much more, to win when the case is brought before a jury.”

The trial is due to begin in San Diego on 28 November – not three weeks after the US goes to the polls. Trump has made it clear that he intends to attend the trial and give evidence in his own defence, which raises the prospect that the newly elected president of the United States could take the stand.

• This article was amended on 1 June 2016 to correct the time period between election day and the start of the trial.