Amid attorney Michael Cohen's damning claims to Congress that President Donald Trump is a "racist, conman and cheat," was his confirmation that Trump had massaged the value of his Jupiter golf club — a practice Cohen said the president frequently used to secure loans, lower his tax bills and jack up his rank on Forbes' list of billionaires.

Under questioning by Democrat firebrand U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Cohen, Trump's former attorney, said Trump's listing the Jupiter club's value at $50 million on his financial disclosure form while claiming to Palm Beach County tax officials that it was worth no more than $5 million was "identical" to financial representations he made about Trump National Golf Club in Westchester, New York.

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"It was my experience that Mr. Trump inflated his total assets when it served his purposes, such as trying to be listed among the wealthiest people in Forbes, and deflated his assets to reduce his real estate taxes," Cohen testified in his opening statement.

However, some of the discrepancy between the value of the Jupiter club Trump reported on his federal financial disclosure form and the the far lower value claimed to the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser could be explained by the different methods used by the county and Trump, his attorneys and accountants.

"It's not exact apples to apples," said Richard Rampell, an accountant in Palm Beach who has worked on valuing assets for financial disclosure forms and appraising a golf course. Still, the discrepancy can't be completely chalked up to using different accounting methods, Rampell said. "It's not like they are even close."

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The federal financial disclosure form Trump is required to file is intended to identify conflicts of interest and not assess his net worth. Because of that, the instructions give wide berth to how filers can calculate the value of their assets.

To determine the "good faith estimate of the fair market value" of a property, filers can use several different methods, including recent appraisals; assessed value; net worth of a business partnership; equity value of individually owned businesses; year-end book value of stock; and "any other recognized indication of value."

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It's not known which method Trump used to come up with the $50 million-plus figure for the Jupiter property. But there is one perk that the president may have used to up the value: Trump's name.

Financial documents that Cohen turned over to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform Wednesday show Trump, in 2013, put a financial value on the brand at $4 billion.

Vince McLaren, a senior commercial property appraiser at the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser's office who is tasked with valuing more about 125 golf clubs in the county, said the Trump brand is "irrelevant" in his valuation process.

"Who owns it means nothing," McLaren said. While McLaren does consider the value of items such as memberships, gross income and even the irrigation system and age of the grass, the Trump brand "means nothing."

"Whoever owns it is not a consideration," said McLaren, who valued the club at $16 million in 2018. He said he can't explain how Trump reached the $50 million value. "I don't know why there is such a big disconnect."

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Larry Hirsch, a golf course appraiser who appraised the Jupiter course before Trump purchased it in 2013, said he can't explain the wide spread between the values either.

"It's unlikely that there would ever be a spread that great," Hirsch said. As for whether the Trump brand could account for the ten-fold increase in value, "right now, there is probably an argument that it's worth less."

"There is no reason to believe from everything I know that it would have increased that much in value from when he bought it," Hirsch said.

Trump purchased the course in 2012 for $5 million and sued the county shortly after receiving his first property tax bill. He followed up with four more lawsuits, each year claiming the county had over-valued the club and charged him too much in property taxes.

In a settlement reached in December, the county retroactively cut the value it had assigned for each year. Trump was refunded the taxes he overpaid on $10.6 million dollars of property valuations.

Cohen also provided the committee with financial statements that he said showed Trump inflated the value of his assets to secure a loan from Deutsche Bank in 2014 to purchase the Buffalo Bills. Trump's clubs and properties in Florida, New York, New Jersey, California, Washington, D.C., and Scotland are lumped together with a total value of $1.3 billion.

Cohen, 52, pleaded guilty to eight counts in federal court in August 2018, and then pleaded guilty in November 2018 to lying to Congress. He was sentenced to three years in prison and is expected to begin serving his sentence in May.

cstapleton@pbpost.com

@StapletonPBPost





