Investors suing the Trump family can watch previously unseen Celebrity Apprentice footage, a judge has ruled.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the studio that owns the footage, must now make the tapes available to lawyers for the investors at a secure location, according to US District Judge Lorna Schofield.
The lawsuit was filed in 2018 by four plaintiffs who claim that Donald Trump and his children, Donald Trump Jr, Eric Trump and Ivanka Trump, used their celebrity status to promote American Communications Network.
Plaintiffs in the case say that their investment in ACM, a multi-level marketing company, cost them thousands of dollars.
The lawsuit claims that promotion of the company by members of the Trump family on Celebrity Apprentice led them to believe the company was credible and to invest their money in it.
One plaintiff claims that she invested $4,600 in ACN but saw just $38 in revenue.
The reality TV show had a whole episode devoted to ACN’s “revolutionary” videophone, and the former president appeared in promotional videos for the company for almost a decade.
Donald Trump was paid $8.8m by ACN from 2005 to 2015 according to a revue of his tax returns by The New York Times.
The lawsuit says that the Trump family was paid millions by ACN to promote the company and failed to perform due-diligence checks on it.
The company has denied it operated a pyramid scheme.
In June, the Trump family tried to have the case moved from being a class-action lawsuit into arbitration, which would have prevented evidence presented in the case being made public, according to Reuters.
