WASHINGTON _ Armed with subpoenas, Maryland and Washington officials are set to penetrate Donald Trump's personal trust and obtain detailed financial records that could shed light on a question that has vexed rivals for two years _ whether the president is personally profiting from foreign and domestic governments.
The subpoenas will be issued Tuesday, a day after a federal judge approved a schedule for the two sides to exchange documents as part of a lawsuit by the attorneys general. The AGs claim that Trump's ownership of a luxury hotel in Washington violates the U.S. Constitution's emoluments clauses because visiting government officials may be spending money there as part of a plan to curry favor with the president.
More than 30 companies and federal agencies will be subpoenaed including The Trump Organization and the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust, according to a spokesman for the Washington Attorney General Karl Racine. The officials will also seek records from the hotel's competitors and the U.S. departments of Defense, Commerce and the Treasury, as well as Maine.
The case is among a number of legal and political challenges to Trump's ownership of a sprawling empire, spurring criticism from Democrats and some Republicans that Trump is seeking to profit from the presidency.
In winning the court's approval to delve into Trump's records, the D.C. and Maryland attorneys general will be entering a realm of the president's life he once declared off-limits to those probing him.
But that hasn't stopped investigators. Last week, special counsel Robert Mueller won a guilty plea from Trump's longtime personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, who told a judge that then-candidate Trump secretly sought to develop a Moscow Trump Tower until well after the 2016 Iowa primary.
And last month New York Attorney General Barbara Underwood won a court ruling allowing the state to move forward with a lawsuit accusing the president and his three oldest children of engaging in a decadelong pattern of self-dealing and using the nonprofit's funds for political purposes.
The attorneys general lawsuit is taking a different tack, searching for proof that Trump's luxury hotel _ just blocks from the White House _ is enriching him in violation of the U.S. Constitution.
The lawsuit names just Trump as a defendant. The hotel and its BLT Prime restaurant are third parties from whom the attorneys general will seek information about the extent of foreign and domestic government business, steps taken to attract their business, and the flow of money from the president's trust to Trump himself.
The attorneys general will also scrutinize competing hotels, restaurants and event spaces in Maryland and the District for evidence they're losing customers to the president.
The Justice Department lawyers last week told U.S. District Judge Peter Messitte that they'll seek permission from an appeals court in Richmond, Va., to appeal and to freeze the evidence-gathering process while that review plays out.
