Trump’s $175M Bond: Analyst Says Court Will Decide If There’s “Hankey-Pankey”

The saga of Trump’s loss of his New York civil fraud case and coming up with a $454 (plus interest accruing every day) is something I’m sure you’re familiar with. Losing the case. Judge Engoron’s ruling determining the amount of damages. Trump’s troubles in posting cash (into escrow) or bond to cover the penalty while he appealed his case. Thirty reputable entities turning Trump down, prompting a plea to the appeals court to reduce the amount he’d have to put up. Which they did. At the last minute, with New York AG James poised to start collecting the appeals court took mercy on Trump and reduced the amount he’d have to put up in cash or bond to $175 million and gave him ten more days.

Trump still had trouble, then in swooped a “White Knight”, a multi-billionaire (an actual billionaire) out in California by the name of Don Hankey, the majority shareholder and chairman of Knight Insurance who claims to have never even met Trump posted the bond. There were questions of course. Starting when the bond was announced, the first of which was “Knight Insurance?” And “Who the hell is Don Hankey” I couldn’t help but flash back to another “you’ve got to be kidding me” named Trump benefactor. Remember David PECKER of National Enquirer infamy? (We might be about to hear from him again, in criminal court this time) Now we have a guy named HANKEY. Admit it, you at least in your head made “hankey-pankey” jokes.  And when you look him up Don Hankey isn’t what you’d call a reputable person.

But after a day or two of Trump’s mid evening announcement of having “posted bond” which he hadn’t actually done yet, and some stories about questionable character and business practices of Hankey and Knight Insurance we figured that was the end of the matter. At least until Trump lost his appeal and had to make up the difference between the only $175M he’d had to put up and the rest of the judgement against him. But things went sideways right off the bat.  Knight insurance couldn’t even manage to get the paperwork correct when they filed it with the court!  The clerk’s office did what they’d normally do, state what needed to be fixed and allow a brief time to correct it.

However, as this article from CNN notes that was enough for New York AG Leticia James to do more than ask questions. She started asking them formally:

The attorney general’s office, led by Democrat Letitia James, on Thursday took a step to challenge the soundness of the deal and filed a “notice of exception to the sufficiency of the surety” to seek additional information from Trump or the underwriter about the bond because the insurer is not regulated by New York state.

Judge Arthur Engoron set a hearing for April 22.

If you’re reading this then either here on Politizoom or elsewhere you’ve read about some of the specifics of what’s going on. That includes Hankey’s shifting explanations about what guarantees he’s gotten from Trump as collateral. How much cash, how much other “assets” such as properties. I should note Trump isn’t allowed to use and of his fast crashing in value Truth Social stock as collateral for any loans or other financial “deals.” There are lots of moving parts and I won’t detail them all  here. If you want details check out the linked CNN article. And other articles including here on PZ.

What matters is that, as our very on Ursula noted Hankey has started to show signs of regret ever dipping his toe into this particular Trump cesspool.  This is shining a spotlight on him and his businesses he’s never been under before. And as Murster asked in his own article on this subject are California regulators noses twitching all of a sudden? I suspect there might be a couple or so visitors from California in the courtroom when the 22nd rolls around. And they’ll stick around to get a transcript of the proceedings and copies of evidence submitted before flying home. Yep, I’d say with each passing day Don Hankey wants to create more and more distance between him/his businesses and Donald J. Trump!

It raises an interesting question. How hard does Hankey have his own lawyers press to uphold the “integrity” of the bond? Does he fight like hell to be able to cover Trump or just have his lawyers put up a perfunctory argument so he can tell Trump: Sorry Donald. I tried but those mean New Yorkers beat my guys in court. That would be a fun conversation to hear.  Then there’s the question of what evidence the court appointed monitors to the Trump Org and Trump’s finances will have to say. The entire bond deal might fall apart and what happens then?

That leads me to this article from Newsweek, which says the whole thing might be about to “implode.” The piece extensively relies on coverage of and input from legal analysist Glenn Kirschner, a former assistant U.S. Attorney who is often critical of Trump. As with the other articles I’ve linked to there are some of the details on the problems related to this bond. Kirschner thinks the whole thing might be about to “implode.”

Kirschner broke down reporting on the nature of KSIC and its chairman Don Hankey, a billionaire noted for his practice of giving loans to those whom other financial institutions would not and for “running afoul of regulators,” according to NBC News.

“With Judge Engoron setting a hearing on April 22 to pull back the curtain on this ‘bond’ that Don Hankey gave to Donald Trump, $175 million bond, I’m quite sure that Attorney General Tish James and Judge Engoron will get to the bottom of what this bond really involves,” Kirschner said. “And they’ll figure out whether this bond involves any financial, you know…’hankey-pankey.”

If you’re an old fart like me you remember a song, and the repeated line “My baby done the hankey-pankey” as a lament. It’s been rattling around in my head ever since I learned the name Don Hankey, and (again thinking back to the National Enquirer stuff) silly thoughts keep coming up.  Joking aside the fact is that this bond is going to get put under a legal microscope. There’s no such legal term as “hankey-pankey.” However there are legal terms, and consequences to for not being forthcoming with the court. Trying to pull a fast one, by say trying to slide through a bond of questionable backing hoping no one will look too closely at the details is something else.

This isn’t some $20k bond for someone accused of serious assault or some a few convenience store robberies. This is a huge amount of money. In a high visibility case and with the person being bonded having a decades long history of stiffing people for amounts small to large.  Call it what you will but if every legal standard isn’t met AG James has every reason to demand the court reject the bond. And judge Engoron has every reason to grant such a motion so both Hankey had better hope everything, and I mean everything is on the up-and-up. And they can prove it.

IF the bond is rejected the fireworks we’ve seen so far will seem like a sparkler in the last half-second of burning out. The best part is that the hearing on the bond is set for the 22nd. When Trump’s criminal trial, which could last four to six weeks is underway! We could be in for a sh*t show the likes of which we have never seen.