Allen Weisselberg, the longtime chief financial officer of the Trump Organization, pleaded not guilty to tax fraud and other charges Thursday — in the first criminal case brought as part of Manhattan DA Cy Vance’s investigation into former President Trump’s business dealings.
In addition to the tax fraud rap, Weisselberg was also hit with scheme conspiracy, grand larceny and falsifying business records charges, prosecutors said in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Prosecutors had probed whether Weisselberg and his family had accepted a number of gifts from the former president during his decades-long employment at the organization — but failed to pay taxes on the bonuses.
In a statement prior to his arraignment Thursday, Weisselberg’s attorneys, Mary Mulligan and Bryan Skarlatos, said he intends to fight the charges in court.
The indictment against the longtime Trump confidante are the first charges brought by Vance, who, along with New York Attorney General Letitia James, have been investigating Trump’s business empire for two years.
Both prosecutors, who are Democrats, watched from the gallery as Weisselberg appeared in the 11th-floor courtroom at 100 Centre Street in Lower Manhattan.
In a statement earlier Thursday, the Trump Organization blasted the prosecution, calling Weisselberg “a pawn in a scorched earth attempt to harm the former president.”
“This is not justice; this is politics,” the company said.
Trump also slammed the impending indictment last week, saying it’s the work of “radical left prosecutors” who are “rude, nasty, and totally biased.”
A lawyer for Trump told The Post previously that the former president is not expected to be charged this week — and ripped the charges against Weisselberg, which had not yet been filed.
“In my more than 50 years of practice, never before have I seen the District Attorney’s Office target a company over employee compensation or fringe benefits,” attorney Ron Fischetti said in a statement last Friday.
“The IRS would not, and has not, brought a case like this. Even the financial institutions responsible for causing the 2008 financial crises, the worst financial crisis since the great depression, were not prosecuted,” he added.
With Post wires