Trump Used Charity Funds To Pay Legal Settlements: Report

NEW YORK, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News -21st Sept,2016) - Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump used funds from his charitable foundation to pay settlements in legal cases involving his businesses, an apparent violation of laws governing non-profits, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.

The cases involved a combined $258,000 paid out by the Donald J. Trump Foundation -- a charity almost entirely funded with other people's money, the newspaper said -- and follow a review of legal documents and the foundation's tax records.

The newspaper carried out a weekslong investigation into the charity's finances, finding that Trump himself has not contributed a Dollar since 2009.

The group is funded by donations from third parties instead.

One of the group's suspect payments was a $100,000 donation to a veterans' charity in 2007 as part of a legal settlement with the city of Palm Beach, Florida. Trump had sued the city after it fined him $120,000, or $1,250 per day, for erecting an 80-foot (24-meter) flagpole at his Mar-a-Lago Club that exceeded the maximum 42 feet permitted by local regulations.

The Trump Foundation also made transactions that appeared to be exclusively for the benefit of the real estate mogul or his businesses, apparently in violation of regulations governing charities, the Washington Post said.