New York's attorney general says that President-elect Donald Trump has agreed to a $25 million settlement to resolve several fraud lawsuits involving his former Trump University.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said Friday that the deal would settle a civil suit he filed against the New York school that taught real estate investing as well as two class-action lawsuits in California filed by former students at Trump University.
The lawsuits claimed that Trump University misled students who paid up to $35,000 each to learn Trump's real estate investing techniques from his "hand-picked" instructors. The suits said Trump was not involved in choosing the instructors and said the school called itself a university when it wasn't an accredited school.
Judge set to rule Friday
Trump has always denied any wrongdoing involving the university, which has since closed. The settlement deal does not require Trump to acknowledge any wrongdoing.
A federal judge in the two California cases had been set Friday to consider arguments on Trump's request to delay a trial until after his inauguration on January 20. Trump's attorneys said that Trump's preparations for his White House administration were "critical and all-consuming."
Schneiderman said the deal is a "stunning reversal by Donald Trump and a major victory for the over 6,000 victims of his fraudulent university." Trump had previously said he would not settle the case.
Settlement had been suggested
Neither Trump's attorneys nor a spokeswoman returned telephone calls on Friday, the Associated Press reported.
U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who is presiding over the two California cases, had urged both sides to settle. The judge was at the center of one of Trump's controversial statements during the presidential campaign, when the candidate said the judge was biased against him because of the judge's Mexican ancestry. The judge was born in the Midwestern state of Indiana.
