DES MOINES, IOWA (July 31, 2024) — Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird has joined a fifteen-state coalition in supporting [former] President [Donald] Trump’s appeal of a court order wrongly fining him more than $350 million.
The suit was brought by New York’s Democrat attorney general, who campaigned on a pledge of using “every legal avenue to pursue” [former] President Trump. The judge required [former] President Trump to pay an unprecedented almost half a billion dollars to the State in fines and pre-judgement interest. The oversized fine the court imposed on [former] President Trump is unwarranted, excessive, and disproportionate to the allegations made against him. The States support [former] President Trump’s appeal and a reversal of the New York court order.
“New York's excessive fine on [former] President Trump is unlike anything we have seen before, and it is wildly disproportionate to the allegations New York’s politically motivated Democrat attorney general brought against him,” said AG Bird. “If it can happen to [former] President Trump, it can happen to anyone. We must uphold the Constitution that protects the rights of not just [former] President Trump, but every American, and reverse the unjust fine that is being imposed on him.”
The court order violates the Eighth Amendment’s Excessive Fines Clause and [former] President Trump’s Due Process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.
Iowa joined the South Carolina-led brief, along with Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah, and West Virginia.
Read the amicus brief here.
