Rosemary Vrablic, the woman in charge of hundreds of millions of dollars in Deutsche Bank loans to Trump’s company is leaving the company next week, just as investigations into Trump’s finances are intensifying.
Trump’s Deutsche Bank Crony Abruptly Resigns As Investigations Ramp Up
Donald TrumpCredit: Crooks and Liars
December 23, 2020

Of course, there could be a totally innocuous explanation, like Vrablic wants to spend some time with family. But the circumstantial evidence looks pretty bad. From The New York Times:

The reasons for Ms. Vrablic’s abrupt resignation were not clear. Deutsche Bank in August opened an internal review into a 2013 real estate transaction between Ms. Vrablic and a company owned in part by Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of Mr. Trump and a client of Ms. Vrablic’s. Dominic Scalzi, a longtime colleague of Ms. Vrablic’s who played a role in that transaction, will also leave the bank.

That real estate deal is a potential conflict of interest given Vrablic’s role as a lender.

Vrablic’s resignation also comes less than two weeks after reports that Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance is ramping up investigations into Trump’s finances. “Since the November election, his prosecutors have interviewed Deutsche Bank officials about the bank’s lending policies and procedures, and bank executives expect that prosecutors will summon employees to testify before a grand jury,” The Times noted.

It looks like Trump was never too popular at Deutsche Bank, or at least, that’s what they’d like us to think now. More from The Times:

Ms. Vrablic and her boss championed the Trump relationship. But it was polarizing inside the bank. Some senior executives argued it was too risky to lend to Mr. Trump, given his history of not repaying loans, including in 2008 when he defaulted on a large loan from Deutsche Bank on his Chicago skyscraper. Those concerns, however, were overruled, and the relationship with Mr. Trump progressed.

As they sought more loans, Mr. Trump and his representatives provided Deutsche Bank with financial statements that appeared to substantially overstate the value of some of his company’s real estate and other assets, according to current and former bank executives, as well as congressional testimony last year from Mr. Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen.

In November, Reuters reported that Deutsche Bank wanted to end its relationship with Trump after the election.

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