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Old 07-26-2016, 11:38 AM   #257
Jim in CT
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Join Date: Jul 2008
Posts: 20,428
Quote:
Originally Posted by PaulS View Post
I searched wikipedia and nothing came up.

http://www.clearinghouse.net/detail.php?id=15342

Case Name United States v. Fred C. Trump, Donald Trump, and Trump Management, Inc. FH-NY-0024
Docket / Court 73-1529 ( E.D.N.Y. )
State/Territory New York
Case Type(s) Fair Housing/Lending/Insurance

Attorney Organization U.S. Dept. of Justice Civil Rights Division

Case Summary



This case was brought against Fred and Donald Trump, and their real estate company, in 1973 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. We are working to obtain the relevant documents. In the meantime, the facts in the summary are from an article by Michael Kranish and Robert O'Harrow Jr. in the Washington Post, Inside the government’s racial bias case against Donald Trump’s company, and how he fought it (Jan. 23, 2016).

In October 1973, the Justice Department filed this civil rights case in federal court in Brooklyn against Fred Trump, Donald Trump, and their real estate company. The complaint alleged that the firm had committed systemic violations of the Fair Housing Act of 1968 in their many complexes--39 buildings, between them containing over 14,000 apartments. The allegations included evidence from black and white "testers" who had sought to rent apartments; the white testers were told of vacancies; the black testers were not, or were steered to apartment complexes with a higher proportion of racial minorities. The complaint also alleged that Trump employees had placed codes next to housing applicant names to indicate if they were black.

The Trumps retained Roy Cohn, former aide to Senator Joseph McCarthy, to defend them; they counter-claimed against the government, seeking $100 million in damages for defamation.

The case was assigned to District Judge Edward R. Neaher. He dismissed the counterclaim and allowed the Fair Housing Act suit to proceed.

After two years, the matter settled with a consent decree, signed June 10, 1975. It included the ordinary disclaimer of liability (the settlement was “in no way an admission” of a violation"), but prohibited the Trumps from "discriminating against any person in the terms, conditions, or privileges of sale or rental of a dwelling." Fred and Donald Trump were ordered to "thoroughly acquaint themselves personally on a detailed basis" with the Fair Housing Act. The agreement also required the Trumps to place ads informing minorities they had an equal opportunity to seek housing at their properties. According to a contemporary article in the New York Times, Trump Management was required to furnish the New York Urban League with a weekly list of all apartment vacancies, for two years; the League would get three days to provide qualified applicants for every fifth vacancy in Trump buildings where fewer than 10 percent of the tenants were black.

The Justice Department called the decree “one of the most far-reaching ever negotiated.” Newspaper headlines echoed that view. “Minorities win housing suit,” said the New York Amsterdam News, which told readers that “qualified Blacks and Puerto Ricans now have the opportunity to rent apartments owned by Trump Management.”

In his autobiography, Donald Trump took a different view: “In the end the government couldn’t prove its case, and we ended up making a minor settlement without admitting any guilt.”
Didn't you call me petty for bringing up Hilary's ethical lapses from 1995? But what Trump did in the 1970s is more relevant? Please explain, I am confused...
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