Former President Donald Trump has filed a lawsuit against New York state Attorney General Letitia James in an attempt to stop her from investigating his business practices.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court on Monday and first reported by The New York Times, claims that James’ investigation violates Trump’s constitutional rights. It requests a preliminary and permanent order that would bar her from any civil or criminal investigations against Trump and his business empire, the Trump Organization.
“Her mission is guided solely by political animus and a desire to harass, intimidate, and retaliate against a private citizen who she views as a political opponent,” the suit reads.
James’ office said the lawsuit is simply Trump’s latest attempt to delay her office’s work.
“Our investigation will continue undeterred because no one is above the law, not even someone with the name Trump,” the state AG’s office said in a statement to HuffPost.
James has been conducting a civil probe of the Trump Organization, related to Trump’s business dealings prior to his presidency, since 2019. In May she announced that she had opened a separate criminal investigation into his business empire as well.
Trump’s suit accuses James of investigating him in “bad faith and without a legally sufficient basis,” which the suit claims violates his 14th Amendment rights by depriving him of “life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
It further accuses James of violating Trump’s First Amendment right to free speech through her alleged “desire to harass, intimidate, threaten, oppress, coerce, and injure” Trump and the Trump Organization, supposedly in retaliation for his political views and acts as president.
The suit lastly accuses James of violating Trump’s Fourth Amendment rights ― which protect against unreasonable search and seizure ― through her subpoenas, which the suit calls “overbroad, overreaching and irrelevant.”
“Plaintiffs will continue to suffer irrevocable loss and irreparable harm as a result of Defendant’s deprivation of their constitutional rights,” the suit states.