Whether or not he really is confident about the outcome, Donald Trump keeps saying that he’ll win the Trump University lawsuits that have been filed against him. And, once he does, he wants to reopen the institution.
The Republican presidential candidate announced his plans in a tweet on Thursday:
After the litigation is disposed of and the case won, I have instructed my execs to open Trump U(?), so much interest in it! I will be pres.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 2, 2016
This comes after an influx of negative press regarding Trump University these past few days. Eric Schneiderman, the New York Attorney General who has filed a $40 million lawsuit against Mr. Trump, has called the venture “really a fraud from beginning to and” and “straight up fraud.” Hillary Clinton, Trump’s likely rival in the general election, said on Thursday that he is “trying to scam America the way he scammed all those people at Trump University.” The Democratic candidate’s press secretary tweeted a similar sentiment:
Trump U is devastating because it's metaphor for his whole campaign: promising hardworking Americans way to get ahead, but all based on lies
— Brian Fallon (@brianefallon) June 1, 2016
Some court documents have also recently been unsealed. In one of them a former Trump Organization employee states, “I believe that Trump University was a fraudulent scheme and that it preyed upon the elderly and the uneducated to separate them from their money.” It’s also been revealed that the university used “playbooks” that taught employees how to convince potential Trump University students to pay for the $35,000 courses.
The institution is currently fighting two class action lawsuits in addition to the $40 million lawsuit filed by Schneiderman. Politico writes that if he does actually reopen Trump University it’s unclear whether it will be run by Trump himself or by his children.
Donald Trump’s campaign could not immediately be reached for comment.