COF Capital One Financial Corporation

By Rebecca Ballhaus, David Benoit and Byron Tau 

This article is being republished as part of our daily reproduction of WSJ.com articles that also appeared in the U.S. print edition of The Wall Street Journal (April 30, 2019).

President Trump, three of his children and his real-estate businesses on Monday filed a federal lawsuit to block Deutsche Bank AG and Capital One Financial Corp. from complying with congressional subpoenas for documents related to him and his family.

In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, lawyers for the president and his companies said the subpoenas -- issued by the House Intelligence and Financial Services Committees -- were intended to "harass" the president and to "rummage through every aspect of his personal finances, his businesses, and the private information of the president and his family, and to ferret about for any material that might be used to cause him political damage."

Deutsche Bank, Germany's largest lender, has for decades had a relationship with Mr. Trump and his businesses and has been the president's primary bank. Since 1998, the bank has led or participated in loans of at least $2.5 billion to companies affiliated with Mr. Trump, The Wall Street Journal has reported.

Public disclosures during his candidacy showed borrowings from Deutsche Bank of more than $300 million by entities affiliated with Mr. Trump, including two 2012 mortgages -- one valued at more than $50 million and the other at between $5 million and $25 million -- for the Trump National Doral Miami, a Florida golf resort.

Deutsche Bank records have been of particular interest to Democratic lawmakers seeking to examine Mr. Trump's finances, given the bank's long ties to him.

According to the lawsuit, the subpoenas sought documents and financial records spanning the last 10 years. The committees said the subpoenas were intended to investigate foreign influence or illicit use of the financial system.

New York Attorney General Letitia James has also sent civil subpoenas to Deutsche Bank and Investors Ban, after former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen testified to Congress about Mr. Trump's financial transactions involving the banks.

During the campaign year, the Journal has reported, the bank denied an attempt by the Trump Organization to increase a loan to the Doral, as the bank grew concerned about expanding the relationship. The German bank also raised questions internally about whether it had enough information about the ultimate use of the funding, the Journal reported.

A 2015 disclosure form filed when Mr. Trump declared his candidacy showed he kept an account at Capital One with at least $5 million in it, along with accounts at other financial institutions, including JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc. and Barclays PLC.

Reps. Adam Schiff (D., Calif.) and Maxine Waters (D., Calif.), who chair the House Intelligence and Financial Services Committees, said in a joint statement the president's lawsuit was "meritless" and "another demonstration of the depths to which President Trump will go to obstruct Congress's constitutional oversight authority."

A Deutsche Bank spokeswoman said the bank was "committed to providing appropriate information to all authorized investigations and will abide by a court order regarding such investigations."

Counsel for Deutsche Bank advised the president, his children and his businesses that the bank, absent a court order, intended to begin providing documents to the committees on May 6. Capital One said the same.

Lawyers for the president and his companies in a statement said they had filed the lawsuit "to protect the privacy rights of the President, his family and their businesses" and called the subpoenas to Deutsche Bank and Capital One "unlawful and illegitimate." In addition to the president and Trump businesses, the plaintiffs include three of Mr. Trump's children: Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump.

The complaint echoes another lawsuit the Trump Organization filed last week against the Democratic chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D., Md.), and the accounting firm Mazars USA LLP. The company is seeking a court order to block a subpoena the panel filed last week against the company for eight years' worth of Mr. Trump's financial statements.

On top of efforts by the president's businesses to thwart congressional subpoenas, the president has indicated the White House intends to rebuff any congressional requests for documents and testimony. Mr. Trump said last week that he would "fight all the subpoenas," including one issued last week for testimony by former White House counsel Don McGahn, whose accounts of the president's efforts to have Robert Mueller fired were prominently featured in the special counsel's report.

The Treasury Department has also thus far rebuffed a request made by the House Ways and Means Committee under a law that would require the president's tax returns to be turned over.

Democrats have aggressively issued subpoenas since taking over the House in January, including calling for an unredacted version of Mr. Mueller's report on Russian interference in the 2016 election and any obstruction of justice by Mr. Trump.

The White House and Justice Department have ordered several current and former administration officials not to testify.

A major fight looms over the House Judiciary Committee's subpoena for the clean version of the Mueller report.

Mr. Trump has said he would fight subpoenas from Democrats because they aren't "impartial," saying their investigations of him and his administration are politically motivated. "The Democrats are trying to win 2020...they're not going to win against me," he told reporters last week when asked about Democratic oversight efforts.

The issue will come to a head this week when Attorney General William Barr is expected to testify before both the House and Senate Judiciary Committees. His House testimony remains up in the air over wrangling between the Justice Department and the committee over the format.

The House panel has warned that the attorney general may be subpoenaed if he refuses to show up.

Liz Hoffman and AnnaMaria Andriotis contributed to this article.

Write to Rebecca Ballhaus at Rebecca.Ballhaus@wsj.com, David Benoit at david.benoit@wsj.com and Byron Tau at byron.tau@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 30, 2019 02:47 ET (06:47 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2019 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.