Trump has until Monday to secure bond or face the possibility of James beginning to seize assets

For days, Donald Trump’s fury over the requirement to secure hundreds of millions of dollars in bond money by Monday has been bubbling behind the scenes and through a steady stream of social media posts.

Friday’s public barrage on his Truth Social platform, which included multiple all-caps posts, highlighted his persistent anger with the judge who handed down the $464 million judgment, the New York attorney general who brought the civil fraud case and Trump’s insistence that it’s all designed to derail his presidential campaign.

The posts, including one sent just before 2 a.m. Friday, contained a mix of invective and claims devoid of fact or evidence. (There is no evidence that the White House has played any role in the case brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James, let alone ordered her to pursue her effort. Nor is there any evidence that Trump, as he claimed, has plans to use any of his own money for his presidential campaign.)

But also embedded in the posts was a reality that has pushed Trump’s company and personal finances to the brink with just two days remaining to land a solution.

Trump, as he himself noted, does have a significant amount of cash, according to a review of his most recent candidate financial disclosure and personal financial statements.

It’s a point he made repeatedly in his deposition and testimony during the New York fraud trial though that diverged from his latest social media claim of having “almost five hundred million dollars in cash.” He consistently pegged the number during legal proceedings at $400 million and, barring any recent and unreported cash infusion, a person familiar with his finances confirmed that remains roughly where his cash holdings stand.

Yet even if the higher-end estimate is accurate, as Trump’s lawyers have made clear in sober, detailed filings, it wouldn’t be enough.

The $464 million decision levied in the verdict, and the bond Trump is scrambling to secure to forestall potential seizure of his properties, would require cash or cash equivalent of roughly $557 million based on industry practice.

And at least some of the money Trump does have is tied up in loan agreements that include terms requiring him to have tens of millions of dollars in cash on hand.

In other words, as the clock ticks toward the Monday deadline, securing a bond of the scale required remains – to quote Trump’s own lawyers – a “practical impossibility.”

A deft strategy

Trump’s deft navigation of – and ability to leverage – his unprecedented collision of the campaign and courthouse has defined the path he bulldozed to once again become the Republican Party’s presumptive presidential nominee.

But it was a filing by New York state lawyers at a county clerk’s office 25 miles north of Trump Tower that demonstrated how perilously close the former president is to a dramatic derailment of that strategy.

RELATED ARTICLENew York Attorney General takes initial step to prepare to seize Trump assets

The move by James’ office to enter judgments in Westchester County marked a first step toward seizing Trump’s assets should he fail to secure a bond.

Westchester County is home to Trump’s golf course and private estate known as Seven Springs.

The initial action, which state lawyers already took in Manhattan, is just the start to what would be a complex and lengthy process.

It also came as Trump’s lawyers have continued to press to reduce or waive the bond requirement, calling it “patently unreasonable, unjust and unconstitutional,” in