donald j. trump <u+2019>s charitable foundation will not be paying any of the $25 million settlement to resolve a series of lawsuits concerning trump university, the president-elect<u+2019>s defunct for-profit education venture that drew customer complaints about price gouging. representatives for mr. trump sent a one-paragraph letter on friday to eric t. schneiderman , the new york state attorney general, stating that no funding for the settlement would come from <u+201c>any charitable foundation or other charitable entity.<u+201d> a copy of the letter, from alan garten, executive vice president and general counsel for the trump organization, was reviewed by the new york times. mr. garten did not respond to a request for comment. in the past, mr. trump has used money from his charitable foundation, the donald j. trump foundation, to settle lawsuits arising from his business and personal activities. last month, in the heat of the presidential campaign, the washington post reported that more than a quarter of a million dollars from mr. trump<u+2019>s charity had been used to settle legal disputes. <u+201c>given mr. trump<u+2019>s reported history of using his charity<u+2019>s money to fund his and his businesses<u+2019> legal settlements, we demanded written assurance that the trump university settlement would not be paid for by any charitable entity,<u+201d> said amy spitalnick, a spokeswoman for the state attorney general. mr. schneiderman sued trump university in 2013, and his office helped negotiate the settlement, which also resolved two class-action lawsuits filed in federal court in san diego. one of those suits was scheduled to go to trial in a few days. the settlement foreclosed the possibility of a potentially embarrassing situation for mr. trump as he moves forward in putting together his administration. during the presidential campaign, mr. trump said he did not like settling lawsuits and insisted that students found trump university to be <u+201c>wonderful<u+201d> and <u+201c>beautiful.<u+201d> he took to twitter early saturday to say : <u+201c>the only bad thing about winning the presidency is that i did not have the time to go through a long but winning trial on trump u. too bad!<u+201d> the lawsuits said that trump university, which was in business from 2004 to 2010, cheated students out of thousands of dollars in tuition through high-pressure sales tactics and deceptive claims about the program. about 7,000 students will be eligible to recoup some of the money they spent on tuition. the settlement still requires the court<u+2019>s approval. some trump university students paid as much as $35,000 in tuition. one of them, jeffrey tufenkian told the new york times in 2011 that his experience at trump university <u+201c>was almost completely worthless.<u+201d> he said the program had wiped out much of his and his wife<u+2019>s savings. it was not known whether an insurance policy taken out by trump university would cover any part of the settlement. customarily, settlements can be taken as a tax deduction by a business, and that appears to be the case in this situation. however, a $1 million penalty for violating state education laws in new york, which is part of the settlement package, may not qualify for a deduction. a version of this article appears in print on november 22, 2016, on page a19 of the new york edition with the headline: foundation won<u+2019>t help to pay off trump suits. order reprints | today's paper | subscribe
trump foundation won<u+2019>t pay any of $25 million university settlement
matthew goldstein