Trump rips ex-lawyer Alina Habbas obnoxious $50M deal with pardoned Venezuelan bankers family
President Trump tore into his former personal attorney Alina Habba on Saturday night, calling her reported $50 million contract with the family of a Venezuelan banker he later pardoned “totally obnoxious and outrageous.”“I thought it was terrible,” Trump told reporters as he arrived at a Halloween party at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, where he joked he had come dressed as himself.The president said he told Habba he didn’t want her to be paid.“You know, it’s one thing for a person to get paid legal fees or whatever.She’s a lawyer,” Trump said.
“I thought it was totally obnoxious and outrageous, and it’s not acceptable.Not acceptable at all.”The family of Julio Herrera Velutini guaranteed Habba more than $50 million over four years in exchange for serving as general counsel of Concord Partners, a family company registered just days before she signed on, the New York Times reported last week.Herrera, a billionaire banker, once faced federal bribery charges.
By August 2025, his case had been whittled down to a guilty plea on a single misdemeanor campaign finance violation instead.The family put Habba on a princely retainer of $10 million a year, plus bonuses, according to the Times.The 42-year-old attorney teed the job up while she was still on the Justice Department’s payroll.Habba was just two weeks into her new gig at Concord Partners when Trump pardoned her boss’ father.The lawyer, for her part, insists the timing is pure happenstance.“Any insinuation that my employment — all of which has been vetted and disclosed to the DOJ — had anything to do with securing a pardon is false,” Habba told the Times.
The White House has also denied any connection, the outlet reported.Trump “erupted” when he learned of the contract, according to the Times, then told aides and allies that some of the money ought to find its way to his future presidential library or some other Trump-linked outfit.On Saturday, the president said ...