Report: Trump Paid Over $1 Million to Settle Polish Workers’ Lawsuit
Unsealed documents show Trump settled after 15 years of litigation with undocumented laborers.

Brendan McDermid/Reuters
President Trump quietly paid $1.375 million in 1998 to settle a class-action labor lawsuit filed by undocumented Polish workers who helped demolish a site for Trump Tower, The New York Times reports. Citing documents recently unsealed after a judge ruled that the public has a right to know of a case involving the “now-president of the United States,” the report says Trump’s payment covered lawyers’ fees and expenses of the laborers, while $500,000 of the overall sum went to a union benefits fund. The laborers were reportedly paid as little as $4 an hour while working 12-hour shifts without hard hats, gloves, or masks to demolish the Bonwit Teller building in 1980. The settlement came after 15 years of litigation, and details were only made public after Time Inc. and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press filed a motion to unseal the deal’s terms. Trump, who has vehemently railed against illegal immigration, reportedly testified prior to the settlement that he had no idea “illegal aliens” were employed on site.
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