Maryanne Trump-Barry

Marriage and Family

• Maryanne Trump Desmond married John Joseph Barry in 1982. “Maryanne Trump Desmond, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Fred C. Trump of Jamaica Estates, Queens, was married yesterday to John Joseph Barry, son of the late Mr. and Mrs. James J. Barry of New York. The Rev. Dr. Norman Vincent Peale performed the ceremony at the Marble Collegiate Church in New York.” (New York Times, December 27, 1982)
• Maryanne’s husband, James Barry, was a criminal defense attorney based in New York and New Jersey. “Mr. Barry, a lawyer with a practice in New York and New Jersey, graduated from Pratt Institute and New York University School of Law, where he was elected to the Order of the Coif. He is a member of the Criminal Law Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, and vice president of the Association of the Federal Bar of the State of New Jersey.” (New York Times, December 27, 1982)

David William Desmond

John Joseph Barry

Legal Career

• Maryanne Trump received her undergraduate degree from Mount Holyoke college and a law degree from Hofstra University. “The bride, First Assistant United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey in Newark, is the highest ranking woman in the major United States Attorneys' Offices. She graduated cum laude from Mount Holyoke College, received a master's degree in public law and government from Columbia University, and received a J.D. degree from Hofstra University School of Law, where she served as editor of the Law Review and a member of the National Moot Court Team. She is first vice president of the Association of the Federal Bar of the State of New Jersey, and a member of the Lawyer's Advisory Committee of the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Her father is founder and chairman of the board of the Trump Organization, a real estate firm, with headquarters in New York City, of which her brother, Donald J. Trump, is president.” (New York Times, December 27, 1982)
• September, 1983: Ronald Reagan nominated Maryanne Trump Barry to a position as a federal judge. “President Reagan today nominated Maryanne Trump Barry, the first assistant United States attorney for New Jersey, to be a district judge in Trenton. […] Mrs. Barry, who is 46 years old and lives in East Orange, was born in Jamaica, Queens. She is a graduate of the Hofstra University School of Law and was editor of its Law Review. Her brother is Donald Trump, a major New York City real-estate developer, who is seeking to build a casino-hotel in Atlantic City. She said she did not anticipate any conflict-of- interest problems regarding his activities in New Jersey.” (New York Times, September 15, 1983)
• February, 2019: Facing allegations of tax fraud, Maryanne Trump Barry resigned from the federal judiciary. "President Donald Trump’s older sister, Maryanne Trump Barry, has stepped down from her role as a federal appellate judge and thus ended the scrutiny into whether she and her siblings’ fraudulent tax schemes constitute a breach of judicial conduct. According to a Wednesday New York Times report, the investigation was launched due to the Times reporting that Barry and her siblings financially benefited from chicanery and fraud committed in the 1990s." (Talking Points Memo, | April 11, 2019)

Political Opinions

• Maryanne Trump Barry called for harsher sentences for muggers after her own mother was mugged. “Judge Not: Donald Trump's sister, Judge Maryanne Trump Barry, says the legal system needs to get tough with muggers, or elderly residents like her mother will have to continue to live in a ‘climate of fear.’ Mary Trump, 79, was beaten and robbed last month. ‘I'm speaking now as a daughter and not as a federal judge,’ Barry said in Newark, N.J. ‘Thugs who brutalize elderly people should be punished severely.’” (Los Angeles Times, November 18, 1991)

Financial Matters

• 1983: Maryanne Trump Barry’s federal judicial position initially paid a salary of $70,300 per year. “President Reagan today nominated Maryanne Trump Barry, the first assistant United States attorney for New Jersey, to be a district judge in Trenton. ‘I am delighted,’ Mrs. Barry said of her nomination to the $70,300- a-year post.” (New York Times, September 15, 1983)

Trump Barry resigned amid an investigation of judicial misconduct stemming from alleged tax fraud

• February, 2019: Maryanne Trump Barry's abrupt resignation from the federal judiciary terminated an investigation into alleged tax fraud committed while she had been a federal judge. "Barry, 82, is reportedly an inactive judge and one step from full retirement. She resigned in February. On Feb. 1, individuals who brought complaints to the judicial conduct council’s attention received a letter from a court official saying the probe was receiving the council’s ‘full attention,’ the Times reported. The investigation has since been dropped, as retired judges are not subject to conduct investigations. Scott Shuchart, a lawyer who filed one of the complaints against Barry, told the Times he finds it ‘galling’ that a minor change in her retirement status inoculates her against an investigation." (Talking Points Memo, | April 11, 2019)
  • While the underlying crimes that Maryanne Trump Barry may have committed could not have been prosecuted due to the statute of limitations, they could have been investigated as an instance of judicial misconduct had she not abruptly resigned her post in the wake of a formal ethics complaint. "All this happened a long time ago, and the statute of limitations would have expired on any possible crimes. But some shrewd people noted that there is no statute of limitations on judicial ethics investigations and filed a complaint against not Donald Trump but Maryanne. This would have launched an investigation of her that would, were she found guilty of wrongdoing, have implicated the president as well." (Vox, | April 11, 2019)
• Maryanne Trump Barry was the alleged beneficiary of a scheme established by her father which involved a company controlled by Maryanne and Donald Trump selling equipment to buildings owned by Fred Trump at wildly inflated prices, thus bypassing gift and estate taxes while simultaneously providing an excuse to raise rents on rent-controlled apartments owned by their father. "Some of the Trump family shenanigans uncovered by the Times have a look of actual criminality to them. The most striking of these, to my eye, began in 1992. The Trump kids, including Donald and Maryanne, were set up as the owners of a company called All County Building Supply & Maintenance. All County then sold boilers, refrigerators, cleaning supplies, and other equipment at unusually high prices to buildings owned by Fred Trump. On its face, this looks a lot like an illegal effort to evade gift and estate tax by masking it as a business transaction. What’s more, Fred Trump then compounded the offense because the buildings in question were rent-regulated and he cited the high prices paid as legal justification for rent increases." (Vox, | April 11, 2019) </ul>