CEO charged with soliciting Trump post
Calk accused of bribing Manafort with $16M in loans
NEW YORK – A banker who prosecutors say tried to buy himself a senior post in President Donald Trump’s administration by making risky loans to former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was arrested Thursday on a financial institution bribery charge.
Stephen M. Calk, 54, was scheduled to appear in Manhattan federal court in the afternoon.
Calk’s lawyer Jeremy Margolis said in a statement his client will be exonerated on the “baseless isolated charge.”
Authorities said Calk committed the crime while serving as CEO of The Federal Savings Bank, a small bank headquartered in Chicago with an office in New York.
Calk has no involvement with the bank and is on a complete leave of absence, a bank spokesperson said Thursday in a statement.
Federal prosecutors described the charge in a release, saying Calk abused his bank position by approving $16 million in high-risk loans that were ultimately downgraded by the bank’s primary regulator.
William F. Sweeney Jr., head of New York’s FBI office, said Calk “went to great lengths to avoid banking violations in an attempt to secure a senior position in a presidential administration.”
“His attempt at petitioning for political favors was unsuccessful in more ways than one – he didn’t get the job he wanted, and he compromised the one he had,” Sweeney added.
If convicted, he could face up to 30 years in prison. Manafort lobbied Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to consider Calk for secretary of the Army, according to emails from the weeks leading up to the 2016 election shown to jurors at Manafort’s tax evasion and bank fraud trial last year.
Prosecutors said while Manafort’s loans were pending approval, Calk gave Manafort a ranked list of government positions he wanted, starting with secretary of the Treasury, followed by deputy secretary of the Treasury, secretary of commerce and secretary of defense, as well as 19 ambassadorships similarly ranked and starting with the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy.
According to trial evidence, Manafort passed along Calk’s resume to Kushner in a Nov. 30, 2016, email, along with two other names of people he said “should be a part of the Trump administration.”