Trump University Case: Ex-Students To Get Money Back, Court Rules

Thousands of former students of the now-defunct Trump University will soon get most of their money back. A federal appeals court in San Francisco on Tuesday upheld a $25 million settlement deal with the students who accused the firm of cheating.

A three-judge panel of the United States 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said in a 21-page ruling that a district judge was right in approving the settlement, which was reached days after the election of Donald Trump as president in 2016, the Los Angeles Times reported. Trump agreed for the settlement after U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel refused to dismiss a lawsuit filed in July 2016.

The students claimed the school, which was open from 2005 to 2010, issued false advertisements claiming it would teach them Trump's "secrets of success" and were charged up to $35,000 for that. However, they instead received three-day seminars during which the attendees were asked to invest thousands of dollars more for a mentorship program.

Trump faced two lawsuits in California and one in New York. However, they were merged into one class action suit later.

Florida-based lawyer Sherri B. Simpson was one of the attendees. She wanted to drop out of the class action settlement and pursue another lawsuit. She filed an objection to the settlement in March 2017 in the U.S. District Court in San Diego.

But the federal appeals court Tuesday said Simpson missed a deadline for exiting the class. It said the 3,700-some class members will have to face "significant hurdles had they proceeded to trial." The panel also said a single student’s plea to back out of the settlement deal was not right.

"Weighed against this was the fairness of the settlement as a whole, which the [district] court estimated would provide class members with almost a full recovery," said Judge Jacqueline H. Nguyen.

Simpson’s attorney Gary B. Friedman said his client was not planning to appeal the 9th Circuit’s ruling.

Jason Forge of San Diego law firm Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd, who helped represent the students, said the amount could begin going out to the class members by the end of the month.

"This has been an incredibly long, hard fight — and today's ruling brings thousands of Americans one step closer to finally putting Trump University behind them," Amber Eck, a lead lawyer in the lawsuits, told the San Diego Union-Tribune.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who sued Trump, issued a statement lauding Tuesday’s ruling.

He said, "For years, President Trump refused to compensate the victims of his sham university. His reversal in 2016 — and the large-scale settlement that resulted — opened the door for student victims to finally obtain the restitution they deserve. … My office will continue to hold those who commit fraud accountable, no matter how rich or powerful they may be."

It may be recalled that Trump, as a candidate, had called judge Curiel a “hater” for ruling against him and said the Indiana-born judge was acting against him as he was planning to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.