Trump shrugs off NYT report on tax fraud

US President Donald Trump on Wednesday shrugged off a New York Times investigation that concluded he made his fortune with the help of more than $400 million from his parents, partly through tax schemes, as a boring, rehashed "hit piece."

Trump has often boasted that he built a multi-billion dollar real estate empire from a $1 million loan from his father, Fred. But the Times reviewed more than 100,000 documents including confidential tax returns and financial records that it said showed he actually received at least $413 million in today's money, in part through schemes to avoid taxes.

The Times story said that from the time Trump was a toddler, his father funneled millions of dollars to his four children through a sham corporation to avoid gift taxes.

The Times said the records also indicate that Trump helped his father take millions more in improper tax deductions. And he helped devise a scheme that undervalued his parents' real estate holdings by hundreds of millions of dollars, sharply reducing taxes on those properties when they were transferred to their children, according to the paper.

The New York State Department of Taxation and Finance announced it was "reviewing the allegations in the NYT article and is vigorously pursuing all appropriate avenues of investigation."