Loan Shark Freed by Trump Charged With Punching Wife, 75-Year-Old Father-in-Law

Jonathan Braun, the loan shark freed from prison by former President Donald Trump, was arrested on charges of punching his wife and his 75-year-old father-in-law.

Braun, 41, was arrested Tuesday at his home in Atlantic Beach, New York, after he punched the in-law in the head, causing “substantial pain,” according to a felony complaint filed by Nassau County police in state district court. The police also charged Braun with assaulting his wife on two occasions, and with evading $160 in bridge tolls by removing license plates from a Ferrari and a Lamborghini he drove, court records show.

Braun pleaded not guilty on Wednesday and was released pending an Aug. 29 court appearance, court records show. Braun “will address the allegations judicially,” his lawyer, Marc Fernich, said in an email.

Trump’s commutation of Braun’s sentence in 2021 drew widespread attention. Clemency is generally reserved for those who can make the case they have reformed or have been imprisoned too long. Braun had served just two and a half years of a decade-long sentence for running a marijuana-smuggling ring. At the time, he was facing separate investigations by US and New York authorities into his lending business, where he was known for ripping off small businesses and threatening them with violence.

Braun’s court appearance came on the same day that Trump, campaigning to recapture the presidency, promoted his “crime and safety” agenda at an event in Michigan. “We’re going to stop violent crime in the United States,” the former president said. “I will deliver law, order, safety and peace, and I will protect those who protect us.” The Trump campaign didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

After Braun’s marijuana sentence was commuted by Trump, he returned to predatory lending, Bloomberg reported in 2022. He’d long been a prolific lender, charging interest rates that topped 500% annualized and collecting tens of millions of dollars in payments. In June 2020, seven months before the Trump commutation, Braun was sued by New York’s attorney general and the Federal Trade Commission over the loans.

“These modern-day loan sharks not only preyed on hardworking business owners with fake loans, but threatened violence and kidnapping,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said of Braun and his associates at the time. Braun was found liable in both the New York and FTC cases, ordered to pay large fines and barred from the lending industry.

Braun was part of a wave of more than 100 pardons and commutations by Trump in his final hours in office. Associates of Braun say he’s bragged about paying millions of dollars to Trump-connected intermediaries to secure clemency, Bloomberg reported. The New York Times reported in 2023 that Braun’s family tried to use a connection to Charles Kushner, the father of Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, to get Trump to consider clemency.

Braun’s aggressiveness made him terrifying to those in hock to him. Some said in court filings and in interviews that he would threaten to beat them or harm their families.

“You don’t know who you’re f—-ing dealing with. We can get you wherever we want,” he told one borrower, who started carrying a gun, court papers say. “We know where you live,” he said to another. “We’ll go after your family.”

With assistance from Chris Dolmetsch.

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