Corruption Large and Small, It All Goes for Trump

He bought five million smackaroos in stock in Axon Enterprise. Axon makes Tasers.

Two weeks later, DHS issued a $220 million RFP for Tasers. Oh, the RFP doesn't name tasers per se, but the wording is such that only Tasers qualify for purchase.

Which, other than the specific corruption part, is not terribly unusual. The Feebie cops frequently issue RFPs for guns that are only met by one company (usually, Glock).

But yeah, this stinks.

Trump Steals Money From Kids

The Trump administration is nearing an agreement with TikTok to resolve an ongoing lawsuit over alleged child privacy violations in exchange for the social media company paying $400 million that the administration plans to use to fund President Donald Trump's Washington, D.C., "beautification" projects, sources familiar with the discussions told ABC News.

Normally, damages in a case are used to compensate victims. But the Orange Dementia Patient wants to use the money to pay for his Arc d'Trump, because even he has realized that Congress and his coterie of supllicant billionares won't pay for it. So he's going to steal money that should go to victims to pay for his vainglorious arch.

Even he knows that nobody is going to construct monuments to him once he shuffles off this mortal plane to Hell. After he's dead, nobody's going to name anything after him other than toxic waste incineration plants and public bathrooms.

When there is a drive to get down to the truth of his corruption, treason and self-dealing, one of the things that will happen (Lord willing) is tearing down that arch (if it's built) and restoring the other things he has defiled with his so-called "improvements".

Trump Threatens to Send His Secret Police In Order to Extort Money

These are screenshots of a fundraising email his team sent out, threatening to send his secret police to drag non-doners out of their homes:

Yeah, yeah, you can say he's not directly threatening people, but that's his fundraising arm and you can bet your feet that there is someone close to him doing this.

Maybe him. He's sleazy enough.

$500 Million Gone

So $500 million in cash from selling Venezuelan oil is in a bank account in Qatar that is controlled by Trump and Trump alone.

If the sale was on the up-and-up, then why wasn't the money depositied in a USG account in an American bank?

I'm going to assume that the cash will soon disappear into crypto investments and will make its way into the pockets of Trump and/or his kids.

Because corruption on a massive scale is the name of the game. Which is why he is so terrified of losing the mid-terms and then the White House-- investigations will follow and he and his relatives will be in line for a nice stay in a Federal cross-bar rest hotel.

Meanwhile, this is intriguing. I can see how it works: a link can be embedded that won't be visible to humans, but a webcrawler will see it.

Another Spectacular Theft

The Orange Criminal is going to have the Treasury pay him a quarter-billion because reasons. He claims that it's reimbursement for his legal fees, but he wasn't acquitted or exonerated. The cases were dismissed because he won the 2024 election. If he had lost, he'd have been in prison by now.

It's a theft, pure and simple, that is being rubber-stamped by the people he put into "Justice" department. The claim that the zampolits in the DoJ are going to follow the guidance of ethics officals is just laughable.

If this was going on in a European or African nation, our tame press would have no trouble calling it out as corruption.

Trump Solicited the Airplane Bribe

The Trump administration first approached Qatar to inquire about acquiring a Boeing 747 that could be used as Air Force One by President Donald Trump, four sources familiar with the discussions told CNN. That’s contrary to the narrative from the president that Qatar reached out and offered the jet as a “gift” to him.

In short, they went looking for airplanes to buy or lease, at least that was the original idea. The Qataris, who were sitting on this massive white elephant of an airplane, were open to the idea. But somehow, somewhere along the line, the transaction was changed from paying Qatar with money to letting them them bribe Trump.

But fret not, Gentle Reader. The Republicans will twist themselves into knots to explain why this is all OK, because reasons.

MCAH-- Most Corrupt Administration in History.

Trump Coup 2.0

He's trying to take over Congress by an attack on the Library of Congress, which is not an executive agency.

Meanwhile, it's slowly sinking in with MAGA that Trump is only out for himself, what with his grift of an airplane. By the time they damn near disassemble that Qatari 747 to look for bugs, install electronics, install an air-to air refueling system, and examine every line of code in the FMS, Trump will be out of office, in exile, in a cell, or dead. Some of the crazier MAGA loyalists are comparing the jet to the Statue of Liberty, which is just fucking insane. Congress authorized acceptance of the Statue and the president at the time, Grover Cleveland, didn't take the Statue home with him when he left office.

And the Chinese Communist Party is pulling off machinations to buy $300 million of Trump's crypto. There's a huge "For Sale" sign blinking over the White House. Nobody is going Trump $300 million in cash or a $400 million dollar airplane.

I've said before that the plane would take years to retrofit. So all I can say, now, is Toljaso, I did.

Xmas Gifts

Per the Trump Aministration's senior officials:

Girls, you get two dolls.

Boys, you get three pencils.

Trump gets a $400 million 747.

That's all.

In Case You've Forgotten, Bribing Trump Still Works for Really Rich Criminals

In December, Popular Information reported that Chinese [national] crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun purchased $30 million in crypto tokens from World Liberty Financial (WLF), a new venture backed by President Donald Trump and his family. Sun’s purchase resulted in a cash windfall for Trump. On Wednesday, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Sun sent a joint letter to a federal judge, asking for a stay of Sun's case. Today, the judge granted the SEC's request.

In March 2023, the SEC charged Sun and three of his companies, accusing him of marketing unregistered securities and “fraudulently manipulating the secondary market” for a crypto token. The SEC accused Sun of wash trading, which involves buying and selling a token quickly to fraudulently manufacture artificial interest. Sun was also charged with paying celebrities, including Lindsay Lohan, Jake Paul, and Soulja Boy, for endorsing his crypto “without disclosing their compensation,” which violates federal law.

A few weeks after Trump won the 2024 presidential election, Sun publicly announced that he had become WLF's largest investor, buying $30 million of its tokens. ... Sun has since invested another $45 million in WLF, bringing his total investment to $75 million. This means Sun's purchases have sent more than $50 million to Trump, Bloomberg reported.

The article also points out that the crypto-tokens are, essentially, worthless. If it looks like a bribe, walks like a bribe and reeks like a bribe...

And yet Trump, that cheapskate, only paid 25 large in "campaign contributions" to get then FL-AG Bondi to back off her investigation of his shady activities. She sold herself cheap.

Moonraker and Bribing Donnie

Ian Fleming's original James Bond novels haven't aged well. For example, Moonraker - published almost exactly 70 years ago in April 1955 - features a villain who's a super-rich industrialist and rocket-maker seeking to cause chaos because he's a secret Nazi. Such a silly idea!

Meanwhile, rumors are that the Russians are offering an oil and gas deal to the Dopenfuhrer if he sells out Ukraine. And the Russians are using their own wounded and disabled soldiers as targets to give the Ukrainians something to shoot at.

Nope, No Corruption Here

A Chinese national, who is being prosecuted for fraud by the SEC, bought $30 million of Trump's cryptocurrency in a way that netted Trump $18 million.

It won't be covered by the WaPo or the NYT, as they're currently flailing about Hunter Biden. “Trump is corrupt and takes cash from the nationals of America’s adversaries” is just too commonplace these days— the GOP’s equivalent of jaywalking. Neither paper won't bother to assign an intern will be assigned to look into it. The SEC case will quietly go away.

And what's a mere $18 million among oligarchs, right?

Trump is corrupt. Toljaso.

Trump’s Chinese Bibles

His "patriotic Bibles" are printed in China for about $3 apiece.

His Bibles are cheap pieces of Commie garbage. Just like his watches.

Does the FOFF Believe That He is Going to Lose?

Donald Trump is now hawking a new line of watches, some with an eye popping six-figure price tag – the latest example of the former president cashing in on his name like no presidential candidate ever has.

The GOP nominee announced his latest branded merchandise, Trump Watches, on social media Thursday – 40 days before the election and on a day when he did not appear on the campaign trail. He told his supporters the watches would make good Christmas gifts and then directed them to a link where they could be purchased.

The watches retail for $499 but one series – Tourbillon – is priced at $100,000. They come in three different colors and are limited in number to 147.

He's been selling NFTs, Bibles, sneakers, cryptocurrency, silver coins, picture books, pieces of his suits and other shit which I've forgotten about. He's been pushing one thing out after another, as though he knows that his time to cash in is limited. And now it's crappy Chinese watches.

Maybe he figures that it'll be harder to sell shit from Sing Sing. Being on office wouldn't slow him down, not since his lackys on the Supreme Court declared that almost everything he did there would be an official act.

His merch, though, functions as sort of a reverse IQ test: Anyone who buys that crap is showing a serious lack thereof.

ETA: Jimmy Kimmel called him "Rolex Luthor". Heh.

And the Grift Goes on..... And the Grift Goes On.

Donald Trump has launched a range of $100 commemorative coins, which join Trump sneakers, Trump Bibles, Trump playing cards, Trump NFTs and strips of the suit he wore when he was booked in Georgia last year, in his hunt for campaign cash.

The latest addition to the Trump entrepreneurial universe – one that four bankruptcies and a recent financial fraud conviction only begin to attest to – display a profile of the former president’s face and an image of the White House with the words “In God we Trust”.

The “1oz .999% silver medallions” will be available on Wednesday. Trump wrote on Truth Social on Saturday that the coins were “the ONLY OFFICIAL coin designed by me – and proudly minted here in the USA”.

The description of the coin was also reported on Fox Business, so what Felon^34 is selling to the rubes is a coin that is less than 1% silver. But even if they were pure (.999 pure, not .999%), they'd be worth about $33. So he's really grifting the Trumpanzees with this coin.

Well, if you're stupid enough to buy one, have fun giving your money to a self-claimed billionaire.

For Don Snoreleone, It's All About Grifting the Suckers

With less than 10 weeks before the presidential election, Donald Trump had a message for voters in late August: He would be selling more digital trading cards for $99 each.

“Fifty all new stunning digital trading cards — it’s really something,” Trump says in the ad. “These cards show me dancing and even holding some bitcoins.”
...
On Tuesday, he again took to Truth Social for another post: selling a book — $99 without his autograph, $499 with his autograph — of pictures of himself. “A MUST HAVE on U.S. History,” he called it.

In both cases, the money was not going to his campaign but to for-profit ventures he earns millions from promoting.

It's all about selling shit to the gullible MAGA crowd. In that, he's no different from the televangelists.

He excels at parting fools from their money.

Did Trump Take a Ten-Million Dollar Cash Bribe? And Did Bill Barr Cover It Up?

The answers to both questions seems to be "Yes" and "Damn skippy, he did."

Five days before Donald Trump became president in January 2017, a manager at a bank branch in Cairo received an unusual letter from an organization linked to the Egyptian intelligence service. It asked the bank to “kindly withdraw” nearly $10 million from the organization’s account — all in cash.
...
Federal investigators learned of the withdrawal, which has not been previously reported, early in 2019. The discovery intensified a secret criminal investigation that had begun two years earlier with classified U.S. intelligence indicating that Egyptian President Abdel Fatah El-Sisi sought to give Trump $10 million to boost his 2016 presidential campaign, a Washington Post investigation has found.
...
Within months of learning of the withdrawal, prosecutors and FBI agents were blocked by top Justice Department officials from obtaining bank records they believed might hold critical evidence, according to interviews with people familiar with the case as well as documents and contemporaneous notes of the investigation. The case ground to a halt by the fall of 2019 as Trump’s then-attorney general, William P. Barr, raised doubts about whether there was sufficient evidence to continue the probe of Trump.

Of course there's not sufficient evidence if you don't go fucking looking for the evidence.

Is anyone surprised at all that the FOFF took a ten-million dollar bribe from the dictator of Egypt? And is anyone also surprised that Bill Barr covered it up?

And is anyone surprised that most of the media is doing its level best to ignore this story?

Non-Shocker of the Day: Trump Cheats on His Taxes (and Grifts the RNC)

Taking a double deduction on a Chicago project to the tune of $100 million in tax evasion.

Former President Donald Trump may face an IRS bill in excess of $100 million after a government audit indicates he double-dipped on tax losses tied to a Chicago skyscraper, according to a report by The New York Times and ProPublica that drew on a yearslong audit and public filings.

If you or I were to cheat on our taxes for a hundred grand or so, we could expect IRS agents to show up with a set of handcuffs. But former president Petomane, well, he cheats on his taxes at Madoff-grade levels and he's still walking around, unindicted and unbothered.

Meanwhile, most of Don Snoreleone's kids are delegates to the GOP convention this summer. I'll bet that's so their lodging is paid by the RNC and Demented Donnie can overbill the RNC for the cost of them flying their on his 757. But it seems that Melania has persuaded (or commanded) Barron to not get involved in that mishegoss. That's probably a smart move, for if he had gone, then he would have been fair game for both the press and the comedians.

Trump Solicits a Massive Bribe

As Donald Trump sat with some of the country’s top oil executives at his Mar-a-Lago Club last month, one executive complained about how they continued to face burdensome environmental regulations despite spending $400 million to lobby the Biden administration in the last year.

Trump’s response stunned several of the executives in the room overlooking the ocean: You all are wealthy enough, he said, that you should raise $1 billion to return me to the White House. At the dinner, he vowed to immediately reverse dozens of President Biden’s environmental rules and policies and stop new ones from being enacted, according to people with knowledge of the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private conversation.

Giving $1 billion would be a “deal,” Trump said, because of the taxation and regulation they would avoid thanks to him, according to the people [at the meeting].

Unfortunately, the Supreme Court doesn't see it for what it is: Pay to play. The TOFF is evil and corrupt. The oil industry, well, they're just evil. Climate change is getting worse, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are steadily increasing. The oil companies are more than happy to poison the planet because they'll all be long gone by the time the butcher's bill is presented. And fuck their descendants, because their descendants have never done anything for them.

Meanwhile, Von ShitzenPantz is seeding his family into the upcoming convention. Every one of the Trump Crime Family is now fair game for satire and mocking. But it's probably because Brokeahontas is too cheap to pay their expenses, so he's sticking the GOP with the cost of trucking them to Milwaukee. No doubt that when they fly there on his jet, he'll bill the RNC a fortune for the seats.

More Fraud From the TOFF, Maybe?

The auditing firm for Trump Media and the auditor’s owner were charged Friday with “massive fraud” by the Securities and Exchange Commission for accounting work that affected more than 1,500 SEC filings, the federal regulator announced.

The auditor, BF Borgers CPA, and its owner, Benjamin Borgers, have agreed to be permanently suspended from practicing as accountants before the SEC, and also agreed to pay a combined $14 million in civil penalties, without admitting or denying the allegations, the SEC said.

The agency, calling BF Borgers a “sham audit mill,” said the company and its owner “deliberately systematically failed to conduct” audits and quarterly reviews incorporated in more than 1,500 SEC filings from January 2021 through June 2023 in accordance with Public Company Accounting Oversight Board standards.

How hard is it to surmise that Trump Media (stock ticker: DJT) went looking for a compliant CPA who would, for a fee, accept whatever garbage of a financial statement that DJT handed them and sign off on it? It would be really delicious if it came to light that it was DJT's financial fictioneering that got the SEC to look hard at BF Bogers.

Doing work for Von ShitzinPantz at any level is committing professional seppuku.

H/T

Anyone Who Does a Deal With That Grifter is a Greedy Moron

Donald Trump is suing two co-founders of Trump Media & Technology Group, the newly public parent company of his Truth Social platform, arguing that they should forfeit their stock in the company because they set it up improperly.

Anyone stupid enough to do a deal with that clown deserves whatever bad shit happens to him. For they knew he was a snake when they signed the papers.