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More Questionable Behavior from Trump, T Admin, DOJ, and R's vs Dems, Press, Justice

With so many pressing issues facing this nation right now starting with the out-of-control Covid-19 pandemic, use of USPS for voting ballots, mail-in ballots, BLM protests, and preserving federal buildings/statues, Relief talks stalled through Labor Day, Acting HHS Chad Wolf’s illegal standing, and now election security and the prospect of Congressional ‘watch dogs’ aka Wisc Sen Ron Johnson with all his suggestions that there is inappropriate actions by VP Biden and son Hunter in the (pro-Russian) Ukrainian region which will be discussed at length by the R’s during these last few months before the election. Oh, and let’s not forget about AG Bill Barr’s dropping of the Durham report of the Mueller investigation to add another layer.

Just make the waters muddier, and muddier…

As convoluted as it all gets, it is worth noting what kinds of misinformation will be coming through about election interference AND any number of October surprises which maybe looming - aka Biden/Ukraine, or Durham Report.

Here’s one piece of what the Intel committee and subsequent rogue actions from Sen Johnson coming into play.

A Counter-Disinformation Playbook for Both Parties

By now, the record of Russian attempts to interfere in U.S. political processes is a matter of record.

The Mueller investigation, for instance, led directly to the criminal indictment of over a dozen Russian nationals and multiple organizations connected to the Internet Research Agency, which has ties to Russian intelligence and the network of oligarchs surrounding Vladimir Putin. The indictment detailed Russian personnel, tactics, and even budget line items for everything from payroll to content creation. Numerous digital open-source investigations – including by the Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab) (our own organization) – continued to identify traces of Russian operations throughout 2019 and early 2020, which were flagged for swift removal by social media platforms.

What should have been a tide turning moment in efforts to curb foreign influence came in April 2020, with the release of the third volume of the SSCI’s thorough, multiyear investigation. This volume evaluated U.S. government failures in 2016 and offered recommendations to mitigate the threat of foreign interference. These recommendations were endorsed by Chairman Richard Burr (R-NC), Vice Chairman Mark Warner (D-VA), and all but one member of the committee (Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) who, while supporting many of the report’s findings, filed a minority view in protest of the opacity of the investigation). The committee concluded:

  • That the executive branch should “be prepared to face an attack in a highly politicized environment, either from Russia or elsewhere.”
  • That “executive and legislative officials, regardless of party affiliation,” should jointly endorse the findings of the Director of National Intelligence as it relates to alleged foreign interference.
  • That “sitting officials and candidates should use the absolute greatest restraint and caution … [in] calling the validity of an upcoming election into question.” They should avoid “exacerbating the already damaging messaging efforts of foreign intelligence services.”
  • Finally, that when a foreign information operation is detected, “the public should be informed as soon as possible, with a clear and succinct statement of the threat” to avoid “allow[ing] inaccurate narratives to spread.”

The SSCI report represented a thoroughly considered, bipartisan consensus around a complex, politically contentious subject. It comprehended the clandestine methods by which Russian and other actors turn deep-rooted divisions toward their own ends. It recognized the differences and care that must accompany any allegation of “foreign interference” or “disinformation,” particularly during elections. The recommendations were based on well-documented evidence and spoke to the collective nature of the challenge of foreign influence across society, most notably institutions responsible for or active in elections: the whole of government, political campaigns and advocacy groups, independent media, social media, and most of all, citizens. It especially understood the need for U.S. officials to speak in a unified voice on such issues to prevent further misinformation from taking root.

Unfortunately, by the time the SSCI report offered this roadmap, some U.S. officials had already begun to undermine its core recommendations.

2020 Warnings: Heeded and Unheeded

The “highly politicized environment” that the SSCI report warned of has come to pass – and it’s even more dire than we expected. Those in government with the solemn duty to ensure and protect our elections are grappling with an unprecedented process of coordinating an election in the midst of a public health crisis that prevents large gatherings and an onslaught of disinformation about voting eligibility and electoral processes (much of which comes from the Oval Office).

And this is before one considers the specter of foreign election interference. So far in 2020, DFRLab has counted ten distinct, credible allegations of foreign influence operations made by U.S. agencies (including foreign influence activities targeting the Democratic primary or spreading COVID-19-related disinformation). An additional twenty attributions have been made by technology companies and civil society organizations. The majority of these attributions have focused on Russia.

Well before the public assessment released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence last week, senior officials continuously warned of foreign election interference. In a February USA Today op-ed, senior administration officials charged with protecting elections – including Attorney General Bill Barr, FBI Director Chris Wray, acting-Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Chad Wolf, then-acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire, and Director of the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency Chris Krebs – wrote, “As long as the threat remains, there is work to be done … we remain watchful of any malicious activities from cybercriminals and from foreign actors like Russia, China and Iran.”

However, when asked under oath during July 29 testimony before the House Judiciary Committee whether it would be acceptable for the president or a presidential candidate to accept foreign help, Barr struck a very different tone, trying to qualify the nature and extent of the aid. Only when pressed did he agree that it would, indeed, be inappropriate.

Similarly, in a July 26 primetime ABC interview, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows tried to dismiss concerns about foreign disinformation by drawing a line between “interference” and “influence.” “There’s a big difference between foreign interference and foreign influence,” he said. “They continue to try to influence, as everyone does across the globe, but in terms of actually affecting the vote totals and interacting, I think we’re in a good place.” While there are indeed important differences between the two phenomena, virtually all of Russia’s malign activities in 2016 would be deemed permissible under Meadows’ dichotomy.

While an enormous amount of work has been done by national security professionals and civil servants to build more resilience against foreign interference, these carefully constructed warnings of the threat have been weakened by more off-the-cuff responses from senior officials that seemingly provide space for the primary activities associated with the threat.

Not Recommended: Foreign Influence About Foreign Influence

In the Senate – and set against the recommendations of his SSCI colleagues – is the probe of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, chaired by Senator Johnson. This investigation seeks to examine Joe Biden’s interactions with Ukrainian officials, as well as those of his son, Hunter, who served for five years as a board member of a Ukrainian energy company.

While Johnson promised an interim report of findings by September 15 of this year, thus far, the inquiry has produced insinuations and half-truths instead of new findings. The inquiry has also seized the news cycle at critical moments of the ongoing presidential election, producing tantalizing headlines with little to back them up.

Most important with regard to national security, the inquiry has also become an irresistible target for pro-Russian Ukrainians, who appear to be using Johnson’s probe to brand outlandish – and debunked – conspiracy theories with the imprimatur of the United States Senate. As a current national security official told Politico , it should be “out of the question to consider [the Johnson-chaired probe’s] information legitimate investigative material.” The fact remains that using foreign influence efforts in the name of curbing foreign influence makes matters worse.

The probe’s inspiration can most directly be traced to a November 2019 investigation by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) into communications between the elder Biden and Ukrainian officials. This earlier investigation was launched at the behest of President Trump as he sought to deflect attention away from congressional impeachment hearings that focused on his own alleged abuse of power in pressuring Ukrainian officials to produce statements that would hurt Biden politically, for which Trump was ultimately impeached. The effort faded by mid-February, as Biden faced setbacks in his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Johnson’s own public investigation began on March 1, one day after Biden’s commanding victory in the February 29 South Carolina primary. Johnson’s probe issued its first (and only) subpoena on May 20, as a Fox News poll found that Biden had an 8-point national lead over Trump. The investigation’s public profile has continued to rise through the summer, although it has yet to officially gather more information or release any evidence of wrongdoing.

Politically motivated probes are nothing new in the history of the U.S. Congress. What distinguishes the Johnson inquiry from previous efforts, however, is the sort of “evidence” that it has attracted. The first intended witness for Johnson’s inquiry was Andrii Telizhenko (whom Johnson had first met in July 2019), a confidante of Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who had previously fomented a disproven conspiracy theory that Ukraine – not Russia – hacked the servers of the Democratic National Committee in 2016. Telizhenko had also previously lobbied Republican officials on behalf of Ukrainian television channels controlled by Russian interests. Johnson’s committee dropped him as a witness in late March, after other senators expressed concern that he was essentially being used to launder a Russian disinformation campaign.

More recent and alarming have been the actions of Ukrainian parliamentarian Andriy Derkach, another Giuliani associate and prospective Johnson witness. Derkach’s father was a Russian KGB operative, and he himself attended a Moscow graduate program with close ties to Russian intelligence services. In May, Derkach released years-old edited recordings of private phone calls between Biden and former Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko, which he claimed to have been leaked by “investigative journalists.” The tapes were played at a press conference hosted by Ukraine-Interfax, which is owned by the Russian Interfax news agency.

Although the tapes contained no new revelations, their release was clearly intended to reinvigorate conspiracy theories around Biden and Ukraine. A third Giuliani associate and former Ukrainian lawmaker, Oleksandr Onyshchenko (currently on the run from Ukrainian authorities on charges of embezzlement) told BuzzFeed on July 24 that more such releases would come “closer to the election.” He also expressed his desire, along with Derkach, to provide direct testimony to the Johnson investigation. When Johnson was pressed on July 23 about whether his investigation had received or intended to publicize such evidence, he was initially noncommittal.

Call and Response

In response to concerns raised by Democrats as well as public reporting citing the fears of anonymous intelligence officials, Senator Johnson defended his inquiry in an August 6 letter to Democratic colleagues. Ironically, he alleged that it was Democrats who had amplified disinformation by drawing attention to the Ukrainians’ claims and vulnerability of his own investigation; arguing they had been “more successful than any Russian troll-farm” in spreading falsehoods.

On August 7, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) released a public update on election threats by state actors. The only specific example provided of a “range of measures” being employed by Russia was the mention of one of Johnson’s prospective witnesses, Andriy Derkach, and his efforts spread claims of corruption by publicizing doctored and leaked phone call recordings.

As media reporting of ODNI’s public disclosure and concerns of Johnson’s inquiry intensified, the Senator published another scathing, 11-page letter on August 10. Johnson re-litigated, among other things, the FBI’s investigation into foreign interference in 2016 elections, presenting a winding narrative that sought to tie past and present investigations together. He also made clear that the blame for any ongoing foreign interference lay with the “relentless” left. However, compared to SSCI’s exhaustively documented, multi-volume report, Johnson’s letter was long on allegations but short on supporting facts, as Goodman and Rangappa’s article demonstrates.

Both of Johnson’s letters flatly denied his inquiry directly received any information from Ukrainians; a counterpoint that doesn’t account for the fact that the inquiry’s origins are rooted in information surfaced by pro-Russian Ukrainians regardless of whether they provide direct testimony or not. It is true that each of these prospective anti-Biden witnesses has loudly denied any ties to the Kremlin. Their efforts have been so transparent and buffoonish that this may well be the case. But it remains clear that it is Johnson’s probe itself – ostensibly an investigation of foreign interference – which is directly and indirectly elevating these (clearly unreliable) foreign sources of information.

Sources whose narrative has now been laundered into multiple news cycles and amplified by an enduring Senate inquiry.

Not Again

There are clear parallels between the hack-and-release component of Russia’s efforts ahead of the 2016 election and potential exploitation of the current Johnson inquiry. Then, as now, Russia-adjacent actors used dumps of “secret” but fairly innocuous material to provide fodder for far-right content creators and conspiracy theorists. No matter how fact-checked the content was, the sheer act of repetition made it seem true as it gradually captured the popular imagination and polluted the information ecosystem. In 2016, these materials were released in a steady drip that intensified in the lead-up to election day, which is what Onyshchenko has promised to do in 2020.

And then, as now, these Russia-adjacent actors used or benefited from a sympathetic third party with incentives to amplify disinformation across the American political system, ensuring their releases were shared as widely as possible. In 2016, that Russian target was Julian Assange and Wikileaks. Today, it may well be the United States Senate.

The great irony is that a number of U.S. officials – including Johnson’s Republican Senate colleagues – have already warned against exactly this sort of threat and proposed steps to mitigate it. The function of a Congressional inquiry is to conduct oversight, not to replace the information gathering, analysis, and assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community, which is more rigid, systemized, and divorced from politics. There is good reason why intelligence analysts do not have to campaign for re-election.

Senator Johnson’s inquiry has fallen short of the bipartisan recommendations to guard against foreign influence and disinformation made by his colleagues at SSCI. It should be the duty of Johnson’s probe and all similar investigations to work with appropriate elements across the United States government charged with national security, to show restraint and caution when insinuating foreign interference, and to rapidly and publicly disclose evidence of such interference.

A common trope used to build support for bipartisan national security efforts is that our politics should end at our borders, but foreign influence using disinformation has weaponized the base incentives of our politics against us. Disinformation about disinformation is in itself, of course, a form of disinformation, and makes our ability to identify, expose, and explain it much more difficult. Likewise, foreign influence affecting how we assess previous foreign influence, without transparency or evidence, makes us more vulnerable to malicious efforts by foreign adversaries. Both are at play in the 2020 elections, posing a major challenge to the strength of American democracy.

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This has been such a hard fought battle to preserve the wilderness of Alaska. Let’s hope it gets stalled and overturned if the Dems win this fall.

Overturning five decades of protections for the largest remaining stretch of wilderness in the United States, the Trump administration on Monday finalized its plan to open up part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to oil and gas development.

The decision sets the stage for what is expected to be a fierce legal battle over the fate of this vast, remote Alaska habitat. The Interior Department said it had completed its required reviews and would start preparing to auction off leases to companies interested in drilling inside the refuge’s coastal plain, which is believed to sit atop enough oil to fill billions of barrels but is prized by environmentalists for its landscapes and wildlife.

While the agency has not yet set a date for the first auction, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt said on Monday, “I do believe there could be a lease sale by the end of the year.”

Companies that bought leases could begin the process of exploring for oil and gas, although actual production would still require additional permitting and is unlikely to occur for at least a decade, if at all.

Drilling opponents are expected to file lawsuits to try to delay or block the leasing plan. Environmental groups, which have been fighting to block drilling in the refuge since the Reagan administration, have already been arguing that the Interior Department failed to adequately consider the effects that oil and gas development in the region could have on climate change and local wildlife such as caribou and polar bears.

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There are some doubts about the veracity of this story, with people noting that locking mailboxes to prevent theft is not uncommon and some of the boxes shown are still accessible from the other side.

Pictures of Locked Mailboxes Circulate on Twitter Amid USPS Crisis

Social media posts of locked mailboxes in Burbank go viral

The USPS said it’s common practice for mailboxes outside post offices to be locked on days they are closed to prevent vandalism.

https://abc7.com/politics/social-media-posts-of-locked-mailboxes-in-burbank-go-viral/6373953/


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T has a change of tune (for PR reasons) - people like and rely on the USPS

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Top Dem says FBI is prioritizing Trump-sought investigations

Ron Wyden accuses the FBI of not sharing information with Democrats.

A top senator is accusing the FBI of keeping Democrats in the dark about the agency’s disclosures to Republican-led Senate committees, revealing that the FBI later made a mea culpa and pledged not to repeat the apparent violations of congressional oversight norms.

Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said in a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray on Monday that the bureau was improperly providing documents and other information to Republicans, sometimes without even informing Democrats of their existence.

“I am deeply concerned that by violating its own policies the FBI is again succumbing to political pressure from Republicans to damage the Democratic presidential candidate,” Wyden wrote in his letter, obtained by POLITICO.

“Providing documents to committee majorities without disclosure to the minority is unacceptable,” Wyden later added. “Providing access to documents for review by Republican staffers without notice to, or inclusion of, Democratic staff is also unacceptable.”

Wyden’s letter is the latest salvo in the ongoing partisan battle over Senate Republicans’ investigations targeting top Obama administration officials, including the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, former Vice President Joe Biden.

Those investigations are being helmed primarily by Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). Democrats have accused their GOP counterparts of using the probes to boost President Donald Trump’s reelection chances by targeting the president’s political opponents, most notably Biden.

Wyden listed several instances in which he says the FBI provided documents to the majority party without informing Democrats or giving them access to the information.

For example, according to Wyden, the FBI allowed Republican aides to view sensitive documents related to an FBI briefing Trump received shortly before assuming office, but Democrats were “not informed of or provided an opportunity to participate in this review.” A similar practice was followed for documents related to defensive briefings provided to the Trump campaign and presidential transition staff, Wyden said.

The senator cited an Aug. 7 letter from the FBI’s congressional affairs director stating that the agency has “surged resources in order to expedite the processing” of the GOP requests for information related to the Trump transition team. According to Wyden, the letter also states that the FBI’s compliance is due to “extraordinary and unique circumstances, and should not be construed as precedent setting in any regard.”

Wyden said FBI congressional affairs staffers “described these circumstances as an oversight that will be remedied going forward.” He also said that in a staff-level phone call earlier this month, those FBI aides “declined to discuss” whether the agency had determined that the Republicans’ investigations serve a valid legislative purpose.

“Nonetheless, the representatives of the FBI stated that providing this sort of highly sensitive information to committees without clear jurisdiction over such matters was indeed extraordinary and would not be repeated in the future,” Wyden added.

Reached for comment on Monday, a spokesperson for the FBI said the agency is working with both committees to provide information. “The same access is being provided to members of the majority and minority and to their respective staffs,” the spokesperson added.

Taylor Foy, a spokesman for Grassley, noted that Wyden never requested such information from the FBI.

“Nevertheless, Sen. Grassley has frequently called on all administrations to respond to oversight requests from members of Congress’ majority and minority parties,” Foy added. “It appears that the FBI is committed to doing that with these requests — many of which date back to when Sen. Grassley chaired the Judiciary Committee.”

Though Wray is a Trump appointee, he has often angered congressional Republicans, especially when it comes to their oversight of the FBI’s actions before and after the 2016 presidential election, in which the Trump campaign was the target of a counterintelligence investigation related to Russian interference in the campaign.

Last week, Johnson issued a subpoena to Wray demanding all documents related to that probe. Two days later, Graham released a statement detailing a phone conversation with Wray, saying the FBI chief was “committed to being helpful — in an appropriate manner — by balancing the needs of privacy for Bureau employees with public transparency for the benefit of the American people.”

“Director Wray expressed to me his commitment to holding accountable those who may have committed violations of law or policy, providing appropriate due process sooner rather than later,” Graham continued.

Indeed, Trump has openly encouraged the Senate GOP-led investigations, even pushing Graham at one point to haul in former President Barack Obama before the Judiciary Committee — a suggestion Graham flatly rejected.

Johnson, meanwhile, has accused Democrats of seeking to undermine his investigations targeting the Obama administration and the Biden family, specifically the former vice president’s son Hunter and his role on the board of a Ukrainian energy company.

Earlier this month, U.S. intelligence agencies said Kremlin-aligned Ukrainians are seeking to interfere in the 2020 presidential election by pushing similar corruption claims about Biden, specifically naming a Ukrainian lawmaker, Andriy Derkach, who has sent information about Biden to top Trump allies on Capitol Hill.

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The thought that USPS Postmaster DeJoy could be fired by the Board of Directors of the USPS, is now moot, given the make up of the USPS Board of Directors.

Most members of the U.S. Postal Service’s board of governors have numerous ties to the Republican Party as well as President Donald Trump’s associates and administration.

The Postal Service’s leadership is under increasing scrutiny with just under three months until the general election between Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy himself was a prolific fundraiser for Trump and the Republican Party before he landed the top USPS job in June. The board members were all appointed by Trump.

Most members of the U.S. Postal Service’s board of governors, who were responsible for selecting Louis DeJoy as postmaster general, have numerous ties to the Republican Party as well as to President Donald Trump’s associates and administration.

According to a CNBC review of public documents and disclosures, five of the six members of the board, including Chairman Robert Duncan, are linked to GOP and Trump circles through various campaign, legal and financial connections.

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A post was merged into an existing topic: Congressional Oversight 2020 - election edition

A post was merged into an existing topic: Congressional Oversight 2020 - election edition

SDNY comes in and arrests Steve Bannon on Campaign fraud for a “We Build the Wall” campaign, defrauding hundreds of thousands of investors - :boom:

Others include Timothy Shea, who was Acting DEA and Brian Kolfage, a Iraq war veteran, and Andrew Badolato.

Former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon has been arrested after being charged with defrauding hundreds of thousands of donors through their campaign “We Build the Wall.”

Bannon, along with three of his associates were indicted by investigators at the U.S. Southern District of New York on Thursday. They allege that the group of conservative leaders defrauded donors and that led to raising “more than $25 million to build a wall along the southern border of the United States,” according to the press release.

The United States Postal Inspection Service assisted in the investigation.

The others mentioned in the indictment are Timothy Shea, who in May was announced as the Acting Administrator of Drug Enforcement Administration, **Brian Kolfage, a Iraq war veteran, and Andrew Badolato. **
>
The campaign was intended to raise money to help President Donald Trump fulfill a campaign promise of building a border wall along the border. Instead, prosecutors allege, that Bannon and his team profited off of the arrangement.

Prosecutors claim that the defendants “collectively received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donor funds from ‘We Build the Wall,’ which they each used in a manner inconsistent with the organization’s public representations,” according to the indictment.

“The defendants defrauded hundreds of thousands of donors, capitalizing on their interest in funding a border wall to raise millions of dollars, under the false pretense that all of that money would be spent on construction,” Acting U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss, said in a statement. “While repeatedly assuring donors that Brian Kolfage, the founder and public face of We Build the Wall, would not be paid a cent, the defendants secretly schemed to pass hundreds of thousands of dollars to Kolfage, which he used to fund his lavish lifestyle. We thank the USPIS for their partnership in investigating this case, and we remain dedicated to rooting out and prosecuting fraud wherever we find it.”

Former Trump campaign CEO and White House chief strategist Steve Bannon was indicted in New York on fraud charges related to a fundraising campaign to build a border wall, federal prosecutors said.

Bannon is among four people indicted for allegedly defrauding hundreds of thousands of donors to the online “We Build the Wall” campaign.

Manhattan federal prosecutors allege that Bannon, campaign leader Brian Kolfage, Andrew Badolato and Timothy Shea “received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donor funds from We Build the Wall, which they each used in a manner inconsistent with the organization’s public representations.”

“We Build the Wall” began as a GoFundMe campaign in late 2018, designed to raise money directly from the public to build a border wall in the face of Congressional opposition.

Adding Statement from SDNY

According to the Indictment[1] unsealed today in Manhattan federal court:

Starting in approximately December 2018, BRIAN KOLFAGE, STEPHEN BANNON, ANDREW BADOLATO, and TIMOTHY SHEA, and others, orchestrated a scheme to defraud hundreds of thousands of donors, including donors in the Southern District of New York, in connection with an online crowdfunding campaign ultimately known as “We Build The Wall” that raised more than $25 million to build a wall along the southern border of the United States. In particular, to induce donors to donate to the campaign, KOLFAGE repeatedly and falsely assured the public that he would “not take a penny in salary or compensation” and that “100% of the funds raised . . . will be used in the execution of our mission and purpose” because, as BANNON publicly stated, “we’re a volunteer organization.”

Those representations were false. In truth, KOLFAGE, BANNON, BADOLATO, and SHEA received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donor funds from We Build the Wall, which they each used in a manner inconsistent with the organization’s public representations. In particular, KOLFAGE covertly took for his personal use more than $350,000 in funds that donors had given to We Build the Wall, while BANNON, through a non-profit organization under his control (“Non-Profit-1”), received over $1 million from We Build the Wall, at least some of which BANNON used to cover hundreds of thousands of dollars in BANNON’s personal expenses. To conceal the payments to KOLFAGE from We Build the Wall, KOLFAGE, BANNON, BADOLATO, and SHEA devised a scheme to route those payments from We Build the Wall to KOLFAGE indirectly through Non-Profit-1 and a shell company under SHEA’s control, among other avenues. They did so by using fake invoices and sham “vendor” arrangements, among other ways, to ensure, as KOLFAGE noted in a text message to BADOLATO, that his pay arrangement remained “confidential” and kept on a “need to know” basis.

KOLFAGE, 38, of Miramar Beach, Florida, BANNON, 66, of Washington, D.C., BADOLATO, 56, of Sarasota, Florida, and SHEA, 49, of Castle Rock, Colorado, are each charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, each of which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.

The statutory maximum penalties are prescribed by Congress and are provided here for informational purposes only, as any sentencing of the defendants would be determined by the judge.

Ms. Strauss praised the outstanding investigative work of the USPIS and the Special Agents of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. She also thanked the U.S Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Florida for their assistance.

The case is being handled by the Office’s Public Corruption Unit. Assistant United States Attorneys Nicolas Roos, Alison G. Moe, and Robert B. Sobelman are in charge of the prosecution.

The charges contained in the Indictment are merely accusations. The defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

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Beat me to it, here are more articles.





Official Statement:

Timothy Shea is Trump’s Acting Administrator of Drug Enforcement Administration since May!!!

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Prosecutor and MSNBC commentator Neal Katyal says that Trump has not been able to block the subpoenas from Cy Vance. More to come.


Judge Throws Out Trump Challenge to Manhattan DA Subpoena for Tax Records

The ruling comes a month after the Supreme Court rejected the president’s earlier claims of absolute immunity from state criminal subpoenas. While the top court rejected the immunity argument, it said the president was entitled to object to the subpoena on alternative grounds

President Donald Trump’s effort to fight a subpoena for his tax records issued by the Manhattan district attorney was rejected on Thursday by a federal judge in New York, handing another loss to the president in a high-profile case that has already made its way to the Supreme Court.

U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero said that the president failed to show that the subpoena would pose an unfair burden, siding in favor of Manhattan D.A. Cy Vance, Jr., who has said his office is pursuing an investigation of potential violations of state law.

The subpoena, directed to the president’s longtime accounting firm Mazars USA, seeks the president’s personal and business records, including tax returns, dating to 2011.

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You love to see it. :smirk:

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Yes…“Show me the money…”

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Some of the money instead funded luxury cars, home renovations, cosmetic surgery, and a 2019 Jupiter Marine boat named Warfighter.

Steve Bannon Arrested on Charges of Stealing From ‘Build the Wall’ Fundraiser

GRIFTERS

The former White House chief strategist allegedly received more than $1 million that was raised to build Trump’s border wall through a non-profit organization under his control.


image

Wow. It really WAS like the Spanish Armada!

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USPS Headquarters Tells Managers Not to Reconnect Mail Sorting Machines, Emails Show

“We are not to reconnect any machines that have previously been disconnected.”

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*He was aboard a 150-foot-long yacht in Long Island Sound, off the coast of Westbrook, Connecticut,when he was arrested, law enforcement sources told NBC News. Bannon is not the owner of the vessel and the arrest was made without incident.

NBC

That’s, like, a really really big yacht, you guys.

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From Axios PM…

Steve Bannon, President Trump’s former chief strategist, was charged with fraud by federal prosecutors in New York.

  • He, along with three others, allegedly defrauded donors out of hundreds of thousands of dollars with a crowdfunding campaign that raised money to privately build a portion of the wall at the U.S.-Mexico border.

Bannon was taken into custody aboard the Lady May, a 152-foot yacht (listing price: $27.9 million) off the Connecticut coast.

Take a :eyes: at this boat

  • You can’t make this up: “Bannon was arrested by inspectors from the U.S. Postal Service,” per the Hartford Courant.
  • All three of Bannon’s cellphones are now disabled, according to Axios’ Jonathan Swan.
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Bigger than a blue whale.

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Wow, that yacht is bigger than my house. Must be nice to be a grifter, bankrolled by a billionaire, well, until you get arrested.

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