Steve Bannon, key to Trump's rise, pleads not guilty to border-wall fraud charges

[mtls2005]

4 minutes ago, rcummings said:

But an indictment has been granted.

 

 

https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/press-release/file/1306611/download

[stevenl]

1 hour ago, RJRS1301 said:

Perhaps it is "real" evidence, (who knows) wait until the evidence is produced in court could be useful before judgement.

Not one word of sworn evidence given, but already some TVF folk have the "facts" one way or another in their minds.

Glad none of you will have to sit on a jury and listen before making up your minds

 

 

This is TVF, not a court of law. And based on the available information they seem guilty, looking at his quick reaction also Trump thinks so.

Edited August 21, 2020 by stevenl

[TheFishman1]

 I guess it’s just coincidence that 10 people that Trump surrounds himself with oh he only hires the best we’re all indicted banyan was arrested on a yacht owned by a fugitive from China most of your friends  are criminals what does that say about his moral character he cares nothing about America only himself five years ago he said I’ll show you my tax returns but now he fights it all the way to the supreme court I want to why do all the roads lead to Russia he has been the worst president in history he divides the country He comes up with fake conspiracy theories he’s just way over his head every time he speaks he lies and how people say nothing because they’re afraid of his Twitter account is disgusting it’s time for a change just my two cents

[shdmn]

All three of Trumps campaign managers have now been charged with crimes.  Most corrupt administration in history.

 

But hey, nobody is talking about the continuing dismantling of the USPS before the election today so I guess that's a bonus for the distractor-in-chief.

[OneMoreFarang]

it's almost a perfect scam. Ask for money for something which won't make any difference.

And lots of people were apparently happy to pay lots of money for nothing in return.

 

If he would not have been arrested the donors would still be happy and he would be happy with all that money.

 

Now the donors are unhappy and he is unhappy. That's really sad. ???? 

[Benmart]

2 hours ago, Sujo said:

The swamp is being drained.

 

for someone who says he only hires the best trump sure does have a lot of dodgy employees.

The world has no shortage of dodgy characters.

[stevenl]

6 minutes ago, Benmart said:

The world has no shortage of dodgy characters.

And Trump is making a good attempt to hire as many as he can for his campaign and administration.

[shdmn]

Do the morons at Trump rallies still chant "drain that swamp"? I mean, how stupid can you possibly be to not realize they were going to turn the swamp into an ocean.

[Chomper Higgot]

The indictment has been filed by the SDNY ‘Public Corruption Office’ which is tasked with investigating and prosecuting corruption crimes committed by people holding public office.

 

We might therefore conclude somebody holding public office is a target of the investigation that has lead to Bannon’s indictment.

 

 

We also know that Barr tried to take control of SDNY by installing his own handpicked AG, his attempt failed. The question then arises was Barr trying to interfere in this investigation.

 

Trump is already trying to put distance between himself and Bannon, but he needs to be careful. 

 

Bannon was intimately involved in Trump’s campaign and early administration, he’s also named in the (Republican lead) Senate report as having committed crimes against the US in the 2016 election.

 

This puts Trump in a corner.

 

Will he rush to Pardon Bannon (and in doing so remove Bannon’s 5th Amendment rights) or will he hope Bannon doesn’t sing?

 

Meanwhile it is clear Barr failed to do the job Trump hired him for - keeping a lid on the criminality around Trump and his close associates.

 

Oh and in a sweet justice of sorts, the people Bannon is accused of bilking are the core of Trump’s own base, they never get anything Trump and his goons promise them.

 

[Somtamnication]

Trumpian number 10 indicted. Waiting for Nov 4, day after the election for number 11, 12 and 13.

[Berkshire]

27 minutes ago, OneMoreFarang said:

it's almost a perfect scam. Ask for money for something which won't make any difference.

And lots of people were apparently happy to pay lots of money for nothing in return.

 

If he would not have been arrested the donors would still be happy and he would be happy with all that money.

 

Now the donors are unhappy and he is unhappy. That's really sad. ???? 

This is classic Trump et al and his associates.  The idiots....eh folks who contributed to that wall project are 100% Trump supporters.  Bannon and his buddies had no problem at all ripping these sheep off.  Trump and his people really detest those MAGA folks and I understand why.  If they're stupid enough to believe a word he says, they deserve to get fleeced. 

[Scott]

Trolling meme removed.  

 

[saminoz]

2 hours ago, mtls2005 said:

 

You are correct.

 

Sorry.

 

That is the yacht he was arrested on, in the Connecticut coast.

 

It is owned by a Chinese billionaire.

 

https://nypost.com/2020/08/20/steve-bannon-was-arrested-on-chinese-billionaires-28m-yacht/

 

The boat, the Lady May, is owned by Guo Wengui, one of China’s most wanted fugitives, who is wanted in Beijing on fraud, blackmail and bribery charges, according to the Washington Post.

 

 

I'm sure we'll find out what bannon spent his cash on? Ostrich jacket?

 

 

 

 

Birds of a feather, and all that...........

[bendejo]

1 hour ago, stevenl said:

looking at his quick reaction also Trump thinks so.

Yes, when the guy who speaks constantly goes quiet it is a noteworthy moment.

Russian bounty on US military, "I know nothing about that."  Apparently not interested, either.

 

[mtls2005]

8 minutes ago, saminoz said:

Birds of a feather, and all that...........

 

Yeah. Apologies for making a mistake.

 

That said, not sure which is worse?

 

Probably being arrested on the yacht of a Chinese super villain.

 

Hopefully we'll hear what he did spend his cash on.

 

 

[Eric Loh]

Bannon's arrest is a testimony that there are still good career federal prosecutors that dare to take on the President and his cronies. It is a relieved to know that Trump's effort has failed to convert the Justice Dept into a protection racket for his family and cronies and a cudgel against his enemies. This arrest will scare the living daylights out of Trump because of Bannon's vulnerability to a plea deal in return for ratting out Trump. Days are numbered for Trump and his criminal organisation. 

[NanLaew]

36 minutes ago, mtls2005 said:

 

Yeah. Apologies for making a mistake.

 

That said, not sure which is worse?

 

Probably being arrested on the yacht of a Chinese super villain.

 

Hopefully we'll hear what he did spend his cash on.

 

 

 

According to Audrey Strauss, the acting US attorney for the Southern District of New York, whose office investigated the alleged scam, the four men “defrauded hundreds of thousands of donors, capitalizing on their interest in funding a border wall to raise millions of dollars, under the false pretence that all of the money would be spent on construction.”

... In reality, said Ms Strauss, the four accused schemed to siphon off vast sums for their personal use. Mr Kolfage is alleged to have creamed off $350,000 to “fund his lavish lifestyle”. Mr Bannon, a former investment banker turned ethno-nationalist activist, was described as the chairman of the wall-building scheme’s advisory board. He is accused of directing over $1m into a non-profit organisation he controlled. He transferred some of the cash to Mr Kolfage and kept a “substantial portion of those donor funds for personal uses and expenses unrelated to We Build the Wall”. The four men are accused of “creating sham invoices and accounts to launder donations and cover up their crimes, showing no regard for the law or the truth.”

 

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/08/20/steve-bannon-is-arrested-for-fraud

[Proboscis]

4 hours ago, TopDeadSenter said:

This is disappointing news. Conservatives have a soft spot for Bannon, he is regarded as one of the architects of the wildly successful MAGA movement that made the dated concepts of being rewarded for effort and entrepreneurship regardless of ethnicity, love of America, and traditional families "cool" again, and for that I thank him. Still, fraud is fraud. Hopefully he can get a fair trial although after the other botched investigations and trials recently this is questionable.

 

 The run up to this election is feeling like a giant board game. This Bannon news is like landing on a snake, a big one at that. Yet the spectacular victory of the brilliant Ms Loomer in the Florida congressional primaries - nearly with double the number of votes than the next candidate, even after being doxed by the left and banned/cancelled from all social media was quite a ladder.

I really don't care about the politics of the issue but these are Federal charges and if they hold water they amount to ripping off your own base. If you are an ardent Trump supporter, you should be mad as hell about this.

[NanLaew]

4 hours ago, Kelsall said:

Interesting timing.

Holy USPS sorting machine dismantling Batman!!!

[NanLaew]

4 hours ago, Grumpy John said:

Will be interesting to hear the evidence the prosecutor has cooked up!

Dontcha just love all these master chef programs?

 

An insight on Bannon's co-conspirator.

 

Mr Kobach, who was previously appointed by Mr Trump to lead a bogus and ill-fated commission into electoral fraud, was listed as the wall scheme’s general counsel. The president’s son, Donald Trump Jr, also praised it—at a wall-building symposium in New Mexico last year—as “private enterprise at its finest”.

 

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/08/20/steve-bannon-is-arrested-for-fraud

[NanLaew]

4 hours ago, TopDeadSenter said:

The run up to this election is feeling like a giant board game. This Bannon news is like landing on a snake, a big one at that. Yet the spectacular victory of the brilliant Ms Loomer in the Florida congressional primaries - nearly with double the number of votes than the next candidate, even after being doxed by the left and banned/cancelled from all social media was quite a ladder.

The "brilliant" Miss Loomer? How about the "brilliant" GOP in endorsing this piece of human excrement.

 

While Loomer faces an uphill climb to unseat Frankel, she still hands Democrats another line of attack against the GOP as Republicans face questions over some of their more controversial House candidates.

Earlier this month, Marjorie Taylor Greene, a supporter of the QAnon conspiracy theory who has made a litany of Islamophobic and anti-Semitic comments, won her Republican primary in Georgia, putting her on track to win a congressional seat in November.

 

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/512254-far-right-activist-laura-loomer-wins-florida-gop-house-primary

 

Here's to the GOP continuing to load their torpedoes the wrong way round.

[Berkshire]

8 minutes ago, Proboscis said:

I really don't care about the politics of the issue but these are Federal charges and if they hold water they amount to ripping off your own base. If you are an ardent Trump supporter, you should be mad as hell about this.

Oh it gets worse.  Bannon and his crew weren't done ripping off Trump supporters.  Bannon knows the Trump base well.  They're incredibly gullible and easily duped into forking over money.  That's why they were compiling a database to go after these MAGA folks...

 

[But the sums the two men allegedly extracted from the organization just scratched the surface of their grandiose plans to make money off the effort. As he was using his group, We Build The Wall, to compile millions of email addresses and phone numbers, Kolfage was also plotting ways to use that data to start a Republican fundraising firm. The venture had gotten far enough that earlier this year, he was already shopping around for potential clients.]

 

https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-we-build-the-wall-huckster-is-accused-of-duping-donors-turns-out-he-planned-to-sell-their-data-too?ref=wrap

 

[KarenBravo]

The Trump circus never fails to amuse. The best reality TV show ever.

[NanLaew]

[cmarshall]

21 minutes ago, Eric Loh said:

Bannon's arrest is a testimony that there are still good career federal prosecutors that dare to take on the President and his cronies. It is a relieved to know that Trump's effort has failed to convert the Justice Dept into a protection racket for his family and cronies and a cudgel against his enemies. This arrest will scare the living daylights out of Trump because of Bannon's vulnerability to a plea deal in return for ratting out Trump. Days are numbered for Trump and his criminal organisation. 

Yes, but it is all but certain that the indictment came down because the previous US Attorney for the Southern District, Geoffrey Berman, resisted Barr's attempt to push him out a month or so ago.  The reason he gave was to protect certain ongoing investigations.  In the end Berman and Barr agreed to a compromise in which Berman would resign, but his duties would be taken over by his own assistant US Attorney, Audrey Strauss, in whom he had confidence.  So, Berman resigned and Strauss took over, not the stooge that Barr had picked presumably to sabotage the Bannon investigation and probably others like it.

 

Geoffrey Berman's integrity was a surprise to me, since prior to his appoint to the Southern District he was the law partner of Rudy Giuliani.  I expected him to be a hack, but he's not.  

 

Bannon, another sociopath like Trump, is now in a bind.  He was cast out of the WH, because he was quoted in Michael Wolf's book criticizing the Trump family.  So, he is still persona non grata to Trump.  In that situation, Bannon would be taking a big risk to refuse to cooperate with prosecutors in the expectation of an eventual pardon.  The better bet would be to sing his guts out, which is what I think he will do.

[soalbundy]

Maybe it's all a hoax ????

[Srikcir]

3 hours ago, bendejo said:

Time for Donnie to break out the ol' rubber stamp

 

 

 

Curious though as that AG Barr must approve the arrest of Bannon. And Barr will protect Trump associates if directed.

Maybe allowing another Trump confederate to escape the law wasn't a message Trump wants to send with less than 100 days to the election

[xylophone]

20 minutes ago, NanLaew said:

Great post and thanks for reminding me and others about the guilt, lying and cheating of the trump coterie, however I fear that despite this and the fact that all of these things are out there in the public domain for all to see, trump supporters do not see it and that is evidenced by what we see on these forums.

 

I was speaking with a friend about this and he had an interesting theory, inasmuch as there is only one way that all of the lies, cheating, racism and misogyny can be overlooked by his supporters, and it is because they are followers of a cult, the trump cult (and cult followers will overlook everything bad about their cult leader in order to support him).

 

I believe there is much more to come after this episode with Bannon and hopefully it will be the downfall of this lying, crooked president and his nepotism, and of course it would be great to see him spend some time behind bars for what he has done to the US. This along with others of his party.

[b17]

4 hours ago, Kelsall said:

Yes, Bannon's arrest 70 or so days before the election shows the left's panic as they desparately try to defeat Trump.  The Lara Loomer victory is causing them to panic even more.  They know the second Trump term may well result in their so-called heros going down.

 

The arrest has backfired.  Trump has distanced himself and turned the tables.  Expect a Trump 2020 victory

To the contrary, expect the American people to push aside this grifter, this criminal, this murderer. He is the worst President that the USA has ever had, and people aren't going to head down the road of lies, obfuscation and total oligarchy. 

[KarenBravo]

Just now, xylophone said:

Great post and thanks for reminding me and others about the guilt, lying and cheating of the trump coterie, however I fear that despite this and the fact that all of these things are out there in the public domain for all to see, trump supporters do not see it and that is evidenced by what we see on these forums.

 

I was speaking with a friend about this and he had an interesting theory, inasmuch as there is only one way that all of the lies, cheating, racism and misogyny can be overlooked by his supporters, and it is because they are followers of a cult, the trump cult (and cult followers will overlook everything bad about their cult leader in order to support him).

 

I believe there is much more to come after this episode with Bannon and hopefully it will be the downfall of this lying, crooked president and his nepotism, and of course it would be great to see him spend some time behind bars for what he has done to the US. This along with others of his party.

I think it's more likely that they do as Trump does.......doubling down when they are wrong and that they may look foolish.