Alito goes a long way. ProPublica just landed another stunner in its ongoing ethics investigation into Supreme Court justices. The latest report revealed that uber-conservative Samuel Alito failed to report a private fishing trip to Alaska footed by billionaire Republican megadonor Paul Singer, who later had business before the court. The news comes on the heels of the outlet’s deep reporting on a billionaire’s unreported longtime largesse to Alito ally Clarence Thomas.
Alito tried to get ahead of the story with a rare op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, claiming that ProPublica, a six-time Pulitzer winner, was “misleading” its readers. (The Journal itself won awards for reporting on ethical conflicts in the federal judiciary, which led to bipartisan reforms.) Conservatives also rushed to Alito’s defense, as they had with Thomas, but Singer’s sweeping generosity might undercut their sincerity. For instance, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) attacked the “leftwing hacks trying to intimidate the Supreme Court,” but Federal Election Commission records show his campaign has received nearly $20,000 from Springer and his family, with maximum donations going back a decade.
Hunter gatherers. On Tuesday, conservatives rejoiced at Hunter Biden’s guilty plea—and then quickly reconsidered. The Trump-appointed prosecutor who had handled the case from the jump hit the Biden black sheep with only three counts, deflating right-wingers thirsty for vengeance from coast to coast. Two of the counts regarded Biden’s failure to pay about $1 million in taxes (which he has since repaid), and the third was for purchasing a gun while addicted to a controlled substance (a girlfriend trashed the gun two weeks later, and Biden didn’t try to replace it).
In return, Biden received probation and an order to enter a diversion program in connection with the gun charge—which prosecutors will drop if he fully complies. While critics dismissed the punishment as a “slap on the wrist,” former federal prosecutors with experience in the realm countered that if anything, he was treated too harshly.
By comparison, Trump ally Roger Stone and his wife were never even criminally charged for their failure to pay $2 million in federal taxes. They settled a civil lawsuit with the DOJ last year, and established a payment plan.
All in the family. Disgraced congressman and liar George Santos failed to block a federal court from revealing the names of the two people who allegedly underwrote his $500,000 bond. The names were unsealed on Thursday, and, at least on the surface, it appears that Santos—whose lawyer claimed in court that the backers were Santos family members—was telling the truth for once.
According to the newly public records, the bond was secured by Santos’ father and an aunt. While neither family member appears wealthy, bond rules don’t require ready access to liquidity. Guarantors aren’t required to pay up front; they only swear to cover the money if the defendant skips out on court. However, they must prove they’re good for the money by providing collateral—such as a house. (Or, say, a condo in Rio.)
No booze, Cruz. While enduring weeks of weird right-wing attacks for running a Bud Light social media promo featuring a transgender influencer, Anheuser-Busch stopped serving politicians. Its corporate PAC’s latest filing showed only one contribution last month—$5,000 to the leadership PAC belonging to Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA).
There’s no place like home. After submitting a bizarre quarterly report in April, the campaign for failed GOP Pennsylvania senatorial candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz is trying to explain itself.
In March, as Pay Dirt previously reported, the Oz campaign’s treasurer—veteran political accountant Sal Purpurra—signed off on a filing that doubled as a time machine, reallocating tens of thousands of dollars of general election donations back to the primary. In a letter to the FEC this week, Purpurra—who according to a previous campaign client is a “savant” and “obsessive perfectionist”—blamed a database error, and claimed the numbers would be corrected post-haste. Purpurra was also recently the target of an FEC inquiry regarding a reallocation scandal involving Oz’s fellow failed celebrity counterpart in Georgia, Herschel Walker.
About that “It’s not a Ponzi scheme” T-shirt… According to new research from Forex Suggest, a platform that tracks stock trades and foreign exchange markets, cryptocurrency lobbying is on an inverse trajectory with crypto’s actual value. Lobbying expenditures have soared 54 percent over the last 12 months, the data shows, revealing nearly $12 million spent in 2022. Coinbase leads the pack, spending nearly $4 million, and the Chinese-based crypto platform Binance—which this month got hit with 13 charges from the Securities and Exchange Commission—increased its spending by 594 percent as it launched its nominally U.S. venture, according to the data.
In other crypto news, the Justice Department last week severed a handful of charges from its indictment against FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried, to be tried separately at a later date. Those counts were all connected to activity based in the Bahamas; no campaign finance charges were affected.
Out of the Carolina blue. Longtime Mark Meadows ally Lynda Bennet was sentenced to a year of probation on Tuesday after pleading guilty to a campaign finance charge—reporting a “personal” loan to her unsuccessful North Carolina House primary campaign that in reality came from another person. During the sentencing hearing, a DOJ prosecutor told the court that the FBI had initially discovered the crime as “part of a larger investigation.”
“We just were reviewing records,” the prosecutor said, but didn’t offer more about the FBI probe or its connection to Bennett.
Calling all masochists. The Federal Election Commission has announced it is now accepting applications for the position of General Counsel. The Republican commissioners have for years routinely ignored OGC recommendations to pursue investigations and punish violators, choosing instead to exercise “prosecutorial discretion.”
