Tag: corruption

Trump’s sons claim share in mining group supported by US govt

A shell company backed by Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump has agreed to a merger with a mining group that secured up to $1.6 billion from the US government in 2025 to facilitate the extraction of tungsten in Kazakhstan, the Financial Times has reported.

The agreement between Skyline Builders group, in which US President Donald Trump’s sons hold a stake, and Cove Kaz Capital group was signed on Thursday. The newly-formed entity will trade on Nasdaq as Kaz Resources, according to a statement.

Cove Kaz currently controls 70% of the Northern Katpar and Upper Kairakty tungsten deposits in central Kazakhstan, believed to be one of the largest in the world. Last year, the federally-funded US Export-Import Bank and the Development Finance Corporation committed to invest heavily in the development of both projects.

The statement didn’t mention Trump’s sons, but the FT reported on Friday, citing informed sources, that they bought into Skyline last August via a special purpose vehicle run by a subsidiary of Dominari Securities. The size of their investment was not disclosed, but they increased it by $24 million in October.

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Former Dem mayoral candidate admits forging voter registration applications

Henrilynn Ibezim, a former Democratic mayoral candidate in New Jersey, pleaded guilty to forging nearly 1,000 voter registration applications during the 2021 Democratic primary, New Jersey’s Office of the Attorney General announced Thursday.

During the 2021 Democratic primary for Plainfield, New Jersey’s mayoral seat, Ibezim allegedly brought a garbage bag filled with around 1,000 falsified voter registration applications to a post office in Elizabeth, New Jersey, with the intention of mailing them to Union County’s registration commissioner.

Of the 1,000 applications, most were completed with the handwriting of only three or four people, according to the attorney general. None of the slips were marked as completed by somebody other than the voter whom they were supposed to represent.

Ibezim also attempted to coach a witness who helped him fill out the applications on how to respond to law enforcement questions, telling the witness not to “admit anything,” the attorney general’s office previously said.

Despite his efforts, Ibezim, who was running on the Unity Party ticket, received only 103 votes in the primary and lost to Plainfield’s current mayor, Adrian O. Mapp.

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Former Congressman David Rivera Convicted of Lobbying for Venezuela

Former Rep. David Rivera (R-Fla.) was found guilty on Friday of secretly lobbying on behalf of Venezuela’s government, following a seven-week federal trial.

Rivera—alongside associate Esther Nuhfer—was convicted on all charges, including failing to register as a foreign agent and conspiring to commit money laundering.

Prosecutors said the pair worked for the government of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro as part of a covert influence campaign.

According to the government’s case, Rivera leveraged his Republican political connections, including ties from his time in Congress, to push U.S. officials to ease their stance toward Venezuela’s socialist leadership.

Prosecutors alleged that Rivera secured a $50 million lobbying deal from Venezuelan official Delcy Rodríguez, with funds connected to the state oil company PDVSA.

As part of the effort, Rivera worked with Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) and others to arrange meetings with U.S. officials and business leaders.

Sessions has not been charged with any wrongdoing.

The case highlighted Miami’s long-standing role as a center of influence in U.S.–Latin America relations, shaped by its large exile community and history of anti-communist activism.

Rivera was first charged in 2022. Prosecutors said he used encrypted communications to conceal his activities, including a messaging group called “MIA.”

One of his key contacts was Venezuelan businessman Raúl Gorrín, who has separately faced U.S. bribery charges.

Messages presented at trial allegedly showed the use of coded language—referring to Maduro as “the bus driver,” Sessions as “Sombrero,” and money as “melons.”

Rivera denied any wrongdoing.

His defense argued that his firm was hired by a U.S.-based subsidiary of Venezuela’s oil company, not directly by the Venezuelan government, and therefore did not require registration under foreign agent laws.

They also said his work focused on business matters, including helping Citgo operate in the United States, and on encouraging political change in Venezuela.

However, prosecutors pointed to a related civil case alleging Rivera performed little of the contracted work and used the agreement to mask illegal lobbying.

Of the roughly $20 million he received, they said millions were diverted to personal expenses, including maintaining Gorrín’s luxury yacht.

Prosecutors said Rivera viewed Secretary of State Marco Rubio as a key ally for gaining access to senior U.S. officials. Rubio was not accused of any misconduct.

Court records showed Rivera met with Rubio in Washington in 2017 and later encouraged him to support negotiations with Maduro, suggesting the United States should help facilitate a peaceful resolution.

The effort ultimately failed.

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The Vaccine Safety Signal the Media Still Won’t Read

The serious-adverse-event signal found in the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA Covid-19 vaccine trials has been in the peer-reviewed literature for nearly four years. Mainstream media outlets, on the rare occasions they address it, have treated it not as evidence to be weighed but as misinformation to be managed — dismissed on the authority of experts without relevant expertise, or simply ignored. A recent BBC Radio 4 broadcast is a near-textbook example.

The broadcast aired on Everything Is Fake and Nobody Cares, a BBC Radio 4 series hosted by Jamie Bartlett, whose stated purpose is to ask why, in so much of modern life, fakery is no longer punished but rewarded. It is a reasonable question. The most direct answer the series has produced to date appears inside one of its own episodes.

In the episode in question, Bartlett devoted his broadcast to Dr. Aseem Malhotra and Covid-19 vaccine safety. As part of that segment, he aired a specific claim about a peer-reviewed paper I led, published in the journal Vaccine in September 2022. To evaluate Dr. Malhotra’s on-air statements, Bartlett brought in Dr. Vicky Male, a reproductive immunologist at Imperial College London. Dr. Male told listeners that the authors of the paper had been “specifically told to make it clear this paper should not be used” to support the kinds of claims Dr. Malhotra was making.

That statement is not true. No one told us that. The paper does not contain such an instruction. I am one of its authors; I have the peer review correspondence; I know what the journal asked of us and what it did not. Anyone could have checked this in five minutes by reading the paper, which runs eight pages and is open-access online. Jamie Bartlett did not check.

On the basis of an unchecked false claim about a scientific paper, Bartlett told his audience that Dr. Malhotra was spreading false information — on a podcast whose central premise is that modern life now rewards exactly this kind of thing.

Whether that reflected willful dishonesty or plain incompetence, I cannot say. The case that follows lays out what happened in enough detail for readers to decide for themselves. Both possibilities reflect poorly on a national broadcaster. Only one of them would be excusable.

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Feds Charge Sinaloa’s Governor, Senator, Mayor, & Other Top Officials With Running A Narco-State

Federal prosecutors in New York have charged ten current and former senior Mexican government officials — among them the sitting governor of Sinaloa, a sitting federal senator, the mayor of the state capital, and the state’s former secretary of public security — with conspiring to protect the Sinaloa Cartel’s most powerful faction in exchange for millions of dollars in drug money, in what may be the most sweeping corruption indictment ever brought against a sitting government in the Western Hemisphere.

The superseding indictment, filed in the Southern District of New York and unsealed Wednesday, charges all ten defendants with narcotics importation conspiracy — specifically, conspiracy to flood the United States with fentanyl, heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine — as well as conspiracy to possess machineguns and destructive devices in furtherance of drug trafficking.

One defendant, a municipal police commander, faces additional charges of kidnapping resulting in death: the alleged abduction and murder of a Drug Enforcement Administration confidential source, his relative, and a 13-year-old boy, carried out using a police patrol car.

The document does not describe a cartel that corrupted a government. It describes a government that became the cartel’s operating infrastructure.

In what appears to be the first instance in American legal history of the Justice Department indicting a sitting Mexican governor, prosecutors allege that Ruben Rocha Moya, 76, who has served as governor of Sinaloa since November 2021, did not simply accept cartel money. He allegedly made his deal with the Chapitos — the sons of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman — before he was ever elected, in a meeting guarded by Cartel sicarios armed with machineguns, and delivered on every term thereafter.

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Senator Finds More Evidence Federal Officials Evaded FOIA

A U.S. senator and his team say they have uncovered additional evidence that federal officials worked to evade requests made under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

Several emails obtained by Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) showed personnel with the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were aware of FOIA requests and sought to evade them. FOIA enables people to request records from the government. It requires officials to retain and produce requested records, subject to certain exemptions.

In a Nov. 26, 2022, missive, Allison Lale, a medical officer with the CDC, asked a colleague about receiving safety analyses of COVID-19 vaccination from the FDA.

Pedro Moro, a CDC epidemiologist, responded. “I think that because of the FOIAs we may have asked FDA to stop sending these weekly data mining outputs,” Moro wrote.

“Oh interesting,” Lale said. She added that during calls for a CDC-managed program, “we used to just verbally mention” that certain terms had not triggered safety signals, or signs vaccines were causing problems.

“But we could also leave it out if that [sic] this creates more hassle,” she added.

In a separate email chain, FDA officials were told by an FDA vaccine safety analytic expert, Dr. Ana Szarfman, that the approach they were using to analyze the safety of COVID-19 vaccines was faulty. The information sparked a long discussion, during which officials considered asking the expert to contact an outside expert on the matter.

“Before we potentially reach out to Ana, we should meet internally – many considerations not suited to email…” David Menschik, an FDA official who distributed the data mining reports, wrote on April 15, 2021.

“Sounds good,” Bethany Baer, another FDA worker, responded. “Happy to meet and discuss anytime open on my calendar.”

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Former Ukraine Top Spy and Currently Presidential Chief of Staff, Popular General Budanov Has Become a Danger to Zelensky’s Rule

Keep your enemies closer?

We have been reporting here on TGP on how the corruption scandal involving Volodymyr Zelensky’s close friend and partner Timur Mindich shook Kiev’s political landscape.

Ukrainian anti-corruption agencies NABU and SAPO exposed a $100 million embezzlement and kickback scheme at the state nuclear energy company Energoatom, which led to Mindich fleeing justice to Israel.

To survive the political crisis, the all-powerful chief of staff Andriy Yermak was sacrificed by the regime, and Zelensky appointed in his place Kirill Budanov, head of Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR), and his moderate critic.

As journalist and political analyst Vitaly Ryumshin detailed in RT, this has been a dangerous idea.

Budanov started in his new role keeping a low profile, but soon he started making public statements at odds with those of Zelensky.

“While the president has prepared the country for a prolonged conflict, Budanov has spoken of ongoing negotiations and suggested that peace may not be as distant as many assume. When Zelensky highlighted Ukraine’s technological breakthroughs, Budanov has downplayed them. He has also openly acknowledged the growing difficulties of mobilization, a rare admission from a senior official in a country at war.

At the same time, Budanov has been carefully constructing his public image. In Western media, he is presented as both a war hero and a pragmatic ‘dove’, a man who understands the need to bring the conflict to an end. For domestic audiences, his team promotes stories of personal bravery, portraying him as a hands-on commander who has taken part in operations and narrowly escaped danger.”

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Son of Norwegian Diplomats, Who Inherited $10M From Jeffrey Epstein’s Will, Commits Suicide Days After Police Launch Investigation on His Parents

Late sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s impact on Norway keeps producing nefarious outcomes.

Since the US DOJ released the ‘Epstein files’, a lot of activity has been going on in the Norwegian kingdom, notably around Crown Princess Mette-Marit, who is suffering deep reputational damage, and former Prime Minister Thorbjørn Jagland, who is under criminal investigation.

But a horrifying development involved diplomat Terje Rod-Larsen and his wife Mona Juul, a former ambassador.

Days after an investigation into their ties to Epstein was launched, their 25-year-old son has reportedly died by suicide.

Daily Mail reported:

“Edward Juul Rod-Larsen, 25, was found dead in Oslo on Wednesday, just days after Norwegian and French police launched a joint investigation into his parents,

[…] ‘It stands in the shadow of months of a public spotlight that has long since ceased to be critical, and has instead become suspicious, speculative and at times limitless. A spotlight that has not only affected two parents, but has also drawn their children involuntarily into the relentless machinery of the public,’ [his family] lawyers wrote.

‘Speculating on connections is both irresponsible and undignified. Suicide is always complex. There is never one explanation, never one cause, never one blame’.”

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Biden-Appointed Judge Orders Release of Dominican Illegal Alien Wanted for Murder by Interpol Red Notice Fugitive Now Roaming Free After ICE Arrest!

A Biden-appointed federal judge in Rhode Island has ordered the release of a Dominican illegal alien who is the subject of an Interpol Red Notice for murder in his home country.

The criminal illegal alien, Bryan Rafael Gomez, was arrested by ICE Boston in Worcester, Massachusetts on April 4th.

He had just been picked up locally for domestic abuse when a background check revealed Dominican authorities issued a criminal arrest warrant against him for homicide in 2023.

He is also the subject of an active Interpol Red Notice, an international arrest warrant for murder.

Gomez was detained at an ICE facility in Rhode Island. An immigration judge issued a deportation order on April 28th. But on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Melissa DuBose, a Biden appointee confirmed in 2024 as the first Black and openly LGBTQ federal judge in Rhode Island, ordered him released on the grounds of “continuous unlawful detention.”

ICE argued Gomez was subject to mandatory detention because of the international homicide warrant. The judge ignored that and set the wanted murderer free.

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More Details Emerge of Trump’s Secret Use of ICE to Spy on Critics

Lawmakers and privacy advocates are demanding answers from the Trump administration about its weaponization of digital tools and popular web platforms to spy on critics and activists. Targets have included a student who attended a pro-Palestine protest and anonymous web users posting about President Donald Trump’s violent immigration crackdown, but the administration’s secret systems of surveillance likely cast a wide net.

Privacy groups are also making demands of Big Tech firms such as Meta and Google, which have come under pressure from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to hand over identifying information for anonymous users. Officials from the agency have wielded legally dubious administrative subpoenas — meant to be used to determine duties on imported products — in an attempt to compel the information.

The efforts to expose domestic spying under the Trump administration offer a preview of how Democrats could yield subpoena power next year if voters hand them the House majority in November. Rep. Delia Ramirez, a Democrat from Illinois who was appointed ranking member of the cybersecurity subcommittee of the House Committee on Homeland Security this week, said emerging technologies are being used to violate civil rights and target Trump’s critics.

“The Trump-Miller regime is weaponizing the government and abusing every authority to persecute anyone whom they perceive as an enemy,” Ramirez told Truthout in a text on April 29, referencing Stephen Miller, the anti-immigrant extremist serving as a top adviser to Trump. “And fascism always requires a public enemy.”

ICE Targets Personal Information of Trump Critics

On April 17, attorneys with the Civil Liberties Defense Center filed a motion in federal court to throw out a grand jury subpoena that Reddit received from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) demanding “extensive private information” about an anonymous user. The user had posted statements critical of ICE and other political content on Reddit, a popular online discussion forum.

Reddit originally received an administrative subpoena from an ICE official in Virginia demanding the user’s personal information, The Intercept first reported earlier this month. The Civil Liberties Defense Center, representing the Reddit user, immediately filed a motion against the summons. Rather than defend the original administrative subpoena in court, ICE switched tactics in early April and demanded that Reddit attorneys appear before a secret grand jury, according to organization’s executive director Lauren Regan.

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