Pete Buttigieg accepted $250,000 and gifts from mayoral campaign donors who were later awarded $33million in city contracts, raising concerns of ‘pay to play’ as Transportation Secretary doles out $210billion in infrastructure plan

Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg’s top political donors received millions of dollars in city contracts after giving thousands to his campaigns while he was mayor of South Bend, Indiana.

Buttigieg’s political action committees took money from 23 companies who then got jobs from South Bend’s Board of Public Works whose members he appointed, documents obtained by DailyMail.com reveal.

On two occasions, the former presidential candidate received donations the same day the companies were awarded contracts.

Other city contractors gifted the mayor cigars, alcohol and golf trips worth hundreds of dollars.

The companies, their executives and spouses donated a total $253,750 to Buttigieg’s campaigns, and received a total of at least $33,310,426 in city contracts between 2011 and 2019. 

After Buttigieg appointed one former company executive to city’s Public Works department, the firm was then handed multiple infrastructure jobs, and became one of Mayor Pete’s largest donors.

Buttigieg served as the mayor of South Bend from 2012 to 2020. He was appointed transportation secretary by President Joe Biden early last year.

Government watchdogs say the pattern of donations and contracts could present the appearance of a ‘pay to play’ scandal – and raises concerns over the $210billion earmarked in the bipartisan infrastructure bill for Buttigieg to dish out in discretionary grants as transport secretary, part of a $1.2trillion budget.

‘The pattern of contracts and donations appears to be a huge conflict of interest,’ Taxpayers Protection Alliance president David Williams told DailyMail.com.

‘This really doesn’t bode well for the secretary of transportation when he has access to almost $1.2trillion in infrastructure money.

‘This is alarming, and very concerning, because this is the swamp personified. You don’t have to be a Rhodes Scholar to look at this and think that something’s wrong here. 

‘Was there a quid pro quo? Was there some sort of backroom deal for these projects? taxpayers deserve answers.’ 

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Democrat Congressman Sparks Backlash After Suggesting to Seize Trucks From Protesters Headed to D.C., Give Them to Growing Businesses

Democrat Rep. Ruben Gallego (AZ) called for seizing the trucks of protesters headed to Washington, D.C., and then giving the property to businesses looking to grow.

“Perfect time to impound and give the trucks to small trucking companies looking to expand their business,” Gallego tweeted in response to the following news headline: “Trucker convoy could shut down DC Beltway tomorrow.”

“Law enforcement agencies in Maryland, Virginia and D.C. are monitoring what could be a number of trucker convoys coming to D.C.,” the report said. “Truckers apparently spurred on by the recent protests in Canada want their voices heard, but the extent of the protests and how disruptive they may be is still unclear.”

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Two Former Hawaii Lawmakers Who ‘Defrauded Citizens’ When They Accepted Bribes Plead Guilty

Two former Hawaii lawmakers who allegedly “defrauded citizens of the state” when they took part in a bribery scheme to benefit a company pleaded guilty Tuesday to felony charges, the U.S. Justice Department (DOJ) announced.

Jamie Kalani English, 54, and Ty Cullen, 41, were charged with one count each of honest services wire fraud. They are scheduled to be sentenced on July 5 and face up to 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 if found guilty.

However, the sentences they receive will depend on various factors, including reductions for taking responsibility by pleading guilty early.

English, a Democratic state senator and Senate Majority Leader, represented Hana, East and Upcountry Maui, Molokai, Lanai, and Kahoolawe from 2000 until 2021 while Cullen was a Democratic state representative for communities including Village Park, Waipahu, Royal Kunia, West Loch, and Makakilo since 2013.

According to the DOJ, the defendants “defrauded the citizens of the State of Hawaii of their right to honest and faithful services as elected legislators through bribery and concealment of material information.”

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Oh, So That’s Why The New York Times Didn’t Cover Latest Durham Bombshell

When a new motion was filed by John Durham on Friday night that included information about Hillary’s Clinton’s campaign and its activities toward Donald Trump’s campaign, the mainstream media largely said “meh” and ignored the development (though Townhall did not, and Vespa’s story is here). Well now The New York Times is trying to defend its decision…by insulting its readership. 

In what was apparently another example of the mainstream media’s selection bias clouding its judgement and causing it not to cover stories that are negative about their pals in the Democrat party, the usual suspects were oddly silent on the development for days. According to analysis from Fox News, on-air coverage of the latest Durham bombshell from Saturday through Monday on ABC, NBC, CBS, and MSNBC totaled zero (0) seconds while CNN gave two minutes and 30 seconds to the story. In primetime, the revelations weren’t covered at all.

After President Trump released multiple statements on the revelations, including one pointedly calling out the mainstream media for ignoring more negative allegations against Hillary’s campaign, The New York Times finally got around to writing a story days after the news broke, running online on Monday and in Tuesday’s print edition.

So what was The Times’ excuse? The revelations, according to national security and legal policy correspondent Charlie Savage, “tend to involve dense and obscure issues, so dissecting them requires asking readers to expend significant mental energy and time.”

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Democrats Framed And Spied On Trump While He Was President

Enemies of Donald Trump surveilled the internet traffic at Trump Tower, at his New York City apartment building, and later at the executive office of the president of the United States, then fed disinformation about that traffic to intelligence agencies hoping to frame Trump as a Russia-connected stooge.

A tangential filing on Friday in the criminal case against former Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann revealed these new details uncovered by Special Counsel John Durham’s investigation. The revelation came in the middle of a 13-page motion Durham’s prosecutors filed in the criminal case against Sussmann. The special counsel’s office charged Sussmann in September 2021, in a one-count indictment of lying to James Baker during a meeting Sussmann had with the then-FBI general counsel in the weeks leading up to the 2016 election.

During Sussmann’s September 19, 2016 meeting with Baker, Sussmann allegedly provided the FBI general counsel information that purported to show the existence of a secret communication channel between the Trump organization and the Russian Alfa Bank. The indictment charged that Sussmann told Baker during that meeting that he was not working on behalf of any client, when, according to the indictment, Sussmann was actually acting on behalf of “a U.S. technology industry executive at a U.S. Internet company”—later identified as Rodney Joffe—and “the Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign.”

While the special counsel’s indictment of the Clinton campaign lawyer was, by itself, huge news, the details Durham sprinkled throughout the 27 pages of the talking indictment suggest even more bombshells are to come. Those allegations suggested “a scandal much deeper than merely Sussmann’s role in a second Russian hoax — a scandal that entangles the Clinton campaign, multiple internet companies, two federally-funded university researchers, and a complicit media.”

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Pelosi’s Capitol Cops Tried to Sneak Into GOP Congressman’s Office Dressed as Construction Workers, Illegally Took Photos of Legislative Documents.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Capitol Police are alleged to have illegally entered the office of Congressman Troy Nehls (R-TX), photographing confidential legislative products and grilling staff, according to reports. The police – now under formal investigation – stand accused of dressing up as construction workers and attempting another entry just two days later.

The stunning, Watergate-style scandal comes after almost a year of warnings that Speaker Pelosi and Democrats in Congress were politicizing the Capitol Police, using them as a Stasi-style enforcement unit against GOP opponents. Reports suggest Capitol Police have built intelligence dossiers on those illegally investigated.

The documents photographed, says Nehls, are “protected by the Speech and Debate clause enshrined in the Constitution, Article 1 Section 6”.

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