Tag: doj

Meta leads largest anti-scam operation with FBI and DOJ, leading to 63 arrests

Officials announced a massive, coordinated anti-scam operation led by Meta alongside the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Department of Justice (DOJ), Microsoft, Coinbase and Starlink, resulting in 63 arrests, millions of dollars in frozen cryptocurrency and the removal of over a million scam-related online accounts.

The initiative, announced Tuesday, represents Meta’s largest disruption campaign to date. It was described as the first coordinated effort of its kind to unite major technology companies, financial platforms and global law enforcement agencies against the broader fraud ecosystem.

Globally, recent federal efforts against these networks have resulted in the arrests of more than 300 individuals, the rescue of over 2,000 human trafficking victims and the seizure of billions in illicit cryptocurrency.

“Protecting people around the world from scams is one of our highest priorities. We’re proud to partner with industry and DOJ, FBI, Royal Thai Police, and other law enforcement agencies in taking this global fight directly to these Asia-based scam centers at their source,” said Chris Sonderby, Meta’s vice president and deputy general counsel, in a statement.

The operation spanned Washington, D.C., and Thailand, utilizing the U.S. Secret Service alongside law enforcement agencies from the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Thailand.

Authorities say these criminal networks steal billions of dollars from Americans annually through romance scams and cryptocurrency investment fraud. Several of the targeted organizations operate out of forced-labor compounds in Southeast Asia run by transnational organized crime groups.

During the crackdown, Meta has successfully removed about 1.4 million scam accounts, pages and groups from Facebook and Instagram, while the Royal Thai Police arrested 63 people suspected of having connections to the scam centers.

Keep reading

New DOJ Indictment Alleges Southern Poverty Law Center Funds Went to Hoods and Cross Burnings

On June 3, a federal grand jury in the Middle District of Alabama returned a superseding indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center, a second, expanded set of charges building on an original April 21 indictment,  alleging that $4.1 million in tax-exempt funds paid informants inside extremist organizations who then recruited new members and purchased materials for cross burnings and Ku Klux Klan robes and hoods.

The new charges do not target the general practice of paying informants but the DOJ’s allegation that the SPLC made these payments without disclosing them to donors and while defrauding banks.

The superseding indictment retains the original 11 counts, six of wire fraud, four of making false statements to a federally insured bank, and one of conspiracy to commit concealment money laundering, while expanding the alleged misconduct to include an SPLC employee’s knowledge that donor money purchased KKK garments, fuel, and wood for cross burnings. The indictment also notes the organization’s revenue and net assets grew more than 200% between 2010 and 2023.

The original 11-count indictment, announced April 21 by Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche alongside FBI Director Kash Patel, alleged the SPLC secretly funneled more than $3 million in donor funds between 2014 and 2023 to at least nine informants embedded in groups including the Ku Klux Klan, the National Socialist Movement, the Aryan Nations-affiliated Sadistic Souls Motorcycle Club, and a participant in the planning of the 2017 Charlottesville Unite the Right rally.

Prosecutors alleged the informants, known internally as “field sources” or “the Fs,” were paid through shell accounts while the SPLC publicly presented itself as working to dismantle those same groups. The SPLC pleaded not guilty and called the allegations false.

The indictment identifies eight informants by designation and specifies payments by group. One informant, F-9, was affiliated with the neo-Nazi National Alliance and received more than $1 million over nine years while fundraising for the organization. Prosecutors allege F-9 also broke into the National Alliance’s headquarters in 2014, stealing 25 boxes of documents the SPLC used in a published report, then paid a second National Alliance member $6,000 to falsely claim responsibility for the theft.

Keep reading

DOJ investigating fmr Rep. George Santos under suspicion of insider trading on Kalshi

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is reportedly investigating former New York GOP Representative George Santos after a prediction market website reported him to federal authorities for suspected market manipulation.

Santos is accused of using the popular prediction/betting platform, Kalshi, to engage in some form of insider trading ahead of President Donald Trump’s State of the Union (SOTU) address on February 24th this year. 

The day before, he notably posted a video to X in relation to the SOTU.

At the time, Kalshi users had already placed millions of dollars worth of wagers on potential high-profile attendees at the SOTU.

While contracts predicting Santos’ attendance opened at 16 cents in January and hovered around 33 cents the day before the event, his posted X video sent prices soaring to 76 cents around 10:00 a.m. ET on the morning of the address.

However, the former congressman failed to show up.

Keep reading

DOJ Sought YouTube Subscriber Data

Federal prosecutors went looking for the personal details of everyone who subscribed to three YouTube channels and a judge refused to let them.

Newly unsealed court records from the Justice Department’s prosecution of people who disrupted a church service in St. Paul, Minnesota show the government reaching for subscriber data that had little to do with the conduct it was investigating.

We obtained a copy of the warrant application for you here.

Journalists and commentators Don Lemon and Georgia Fort were charged as part of the disruption, though both allege they were there as reporters rather than participants.

On February 24, prosecutors filed five search warrants. Three of them asked YouTube to turn over the names, mailing addresses, residential addresses, business addresses, email addresses, telephone numbers, and IP addresses for every subscriber to channels run by Lemon, Fort, and activist William Kelly, whose channel goes by DaWoke Farmer.

The applications, sworn out by Homeland Security Investigations agent Timothy Gerber, went beyond the journalists and activists running the channels. They swept toward the audience, the ordinary people whose only link to the case was having clicked the channels’ subscribe button.

Magistrate Judge John Docherty rejected all five, several of them for lack of probable cause. On the warrant aimed at Kelly’s channel, Docherty pointed to a video that “appears to be paradigmatic political speech protected by the First Amendment.” A demand that treats a list of viewers as evidence turns watching journalism or activism into a reason to be identified by the state, which is a steep price for pressing play on a livestream.

Prosecutors tried again on March 6, refiling four warrants, including the three tied to Lemon, Fort, and Kelly. This time they cut the request down to the channel owners themselves, dropping the demand for subscriber rosters and asking only for the same categories of identifying data on the three named people.

What’s interesting here is that the government already treats the list of people who subscribe to a YouTube channel as something it can ask a court to hand over.

Picture that same demand landing in a world where every account is welded to a verified government identity. That world is being built right now.

The numbers tell part of the story. By late 2025, half of US states required people to prove their age before viewing some content, with nine states enacting such laws in 2025 alone. The movement started in Louisiana in 2022 as a single-state experiment and turned into a coordinated national push.

Keep reading

SHOWDOWN: GOP Senators Make More Demands as DOJ Signals Trump Administration is Dropping Weaponization Fund

Republican Senators were not satisfied with the Justice Department’s statement on the $1.77 billion weaponization fund and demanded a clear statement from Trump.

Recall that the Senate GOP last month delayed the reconciliation vote to fund ICE and Border Patrol – and Senate Majority Leader John Thune admitted it is a political hit against President Trump.

The Republican Senators delayed the reconciliation vote because of the DOJ weaponization fund.

Earlier Monday it was reported that President Trump is going to drop the $1.77 billion weaponization fund created to pay people targeted by the Biden Regime.

The DOJ released a statement on the weaponization fund:

The Department of Justice disagrees strongly with the decision on the Anti-Weaponization Fund put forth by the United States District Court Judge in the Eastern District of Virginia, wherein the Court stated that, under no circumstances, may the Department of Justice proceed with the Anti-Weaponization Fund recently established in order to make up for the tremendous abuse, harm, and hate unfairly shown to so many people. This Fund was open to anybody who was so weaponized, targeted, or persecuted, whether they were Democrat, Republican, Conservative, Independent, or otherwise. The Department will abide by the Court’s ruling.

Keep reading

Judge Blocks DOJ Victim Restitution After Leftists Complained The Victims Were Conservatives

Afederal judge blocked the Trump administration’s $1.776 billion anti-weaponization restitution fund Friday after plaintiffs claimed the fund was politically discriminatory because it helped victims of Democrat administrations. The Department of Justice created the fund earlier this month to provide restitution for targets of federal political persecution regardless of political affiliation.

U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema, an appointee of President Bill Clinton with a history of ruling against the Trump administration, temporarily blocked the Justice Department from establishing the fund while Brinkema hears legal arguments.

Andrew Floyd, a fired assistant U.S. attorney and Jan. 6 prosecutor, John Caravello, a professor who was accused and acquitted of assaulting a federal agent, the National Abortion Federation, and far-left nonprofit Common Cause sued the Department of Justice last week to stop the fund.

With seemingly no sense of irony, the plaintiffs’ primary claim is that the fund is politically discriminatory against Democrats, apparently because the lion’s share of potential victims seeking restitution would be conservatives targeted by the Biden and Obama administrations. The plaintiffs’ argument implies that, because Democrat administrations decided to conduct large-scale political persecutions of normal Americans they perceived as their enemies — and there is a much larger number in that victim pool — restitution should not be allowed.

“By its own terms, the Anti-Weaponization Fund is available only to claimants who assert that they were targeted by ‘Democrat’ administrations, even though the current administration has weaponized the awesome power of the federal government against its perceived political opponents like no other administration before it,” the lawsuit states. The suit declines to acknowledge how the Biden administration sent its federal thugs after Americans peacefully praying outside abortion facilities, or parents concerned about their children’s public schools, or Catholics who attend Latin Mass, or Jan. 6 protesters who were wildly overcharged and over-sentenced, and much more. It also does not meaningfully mention the Obama administration’s targeting of the Trump campaign, the Russia collusion hoax, or any other abuse that effectively stripped the American people of proper representation in the White House by kneecapping Trump’s first term.

Vice President J.D. Vance has said that the fund is open to anyone who believes he was unfairly targeted by the federal government, explicitly stating it was open to Democrats as well. Each claim, he said, would be decided on a case-by-case basis. A DOJ overview of the fund explicitly states that “Democrats can submit claims, too.” It also notes that the fund is for victims of “use of government power to target them for ‘improper and unlawful’ reasons,” without mentioning a requirement that a particular party have wielded the power.

Floyd, through public statements, may be inadvertently making the case for the fund, as he has been displaying the zeal with which prosecutors like himself wanted to punish Jan. 6 protesters.

“First, hundreds of people attacked the foundation of an ordered society by trying to stop the results of a free and fair election — committing serious assaults on law enforcement and other crimes as they did so,” he said. “Then, this administration pardoned them — removing the accountability that had been hard earned by victims, witnesses, law enforcement, and prosecutors and imposed by impartial jurors and judges. Now they are asking taxpayers to illegally reward them for their crimes.”

Keep reading

Everything About E. Jean Carroll’s Half-Baked Hit Job Against Trump Was A Mess

he Department of Justice purportedly launched a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, according to a CNN exclusive published Wednesday, and corporate media rushed to decry the supposed “weaponization” of justice against the writer who accused President Donald Trump of sexual assault. Though the exact nature of the investigation remains uncertain, it’s well worth revisiting the facts that undermine Carroll’s half-baked anti-Trump hit job.

CNN reported that the investigation is centered on whether Carroll committed perjury. Prosecutors, CNN said, are focusing on a deposition Carroll provided in 2022 in which she said she received no outside funding for her lawsuit. Despite her testimony, it turns out billionaire Democrat donor Reid Hoffman paid some of her legal fees and expenses.

U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros said in a statement that the Northern District of Illinois “has not opened — and has never opened — a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll,” though CNN said its “sources reaffirmed the investigation to CNN.” A source told Axios that the DOJ is actually investigating the Hoffman nonprofit organization that paid some of Carroll’s legal fees, and that Carroll “is not the subject of the investigation.”

Whether this reported investigation goes anywhere remains to be seen. But it does remind Americans just how deeply flawed and politically charged the entire case was from the very beginning.

Carroll accused Trump of raping her in a Bergdorf Goodman and then sued him for defamation when he denied it in 2019. Carroll notably declined to press criminal charges against Trump because, according to her, she “would find it disrespectful to the women who are down on the border who are being raped around the clock.” Carroll then filed a second lawsuit in 2022 after the state of New York temporarily changed a statute of limitations law.

That was only one of many suspect aspects of the crusade against Trump.

Keep reading

Lead Federal Prosecutor in James Comey Criminal Prosecution Resigns from Case

The lead federal prosecutor in James Comey’s criminal prosecution related to his Instagram assassination post has resigned from the case.

Matthew Petracca, an Assistant US Attorney in the Eastern District of North Carolina, has resigned from Comey’s case and other criminal cases.

According to NBC News, Petracca thought about leaving the DOJ, but decided to remain at the Department after taking a week off.

Ellis Boyle, Acting US Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, hired Petracca several months ago.

NBC News reported:

A rookie federal prosecutor who brought a case accusing former FBI Director James Comey of threatening President Donald Trump’s life by posting a photo of seashells on Instagram has stepped off the case.

Matthew Petracca, who had been recently hired as an assistant U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of North Carolina, is no longer on the Comey case, according to a court filing.

Petracca also dropped off of other criminal cases in the Eastern District of North Carolina in recent days, according to court filings. Petracca is a former Republican county committeeman in New Jersey whom Eastern District of North Carolina W. Ellis Boyle hired months ago, NBC News has reported. Boyle oversaw the highly criticized case, which will go to trial in October if it manages to survive legal challenges.

Petracca had contemplated leaving the Justice Department altogether, according to two people familiar with the matter, but instead remained a DOJ employee after taking a week off. Petracca had not responded to a previous request for comment on his status at the Justice Department, and did not respond to an additional request for comment on Friday. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of North Carolina did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Keep reading

Now We Know Who Was Really Behind E. Jean Carroll’s Bogus Allegations Against Trump

E. Jean Carroll’s rape allegations against President Donald Trump were never credible, and now she’s under investigation by the Department of Justice for perjury. Now, Byron York is digging into the case and has uncovered what could be the most elaborate political setup in history.

Trust me, the picture coming into focus is damning. Carroll has claimed, without any evidence, that Trump raped her sometime in 1995 or 1996. She can’t remember which year. Nothing about her allegations makes any sense. Are we supposed to believe that she simply stayed quiet about it through Trump’s rise to fame and politics, through his 2016 presidential run, and through the wave of #MeToo accusations that dominated the news cycle? Carroll said nothing about it for decades, and her stated reasons range from concern over her elderly Republican mother’s health to worries that speaking out might actually help Trump win key states.

Right. Sure.

It wasn’t until 2019 that she came forward with her bizarre allegations. But she didn’t tell the police, she didn’t go to an elected official, or even to a journalist. She chose to disclose it in a book. Why? Because no other option would generate royalties.

And Carroll had a history of grifting, too. Before the book even dropped, she was charging admission for her “Most Hideous Men in NYC Walking Tour,” a 90-minute #MeToo landmark stroll through Manhattan. The tour started at the Bergdorf Goodman entrance on 58th Street, which just so happens to be exactly where she claims she first encountered Trump the day of the alleged assault. She had been leading paying groups past that spot before she’d told the world what had supposedly happened there.

Now here’s where the origins of these allegations get genuinely interesting. Carroll, by then a certified celebrity of the anti-Trump resistance, attended a party at writer Molly Jong-Fast’s Manhattan home, a gathering the New York Times described as “Resistance Twitter come to life.” The guest list included George Conway, who apparently advised Carroll to sue Trump for defamation.

The case got a critical boost when the New York legislature passed the Adult Survivors Act in 2022, which allowed sexual assault claims to be filed regardless of expired statutes of limitations. Carroll had helped advocate for the bill. The Act went into effect on November 24, 2022, and within hours, Carroll filed a second suit, this time adding a rape allegation in addition to defamation.

Keep reading

Justice Department investigating whether Trump accuser E. Jean Carroll committed perjury, sources say

The Justice Department is conducting a criminal investigation into whether author E. Jean Carroll committed perjury in connection with her civil lawsuits against President Trump, sources familiar with the matter said.

The investigation is being led out of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois, one of the sources added. 

Carroll sued Mr. Trump in two civil lawsuits accusing him of sexual assault and defamation. In 2023, a jury found Mr. Trump liable for sexual assault and defamation for comments he made in 2022. Carroll was awarded $5 million in damages.

A second jury in 2024 found him liable for defamation in connection with comments he had made about Carroll in 2019, awarding her $83.3 million in damages. Both judgments were upheld on appeal.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who represented Mr. Trump on some of the litigation, is recused from the case, one source added.

The investigation was reported earlier by CNN. The theory of the case hinges on whether Carroll lied when she said in a 2022 deposition that she received no outside funding for her lawsuit, a source told CBS News.

It was later revealed that billionaire Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn, helped pay for some of her legal expenses.

CBS News has reached out to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois for comment on the investigation, as well as to Roberta Kaplan, the attorney who represented Carroll for the two lawsuits.

Carroll accused Mr. Trump of sexually assaulting her in a New York City department store dressing room during an encounter in the mid-1990s, an account which she published in a 2019 story for New York Magazine. In 2019, Carroll sued Mr. Trump for defamation, but the case stalled in court.

She then filed a second defamation lawsuit in 2022, adding a claim of rape under New York’s Adult Survivors Act.

Mr. Trump has repeatedly denied the sexual assault allegations.

Hoffman’s financial backing for Carroll’s lawsuit was first revealed in legal papers filed by Mr. Trump’s attorneys in April 2023, just ahead of the trial in the first defamation lawsuit, according to the New York Times.

When Mr. Trump’s attorneys brought the issue up on appeal, the appeals court found that Carroll had “plausibly represented” in her deposition “that she had forgotten about the limited outside funding counsel obtained.” 

Keep reading