Tag: taxes

European Researcher Bernadette Conrads Uncovers the Shadowy Reach of USAID Across Europe — Deep State Dollars, Election Meddling, and Censorship Campaigns Exposed

In an explosive sit-down interview with The Gateway Pundit’s Jim Hoft back in March, European researcher Bernadette Conrads delivered a chilling exposé on the sprawling influence of USAID and its deep state-funded allies operating across the European continent.

Conrads, who currently serves as Head of Communications for MEP Petr Bystron of Germany’s populist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), has spent the last five years tracing a tangled web of taxpayer-funded NGOs, censorship initiatives, and foreign election interference stretching from Washington, D.C. to Brussels.

While USAID may present itself as a harmless humanitarian initiative, Conrads warns it’s anything but.

“Foreign aid? No. It’s not about aid—it’s about control,” said Conrads. “It’s about censorship, regime change, and election interference.”

Her findings confirm what conservatives in America have long suspected: USAID and its sister organizations, like the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), according to Conrads, are merely fronts for the CIA and other unelected power centers in the U.S. government.

These groups allegedly launder influence through NGO cover operations, rig foreign elections, silence dissenting media, and export the very same “deep state” corruption President Donald Trump has vowed to dismantle.

Conrads: “I think I’ve been interested in this topic for about five years—not specifically in USAID. I’m not an expert on USAID, but on these kinds of structures. There are many money pots like USAID. There’s also the National Endowment for Democracy. There are plenty of these organizations—organizations that work with the CIA and are deep state entities active around the world.

They create regime changes, control our media, and use so-called NGOs as covers for their operations. They call them NGOs—Non-Governmental Organizations—although they are funded by U.S. taxpayers. That’s a very crazy thing.

I’ve followed these structures over the past few years many times because I was constantly confronted with them. I faced media censorship—not directly by our governments, who also attempt such control—but very strongly by organizations like these, which are funded by USAID.”

Back in January, President Trump froze all foreign aid spending on Day 4 of his second term. Less than two weeks later, Elon Musk—appointed by Trump to lead the newly empowered DOGE group—completely shut down USAID. Musk called it “an organization beyond repair.”

In response, a rogue leftist judge in D.C. ordered Trump to reinstate $2 billion in aid payments—an absurd ruling that has ignited a new constitutional crisis over who really runs the country: the elected president or a network of unelected bureaucrats and activist judges.

“This isn’t about charity,” Hoft said during the interview. “This is about global control. About silencing voices like Gateway Pundit—using American dollars and foreign fronts to do it.”

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Canada hands big win to Trump, suspends U.S. tech firm tax that had roiled trade talks

Canada announced Sunday night it was suspending a tax on U.S. technology firms that had caused President Trump to suspend trade negotiations between the two nations, handing a major victory to the American president.

The Canadian government said it was suspending enforcement of the tax that was due to be collected starting Monday, saying the action was taken “in anticipation of a mutually beneficial comprehensive trade arrangement with the United States.”

Prime Minister Mark Carney informed the Trump administration of the decision, and the two sides plan to resume trade talks on or about July 21.

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Trump admin targets ‘ghost students,’ AI scammers stealing tens of millions in federal college aid

The Department of Education is cracking down on “ghost students,” AI scammers and others whom they say have recently swindled of tens-of-millions of dollars from the federal government – including roughly $8.4 million alone from California community colleges.

Within California’s system of 116 community colleges, 31% of applications last year – or 1.2 million – were found to be likely fraudulent, according to data from the office of the chancellor for the college system.

What makes the system vulnerable is that anyone who applies is admitted and more students not having to attend class as a result of the increase in remote learning since the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The scammers, with the help of stolen identities, bots and artificial intelligence join classes and stay enrolled until they receive their financial aid checks, according to The Los Angeles Times.

“The biggest target for fraud rings tends to be community colleges and lower-cost institutions,” Jason Williams, an official with the Education Department’s Office of Inspector General, said on a recent agency podcast. “This is because their tuition costs are lower than other schools, which increases the student aid award balance for the fraudulent student.”

While prevalent in California, the problem of fake applications is nationwide, with reports of fraud rings in states including Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Missouri and Nevada. 

The Education Department reported in May nearly $90 million in disbursements recently to ineligible recipients across the U.S., including thousands of deceased individuals receiving some form of payment. 

In Mississippi, a mother and daughter team recruited anyone in the area willing to participate. They then used these identities to apply for student aid, register for classes and collect the checks when the money was disbursed. They were later put in prison after obtaining $2.5 million. 

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Federal security grants to US synagogues to resume after two-month Trump freeze

The US Federal Emergency Management Agency has lifted a freeze on security funding for religious institutions this week, ending a months-long pause that drew alarm from Jewish groups that had advocated for expanded federal security funding.

The Nonprofit Security Grant Program provides funding for synagogues, schools and Jewish community centers to pay for security measures to protect their buildings from attack. Congress provided $274.5 million for the program in 2025.

Reimbursement payments to participating institutions were halted in March as part of an overall funding freeze on FEMA, the federal disaster relief agency. At the time, nearly 80 members of Congress from both parties signed a letter urging the Trump administration to reverse course.

Nechamia Dsatmar on October 13, 2023. (Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)

JTA — The US Federal Emergency Management Agency has lifted a freeze on security funding for religious institutions this week, ending a months-long pause that drew alarm from Jewish groups that had advocated for expanded federal security funding.

The Nonprofit Security Grant Program provides funding for synagogues, schools and Jewish community centers to pay for security measures to protect their buildings from attack. Congress provided $274.5 million for the program in 2025.

Reimbursement payments to participating institutions were halted in March as part of an overall funding freeze on FEMA, the federal disaster relief agency. At the time, nearly 80 members of Congress from both parties signed a letter urging the Trump administration to reverse course.00:20 / 37:55

That appears to have happened this week, Jewish Insider reported on Friday, citing an email sent by Jewish Federations of North America to its member federations.

“Nonprofit Security Grant Program funds are essential to keeping our communities safe, especially amid rising antisemitism,” Karen Paikin Barall, the Jewish Federations of North America vice president for government relations, said in an emailed statement. “We are relieved that the government’s review process has concluded and that funds will now be released, allowing nonprofits to be reimbursed for critical security investments they’ve already made.”

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Administrator Kelly Loeffler Announces Full-Scale Audit of SBA 8(a) Program After DOJ Finds Over $550 Million in Contracts Linked to Bribery and Fraud Scheme

A USAID official and three government contractors pleaded guilty to a decade-long bribery scheme involving over $550 million in contracts, according to the Justice Department.

According to court documents, beginning in 2013, USAID contracting officer Roderick Watson agreed with corporate executive Darryl Britt to receive bribes in exchange for Watson’s influence to award contracts to a small business named Apprio and its subcontractor Vistant.

Watson received more than $1 million in bribes to steer no-bid contracts to Apprio and Vistant.

Wilson and Britt used the Small Business Administration’s 8(a) contracting program, which helps ‘socially and economically disadvantaged businesses’ bid on contracts, to make this massive scheme possible.

Per the DOJ:

Four men, including a government contracting officer for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and three owners and presidents of companies, have pleaded guilty for their roles in a decade-long bribery scheme involving at least 14 prime contracts worth over $550 million in U.S. taxpayer dollars.

  • Roderick Watson, 57, of Woodstock, Maryland, who worked as a USAID contracting officer, pleaded guilty to bribery of a public official;
  • Walter Barnes, 46, of Potomac, Maryland, who was the owner and president of PM Consulting Group LLC doing business as Vistant (Vistant), a certified small business under the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) 8(a) contracting program, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official and securities fraud;
  • Darryl Britt, 64, of Myakka City, Florida, who was the owner and president of Apprio, Inc. (Apprio), a certified small business under the SBA 8(a) contracting program, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official; and
  • Paul Young, 62, of Columbia, Maryland, who was the president of a subcontractor to Vistant and Apprio, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official.

On Friday, Kelly Loeffler, the head of the Small Business Administration announced the SBA will perform a full-scale audit of the 8(a) race-based contracting program.

Loeffler released this statement Friday.

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US Terminating All Trade Talks With Canada Over New Tax on US Tech Firms

President Donald Trump announced on Friday that the United States is halting all trade negotiations with Canada due to Ottawa’s decision to implement a new tax on American tech companies.

“We have just been informed that Canada… has just announced that they are putting a Digital Services Tax on our American Technology Companies, which is a direct and blatant attack on our Country,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.

“Based on this egregious Tax, we are hereby terminating ALL discussions on Trade with Canada, effective immediately,” the US president added.

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NYC Mayoral Candidate Mamdani: Tax Whites and the Rich

Socialist New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani is not shy about playing race and class cards in his campaign platform proposal to hike property taxes for “richer and whiter neighborhoods.”

Calling it a “soak-the-rich” proposal, the New York Post described the platform as an effort to fix the city’s “notoriously skewed property tax system,” where high-end brownstones are assessed at lower rates than homes and rentals in lower-income neighborhoods.

The race-based language is contained in Mamdani’s extensive “Stop the Squeeze on NYC Homeowners” campaign material.

It promises that a Mamdani administration will:

Shift the tax burden from overtaxed homeowners in the outer boroughs to more expensive homes in richer and whiter neighborhoods: The property tax system is unbalanced because assessment levels are artificially capped, so homeowners in expensive neighborhoods pay less than their fair share. The Mayor can fix this by pushing class assessment percentages down for everyone and adjusting rates up, effectively lowering tax payments for homeowners in neighborhoods like Jamaica and Brownsville while raising the amount paid in the most expensive Brooklyn brownstones.

The Post account acknowledged that “Democrats and many Republicans have long pushed to fix the out-of-whack system that ends up hitting poorer, often largely black and brown neighborhoods, with higher property taxes than their neighbors in swanky areas that tend to be majority Caucasian.”

But the candidate’s language drew fire from conservative critics.

Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon threatened to investigate Zohran Mamdani over his proposal to tax ‘whiter neighborhoods’  if he becomes the mayor, calling race-based policies “illegal.”

One former northeast resident, now a Florida-based commentator, called the candidate a “racist” on X.

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Former NY DEI Director and Hochul Aide Linda Sun CHARGED in Multimillion-Dollar PPE Fraud and Kickback Scheme

While New Yorkers were gasping for N-95 masks and latex gloves in the dark spring of 2020, the woman once tasked with “diversity, equity & inclusion” inside the Hochul-Cuomo political machine was allegedly busy funneling state contracts to her own relatives—and pocketing the profits.

The Gateway Pundit reported last year that the FBI conducted a pre-dawn raid on the $3.5 million Long Island home.

The lavish five-bedroom home, located in a gated community called Stone Hill in Long Island, was searched thoroughly by agents, though it remains undisclosed whether any items were seized during the operation.

A federal grand jury has returned a second superseding indictment against Linda Sun, former Director of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion for New York and later Deputy Chief of Staff to Gov. Kathy Hochul, along with her husband Christopher “Chris” Hu.

Prosecutors say the pair raked in more than $8 million in kickbacks, bribes and laundered cash by steering COVID-19 personal-protective-equipment (PPE) contracts to companies run by Sun’s cousin and Hu’s business partner.

The new counts include honest-services wire fraud, conspiracy, bribery, money-laundering, and—just for good measure—tax evasion for Hu. Arraignment is set for Monday, June 30 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

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Big Data Centers Are Booming, But Secret Deals Draw Local Opposition

From Georgia to Oregon, New England to New Mexico, data center projects are drawing opposition in local government hearings by residents concerned about the voracious demand for electricity, water consumption, and noise. Critics also argue that data centers don’t produce the jobs other land uses generate.

In Texas, people in small towns question data center development in the broader context of rapid rural industrialization.

In Pennsylvania, ad hoc groups say data centers are tapping into nearby natural gas fields, increasing the frequency of fracking, and straining water supplies.

In Indiana, Minnesota, Kansas, Nebraska, and across the country, residents say the scale and proximity of these high-tech campuses degrade their neighborhoods and devalue properties.

Objections vary, depending on proposal and site, but a common complaint is state and local governments offering data center projects tax incentives that are often shielded from public scrutiny through nondisclosure agreements.

Companies say these pacts shield proprietary corporate intelligence, but the perceived lack of transparency fosters suspicion and anger when residents realize local planners are set to approve a proposal they knew little to nothing about until it appeared to be a done deal.

“Just from our experience, it seems like one of the big concerns is that, yeah, there is no community outreach,” Kamil Cook, Public Citizen’s Texas climate and clean energy associate, told the Epoch Times. “There’s no method by which the community can be informed in a way that actually makes it seem like their voice is valued and that they have a choice in these matters.”

Much of this local opposition appears rooted in the complaint that people “weren’t informed to begin with, were ignored at some point,” said Joe Warnimont, who co-authored a February HostingAdvice.com survey. The survey of 800 people in 16 states found that 93 percent agreed that “cutting-edge AI data centers are vital to the United States,” but only 35 percent want one in their town.

“The main insights are there is clearly a disconnect between what the local residents experience and what is being sold to these communities from developers,” Warnimont told The Epoch Times.

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Zohran Mamdani Wants to Spend $65 Million on ‘Gender Affirming Care’ – Including for Minors

Zohran Mamdani, the Muslim communist that just won the Democratic nomination for mayor of New York City, wants to spend $65 million on ‘gender affirming care’ including for minors. In case you’re not aware, gender affirming care is a term that means butchering the otherwise healthy body parts of a person in order to ‘transition.’

This was one of the issues that came up repeatedly in the 2024 election and the American people made their opinion quite clear. Most people are against this. It’s one of the 80/20 issues that have come up repeatedly in recent months.

Mamdani is choosing the 20 percent side of this issue, which should surprise absolutely no one.

The New York Post reported:

Zohran Mamdani wants to spend $65M on trans medical treatment — including for minors — if elected NYC mayor

Mayoral hopeful Zohran Mamdani wants to spend $65 million in taxpayer funds on transgender treatment — including for minors — if he’s elected to lead New York City…

About $57 million would be allotted for public hospitals, community clinics, federally qualified health centers and nonprofits with another $8 million for more expanded services, the website states.

The surging Democratic socialist contender first unveiled his plan to “deliver care, opportunity, and protection for LGBTQIA+ New Yorkers” last month following a Trans Community Town Hall with advocates…

Mamdani defended the spending plan as necessary, citing how private Big Apple hospitals had stopped providing gender-affirming care for minors under threats from the Trump administration earlier this year.

“LGBTQIA+ New Yorkers are under attack by the Trump administration and Zohran is going to stand up for them as Mayor,” a campaign spokesperson said in a statement to The Post on Monday.

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