signalmankenneth
Verified User
I would say it's a good possibility the Trump White House sold pardons?!! Trump abused the power of the pardon while in office too?!! The power of the pardon, needs a lot more oversight or just end this presidential power?!!
Yesterday’s New York Times has a fascinating article about Trump pardoning a major drug dealer and violent loan shark; it’s titled “A Troubling Trump Pardon and a Link to the Kushners.”
Like with so much reporting on Trump and his possible criminal activity while in the White House, it somehow manages to miss a possible larger picture, in this case the multiple allegations that Trump and Giuliani were selling pardons for $2 million a pop.
Although the allegations are well documented, including under oath in a lawsuit, there’s not a single mention of it in the Times article.
The reporters do, however, an excellent job of laying out a case for Jonathan Braun not being pardoned. First, he was a convicted major drug dealer who was less than 2 years into a 10 year prison term. Second, he was also allegedly running a mafia-like illegal loan shark operation, using threats of violence to make sure people paid up. As the Times notes:
“A Staten Islander with a history of violent threats, Mr. Braun had told a rabbi who owed him money: ‘I am going to make you bleed.’”
Third, he was apparently more than willing to use his great wealth to both get out of prison and escape the loan shark charges that the DOJ was preparing against him. Again, from the Times:
“Mr. Braun’s family had told confidants they were willing to spend millions of dollars to get him out of prison.”
In a lawsuit filed earlier this year by Noelle Dunphy, a former employee of Rudy Giuliani, she asserts under oath that Giuliani was offering people pardons for $2 million, the money to be split 50/50 between him and Trump. As the lawsuit itself claims:
“[Giuliani] asked Ms. Dunphy if she knew anyone in need of a pardon, telling her that he was selling pardons for $2 million, which he and President Trump would split.”
The suit further alleges Giuliani told Dunphy that she should avoid the normal channels for handling pardons, including the Office of the Pardon Attorney (yes, there is such a job in the White House), “because those communications would otherwise be subject to Freedom of Information Act requests.”
But Dunphy wasn’t the only one blowing the whistle that Trump was hustling pardons out of the White House for $2 million a pop. As Phillip Bump wrote for The Washington Post earlier this year:
“The allegation that Giuliani was offering pardons for $2 million has been made before. In January 2021, shortly before Trump left office, the New York Times reported that former CIA officer John Kiriakou had been ‘told that Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani could help him secure a pardon for $2 million.’ Kiriakou rejected the request, but an associate worried about the legality of such an offer tipped off the FBI. Kiriakou was not granted a pardon.”
When the Times reported on the pay-for-pardons scheme, Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) wrote to Trump’s acting Attorney General, Jeffrey Rosen, about his concern of criminal behavior in the White House:
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/thom-hartmann/108582/was-the-trump-white-house-selling-pardons
Yesterday’s New York Times has a fascinating article about Trump pardoning a major drug dealer and violent loan shark; it’s titled “A Troubling Trump Pardon and a Link to the Kushners.”
Like with so much reporting on Trump and his possible criminal activity while in the White House, it somehow manages to miss a possible larger picture, in this case the multiple allegations that Trump and Giuliani were selling pardons for $2 million a pop.
Although the allegations are well documented, including under oath in a lawsuit, there’s not a single mention of it in the Times article.
The reporters do, however, an excellent job of laying out a case for Jonathan Braun not being pardoned. First, he was a convicted major drug dealer who was less than 2 years into a 10 year prison term. Second, he was also allegedly running a mafia-like illegal loan shark operation, using threats of violence to make sure people paid up. As the Times notes:
“A Staten Islander with a history of violent threats, Mr. Braun had told a rabbi who owed him money: ‘I am going to make you bleed.’”
Third, he was apparently more than willing to use his great wealth to both get out of prison and escape the loan shark charges that the DOJ was preparing against him. Again, from the Times:
“Mr. Braun’s family had told confidants they were willing to spend millions of dollars to get him out of prison.”
In a lawsuit filed earlier this year by Noelle Dunphy, a former employee of Rudy Giuliani, she asserts under oath that Giuliani was offering people pardons for $2 million, the money to be split 50/50 between him and Trump. As the lawsuit itself claims:
“[Giuliani] asked Ms. Dunphy if she knew anyone in need of a pardon, telling her that he was selling pardons for $2 million, which he and President Trump would split.”
The suit further alleges Giuliani told Dunphy that she should avoid the normal channels for handling pardons, including the Office of the Pardon Attorney (yes, there is such a job in the White House), “because those communications would otherwise be subject to Freedom of Information Act requests.”
But Dunphy wasn’t the only one blowing the whistle that Trump was hustling pardons out of the White House for $2 million a pop. As Phillip Bump wrote for The Washington Post earlier this year:
“The allegation that Giuliani was offering pardons for $2 million has been made before. In January 2021, shortly before Trump left office, the New York Times reported that former CIA officer John Kiriakou had been ‘told that Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani could help him secure a pardon for $2 million.’ Kiriakou rejected the request, but an associate worried about the legality of such an offer tipped off the FBI. Kiriakou was not granted a pardon.”
When the Times reported on the pay-for-pardons scheme, Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) wrote to Trump’s acting Attorney General, Jeffrey Rosen, about his concern of criminal behavior in the White House:
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/thom-hartmann/108582/was-the-trump-white-house-selling-pardons
