Something to Know - 10 November

It seems that it is now fashionable to pull out the collection of abuses perpetuated or created by the Trump Administration.   There is going to come a day, either very soon or eventually, when the Democrats assume the control of the levers of power in Washington DC.   The volume or degree of corruption should spur Congress to immediately begin to clean house and refurbish and create or amend laws to plug loopholes on the behavior by errant elected officials.   Having Trump as an example of a president who flouted, ignored, and denied that the Constitution did not apply to him is enough to build a solid wall of controls over the leader of the executive branch.   With the corruption fresh in our minds, we should demand and constantly push that Congress to do so.   I write in the tense that Trump will fall, and fall badly.   I guess it takes an example of just how bad and weak we become with a nut-job authoritarian to make us realize how to reform our Constitution.   With this in mind, Christopher Armitage provides a hard-hitting piece that speaks to our sensibility with a desire to clean up the biggest mess ever created in the White House.   

Christopher Armitage from The Existentialist Republic <cmarmitage@substack.com>	6:04 AM (5 hours ago)
to me

	Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more The Bombshell Inside Trump's $1.3 Billion Pardon Market The Pardon for Pay President Christopher Armitage Nov 9   READ IN APP   Katherine Faulders/ABC News In December 2020, federal prosecutors unsealed evidence of a presidential pardon bribery scheme during Trump's first term. Court documents revealed a "bribery conspiracy" involving "substantial political contribution in exchange for a presidential pardon." No charges were filed. Four years later, Trump returned to office and issued clemency to more than 1,600 individuals in his first 10 months. For context, Obama issued 1,927 grants over eight years. Biden issued fewer than 200 over four years. Trump's first term produced 237 over four years. Trump's current pace exceeds all modern presidents combined. These pardons have eliminated $1.3 billion in court-ordered restitution and fines owed to crime victims. Documented payments to Trump, his family businesses, and his allies preceded many of them. Trevor Milton founded Nikola, an electric truck company. In October 2022, a jury convicted him of securities fraud after prosecutors proved he deceived investors with a viral video showing a prototype truck appearing to drive under its own power. The truck was actually rolling downhill after being towed to the top. The jury deliberated for hours after a two-month trial. Federal prosecutors sought $695.2 million in restitution from Milton, including $680 million to Nikola shareholders and $15.2 million to wire fraud victim Peter Hicks. Many investors lost retirement savings during the COVID-19 pandemic and waited for repayment. In October 2024, Milton and his wife donated more than $1.8 million to Trump's reelection campaign. Milton personally contributed $920,000 to the Trump 47 Committee and $284,000 to the RNC. The combined total represented one of the largest individual contributions to Trump that cycle. Five months later, on March 27, 2025, Trump personally called Milton to inform him of his pardon. Trump granted it the next day. The pardon eliminated both Milton's four-year prison sentence and the $695.2 million restitution obligation. Investors will never be repaid. The return on Milton's "investment" to Trump was 37,400 percent. This is the America that republicans are desperate to make permanent. Upgrade to paid Trump stated at a press conference that Milton's only crime was supporting "a gentleman named Donald Trump for president." The timing established a price. Donation in October. Pardon in March. The transaction was complete. Paul Walczak ran nursing homes in Florida. Between 2013 and 2016, he withheld approximately $7.4 million from employees' paychecks that should have gone to federal tax payments. He also failed to pay $3.5 million in employer tax obligations. The total tax loss to the federal government exceeded $10 million. Walczak used the stolen funds to purchase a yacht and finance a lavish lifestyle. Low-wage healthcare workers whose taxes were stolen faced IRS penalties and credit damage. A federal judge sentenced Walczak to 18 months in prison and ordered him to pay $4.4 million in restitution. His mother is Elizabeth Fago, a major Republican fundraiser. In early April 2025, Fago attended a Mar-a-Lago fundraiser where tickets cost $1 million per person. Twelve days after Walczak's sentencing, on April 23, Trump pardoned him before he served a single day. The pardon eliminated the restitution. Those healthcare workers will never be repaid. House Judiciary Committee Democrats calculated that the $1 million Fago paid for Mar-a-Lago access was "exceptionally well-invested." Changpeng Zhao founded Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange. In November 2023, he pleaded guilty to money laundering violations. Federal prosecutors proved Binance allowed criminals to use the platform, including terrorists from Hamas, drug traffickers, and child sex abusers. Binance paid a $4.3 billion settlement. Zhao served four months in prison and paid a $50 million fine. The Existentialist Republic is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and supporting our work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Upgrade to paid During Trump's 2024 campaign, Binance became the infrastructure provider for World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency venture owned by Trump's family that generated $57 million for him that year. Binance wrote the code for Trump's family stablecoin, establishing a direct business relationship between Zhao's company and Trump's financial interests while Trump was running for president. After Trump won the election, Binance paid $450,000 per month to lobbying firms seeking Zhao's pardon while an Abu Dhabi state-backed firm agreed to invest $2 billion using Trump's stablecoin in a deal facilitated by Binance. On October 23, 2025, Trump pardoned Zhao. When Scott Pelley asked Trump about Zhao on 60 Minutes, Trump claimed: "I don't know who he is. I don't think I ever met him." The pardon removed the criminal conviction from a man whose company was paying Trump's family and lobbying for his release simultaneously. P. Scott Jenkins served as sheriff of Culpeper County, Virginia, for more than a decade. In December 2024, a jury convicted him on 12 counts including conspiracy, honest services fraud, and bribery. Prosecutors proved Jenkins accepted more than $75,000 in bribes to appoint Northern Virginia businessmen as auxiliary deputy sheriffs. He sold law enforcement badges and credentials to wealthy men who had no law enforcement training, underwent no background checks, and provided no services to the county. Three of the men involved, including two undercover FBI agents, had already pleaded guilty before Jenkins went to trial. Prosecutors also presented evidence that Jenkins pressured local officials to restore gun rights to a convicted felon who had paid him bribes. A federal judge sentenced Jenkins to 10 years in prison in March 2025. Prosecutors stated Jenkins "repeatedly violated the public's trust by exploiting his official powers for personal gain" and that after being caught, he "sought to manipulate the judicial process and to evade responsibility for his crimes by lying to the Court and the jury." Jenkins was scheduled to report to federal prison on May 27, 2025. On May 26, the day before, Trump pardoned him. Ed Martin, Trump's pardon attorney, posted on social media: "No MAGA left behind." The phrase made the selection criteria explicit. Political loyalty determines who receives a pardon. Criminals everywhere now have an incentive program to do the bidding of MAGA. Officer Michael Fanone served 20 years with the DC Metropolitan Police. On January 6, 2021, rioters dragged him into the mob outside the Capitol. They beat him unconscious, tased him repeatedly at the base of his skull, and caused a heart attack. He sustained a traumatic brain injury and PTSD severe enough to force his retirement. Daniel Rodriguez pleaded guilty to driving a stun gun into Fanone's neck multiple times. A federal judge sentenced Rodriguez to 12 years in prison. Trump pardoned Rodriguez along with more than 1,500 other January 6 participants. Fanone is now filing protective orders against Rodriguez and other attackers who walked free. If you find this article worthwhile, check out my most recent book: Conservatism: America's Personality Disorder https://a.co/d/6d4b1uH "Six individuals who assaulted me as I did my job on January 6 will now walk free," Fanone stated. "My family, my children and myself are less safe today because of Donald Trump and his supporters." The evidence of a pardon bribery scheme extends beyond individual cases. On December 1, 2020, Chief U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell unsealed court documents revealing that federal prosecutors had seized over 50 digital devices during Trump's first term. The devices contained evidence of what prosecutors described as a "bribery conspiracy" involving "substantial political contribution in exchange for a presidential pardon." The investigation focused on two individuals who acted as unregistered lobbyists to senior White House officials. Court documents showed individuals sought clemency "because of past and future political contributions." Judge Howell ordered the Justice Department to act or provide more details by November 2020. All names in the court filing were redacted. A DOJ official stated: "No government official was or is currently a subject or target of the investigation disclosed in this filing." No charges have ever been publicly filed. The investigation appears to have been closed despite extensive documented evidence of a bribery scheme. A January 2021 New York Times investigation provides additional documentation of the pardon market. Reporters interviewed over 36 lobbyists and lawyers who described a systematic operation where Trump allies collected "tens of thousands to millions of dollars" to lobby for pardons. The prices were known. The access was for sale. Fred Daibes provides the clearest documentation. A jury convicted Daibes of bribing Senator Bob Menendez with gold bars. Daibes paid $1 million to Javelin Advisors, a lobbying firm led by Keith Schiller. Schiller served as Trump's director of Oval Office operations and worked as Trump Organization security director for 18 years. The $1 million bought access to Trump for pardon lobbying. NBC News reported that multiple people had knowledge of $5 million offers to lobbying firms to get cases directly to Trump. Margaret Love served as U.S. Pardon Attorney under Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. She told the Times: "This kind of off-books influence peddling, special-privilege system denies consideration to the hundreds of ordinary people who have obediently lined up as required by Justice Department rules, and is a basic violation of the longstanding effort to make this process at least look fair." The Supreme Court removed the final barrier to pardon bribery in 2024. The Court's decision in Trump v. United States established broad presidential immunity for "official acts."

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Juan Matute

 C C C

Claremont, California

Something to Know - 9 November Part 2

Mary Geddry really hits on the ugliness of Trump and his cronies running around knocking down East Wing Walls, and doing everything he can to enrichen the already rich, while doing nothing but raise taxes on the middle class, while cutting or eliminating any all social programs on the middle class, and eliminating assistance and concern for the ones who need help the most.    The examples of his disregard for the Constitution fill the pages of history now, and it is thiso history of an era in our past to which he is being compared, and which will bring him down.   

Geddry's Newsletter a Publication of nGenium <marygeddry@substack.com>	7:29 AM (2 hours ago)
to me

	The Napkin and the Noose How Laffer's curve, Piketty's math, and Trump's Mar-a-Lago feasts turned America into a banquet for billionaires and a breadline for everyone else. Mary Geddry Nov 9   READ IN APP   Good morning! Elizabeth Wick got the email she'd been dreading. Her health-insurance premium is about to leap from $862 to $1,380 a month, and the federal subsidy that keeps her practice afloat will evaporate at year's end unless Congress acts. She's a therapist for sexual-assault survivors, which makes this all the more poetic: Washington is assaulting her finances while she tries to help others recover from theirs. She says health insurance will determine what her life looks like. Multiply Wick by 24 million ACA enrollees and you have a country on the edge of a health-care cliff. The "enhanced subsidies" that made Obamacare barely affordable expire December 31, and the Trump administration's government shutdown has turned renewal talks into hostage negotiations. Republicans say they'll discuss it after reopening the government; Democrats say they won't reopen until the aid is extended. Meanwhile, insurers are hiking rates an average of 26 percent, and the KFF analysis shows premiums for many will more than double. So, in the richest nation on earth, the question confronting millions is whether to pay rent or stay alive. A 63-year-old cancer patient in Missouri says her new premium will be $1,758 a month. A retired Maryland couple dropped coverage entirely because the cheapest policy costs half their income and "doesn't cover much anyway." Across the country, people are deciding whether chest pain merits an ER visit or just another prayer. The American dream has become a deductible with legs. And as those choices tighten, the regime's media ecosystem is accidentally letting the mask slip. Fox News aired footage of mile-long lines outside a Cleveland food bank, because SNAP benefits for 42 million Americans have been frozen by the shutdown, before pivoting to a fluff piece about Mar-a-Lago's latest indulgence. MeidasTouch spliced the two images together: emaciated Americans in the cold and, a few hundred miles south, Trump's guests toasting themselves with champagne and snow crab claws under chandeliers. Just a week ago, the same crowd packed into a "Roaring '20s" Great Gatsby gala, complete with synchronized swimmers performing "God Bless the USA" and a $64,000 Thailand vacation auctioned off between verses. The theme for that one was "A little party never killed nobody," which is technically true if you're rich enough to outsource your dying. And the guest list keeps getting richer. Last night's glittering dinner doubled as a celebration of Argentine libertarian president Javier Milei, who flew in fresh from CPAC to rave about his $40 billion U.S. bailout, the one underwritten by taxpayers now choosing between food and insulin. Milei, Trump's new favorite apostle of "anarcho-capitalism," told the cheering donors that socialism is the enemy while he clinked glasses with the man literally cutting America's safety net. It was the perfect tableau of modern empire: the strongmen eat stone crab, the poor eat nothing, and the only trickle-down is champagne runoff on a marble floor. The irony's radioactive: Trump's regime slashes food aid and health subsidies while serving the world's most expensive shellfish beneath a banner celebrating the decade that birthed the Great Depression. It isn't hypocrisy, it's the purest expression of Arthur Laffer's napkin religion, the idea that cutting taxes for the wealthy will somehow make everyone richer. We've been living under that napkin for forty years, and now it's soaked through with grease and contempt. Laffer's curve promised prosperity through starvation, and every administration since Reagan has traced its slope straight into the abyss. Taxes on capital fell, public wealth shriveled, and the state's remaining purpose became protecting those crab claws from confiscation. Piketty eventually did the math Laffer refused to check. R > G, he wrote, the rate of return on capital exceeds the growth of the real economy, and once that happens, inequality stops being an accident and becomes a feature. We now live in Piketty's dystopia: capital earning 5 percent while the economy limps along at 1 percent, and the political class calling it freedom. The "free market" has become a feudal lease system where the lords collect rent in perpetuity and the peasants are told that if they just work harder, they might one day afford insulin. Even the government's data are collapsing under the weight of its own ideology. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is gutted, 40 percent of the Consumer Price Index now "estimated" because Trump fired the statisticians, and the job reports are postponed indefinitely "due to the shutdown." Inflation numbers are literally being made up, which is the perfect endpoint of Laffer economics: when you hollow out the state enough, you can claim prosperity by spreadsheet. In Washington, Trump Media just posted a $54.8 million quarterly loss, roughly equal to the GDP of a small island nation. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is hollowed out, 40 percent of the Consumer Price Index is now "estimated" because data collectors were fired, so inflation numbers are literally made up. The regime's answer? Propose a 50-year mortgage so Americans can spend half a century paying interest to banks while pretending to own homes. Even MAGA commentators called it "indentured servitude with a yard." Workers are still waiting for job reports that never arrive because the shutdown "prevents publication." When the government stops counting the unemployed, they simply vanish, Schrödinger's labor force. It's the first economy run entirely on vibes, spreadsheets, and lies. If you want a physical metaphor for the entire Trump presidency, look no further than the East Wing of the White House, now a pile of rubble possibly laced with asbestos. The administration bulldozed the 1902 structure without a public abatement plan, contracting an unlicensed firm after refusing union labor. Senators, health advocates, and journalists have all requested the safety documentation; the White House has produced exactly zero pages. Witnesses describe clouds of dust drifting over the grounds while Trump's favorite contractor shut down its website and hid its records. It's almost poetic: tear down history, poison the air, deny the paperwork, and call it progress. Trump even wrote in 1997 that asbestos was unfairly maligned by "the mob." Now his EPA director is reconsidering the national ban. As a metaphor, you can't improve on it, a government dismantling its own house, insisting the toxins are imaginary, and daring the workers to breathe deeper. Across the Atlantic, Ireland delivered a reminder that the rest of the world still notices when moral rot starts to stink. The Football Association of Ireland voted 74-7 to urge UEFA to suspend Israel from European competitions for violating international law by fielding clubs in illegal settlements and ignoring racism rules. It's a sports motion, yes, but it's also a statement that conscience doesn't have to wait for Congress. Within hours, U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham thundered on X that Ireland would "pay a heavy price", economic threats over a soccer vote, accusing Dublin of "punishing the Jewish people 80 years after the Holocaust." The bluster only underscored the point: when compassion defies empire, empire reaches for its wallet. Ireland's action mirrors what's happening in cities worldwide: fans, artists, and unions doing what governments won't, demanding accountability for Gaza's devastation while Washington pretends not to see the plumes of smoke. So here we are: Americans choosing between food and medicine while their president parties among synchronized swimmers; a White House literally and figuratively filled with asbestos; a Senate threatening allies for voting with their conscience; and a nation that once exported democracy now exporting carcinogens and debt. The fireproofing has failed. The house is burning. And somewhere in Mar-a-Lago, the band is still playing "God Bless the USA."

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Juan Matute

 C C C

Claremont, California

Something to Know - 9 November, Part 1

There are two separate authors who have written timely and spot-on pieces.   So, the first one is by Jay Kuo, who explains why Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown voted as she did to block a Republican maneuver with a SNAP bill that would find a temporary benefit, but a disaster for in the long run.   To many, it would appear that Brown was in cahoots with those who want to starve our nation's poor.   Jay Kuo provides the story.  (part two will follow shortly)

The Status Kuo <statuskuo@substack.com>	7:50 AM (1 hour ago)
to me

	Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more What's Up With That Stay by Justice Jackson?! And why we should all take a breath Jay Kuo Nov 9   READ IN APP   On Friday night, a large chunk of liberal America freaked out. The Supreme Court had issued an administrative stay upon the district court's order, which had directed the White House to start feeding millions of Americans. But then it got worse: It turned out, the stay was issued by none other than Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, acting alone. It was a collective WTF moment. Why would she do that? Had she crossed over somehow?! On social media, I posted a piece by Prof. Steve Vladeck of Georgetown Law that I thought explained what had happened. But it turned out to be a bit too dense for many non-lawyers to process, so yesterday I wrote out an explanation in an attempt to make the explainer more accessible. I'm reprinting it here. But before we get into it, I want to urge everyone to start from a basic premise: Justice Jackson was trying to HELP not HURT here. People who leapt to the conclusion that she is part of some evil SCOTUS plot to deny food to starving children need to take a breath. This is exactly the reaction that the media's click bait headlines sought to drive. I find it helpful to assume goodwill from the three liberal judges and work backward from there. It actually is a good practice with anyone whose heart and head are in the right place—particularly in the comments section on social media. With that out of the way, let's walk through what happened. The background A federal judge ordered the government to fully fund SNAP benefits for November. The government decided to appeal that order. That was the really basic evil thing that started this all off. Why appeal a judge's order asking you to feed hungry people, like you should do under the law anyway? Meanwhile, the White House also asked for an "administrative stay" — meaning a temporary pause of the judge's order so that the appeals court can consider the appeal. That was a dangerous move, as I'll explain below. The appeals court said "no" to the administrative stay late Friday afternoon. So the government appealed that to SCOTUS. The way it works is this: For each circuit, the justice assigned to oversee it makes an initial determination on emergency requests. Justice Jackson handles such matters for the First Circuit, and on Friday evening she stepped in and issued the administrative stay. But, but, but…why?! Fair question. To understand, we need to play a bit of Chess. Or in this case, Hearts. Taking the trick even if it's painful Justice Jackson's order said in effect: "We're pausing the judge's order while the First Circuit considers the stay-motion, and this pause will end 48 hours after the First Circuit decides."  This was the right move to make. Justice Jackson used the tools she had to force a faster process rather than let things drag indefinitely. Why is that? If the district judge's order were allowed to go into effect immediately, it might get legally messy. And if the case got delayed as a result, millions might go without benefits. But what could cause that delay? If Justice Jackson didn't grant the administrative stay, there was a strong possibility that five radical justices on SCOTUS would step in and grant one anyway. They're allowed to do that, and she knew this. And here's the thing: They could do it potentially with no deadline. The district court order could conceivably languish in legal limbo for a long time. So she took control of the case the only way she could. If this were a Hearts game, she "took the trick"—and some heart points in the process—but also and critically assumed control of play. Now the pause is temporary, it ends 48 hours after the appeals court acts, and she has signaled the appeals court must act quickly. Her other option was to deny the administrative stay, but then as I discussed above the full Court could weigh in to overrule her. If the full Court granted the administrative stay, it might have stretched out for weeks (or more) before a decision came—while still blocking the judge's order. She reduced the chance of that by acting. Justice Jackson's stay has an automatic time-limit, so the appeals court is under pressure. In that sense, she chose "the least-bad option" given the messy facts and timing. What now? Justice Jackson's stay wasn't a final ruling on whether the government is right or wrong. The stay simply pauses the lower court's order while the appeals process catches up. That's order should come out, perhaps even by tonight or tomorrow. She definitely wasn't endorsing the lower court's order, nor was she giving the government a permanent win. The stay is quite temporary, and she's hoping the First Circuit issues a full opinion soon. Appellate procedure can be hard even for experienced lawyers to parse at times. I'm certain her clerks and she weighed all options and gamed this out before she acted. We don't know how SCOTUS will rule in the end, but she took away their power to delay the decision indefinitely by setting out the timeline herself. It's ironic because Justice Jackson is actually one of the biggest critics of administrative stays issued on the emergency or "shadow" docket. And here she was, cleverly using the system against the majority. ___ One cool update before I go: My fundraiser with host Heather Cox Richardson (featuring Lin-Manuel Miranda and Hillary Clinton) raised $28,000 earlier this week. Woohoo! The folks from Latino Vote are thrilled. They keep emailing me updates, marveling at the rush of support from around the country. The event on November 18 in NYC still has tickets available, and I'd love to push that number still higher! And if you can't attend or just want to donate a smaller amount, you can also do so. Every bit helps. The Latino Vote is the most crucial swing bloc for the 2026 midterms. If you want your money to be used smartly and strategically, backing organizations like Latino Vote, which can lock in the big shift we saw last Tuesday, is the best use of your money now. Help build on the momentum, and let's crush the GOP next year in a blue tsunami. I want to see Latinos back in the 68 percent range for Democrats. We can do this!

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Juan Matute

 C C C

Claremont, California