Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested in the Bahamas on Monday after being charged with multiple crimes by the Department of Justice. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) also issued civil charges against Bankman-Fried, accusing him of defrauding investors.
This has been exposed and covered extensively by mainstream media ONLY because of bankruptcy and some influential VCs and lots of retail investors lost monies buying product promoted by stars and on business programs like CNBC Squawkbox. Yet, there are 1000s of Co's legally buying politicians and apparently Supreme Ct justices and their wives everyday to get the legislation and court rulings they desire without a peep of coverage from mainstream media as it's the norm. Does anyone see the big picture? Our system is broken and corrupt!!!
What is happening here?!?!?
Beyond the lack of journalist / media doing good investigative and objective reporting like Judd, this is the other big reason our democracy is in decline (and the 3rd being citizens lack of basic understanding in civics).
Well done Judd & staff. I am so happy that I ran across your work in my internet wanderings. I guess the issue I have with the Sam Baked & Fried situation is, how many others are out there doing what he did but keeping a much lower profile? They are out there. Conniving and seeking new ways to grind the people of this great nation down!
Great report. Keep pressing those who declined to respond or didn’t respond, and follow any lead on the dark donations. We want to know every last cent. As the country focuses on voting rights, the logical companion is campaign finance reform.
Is it really OK to give away stolen money? I would think that the campaigns should be returning or holding it so that it can be collected and returned to the lawful owners.
I'm curious as to why it's okay to just give away these tainted donations to one's favorite charity, instead of waiting to see what the bankruptcy court orders. Thinking of all those poor dupes who lost their money to Bankman-Fried's schemes. Though why anyone believes that unregulated "currency" is a safe investment, I will never understand.
Shouldn’t the politicians give the money back to the shareholders that were defrauded? Also did all that money turn into actual bills that passed, ie did the spending work?
Great report, Judd! I find the silence of some recipients the most damning critique of our current money-based political system and also, of course, another reproach to Citizens United.
Do we need one more ounce of evidence that money must be kept out of politics?! We need to finance this through taxes and be allowed to audit all candidates. Campaigns should be limited to 4 months not years!
One thought I had reading this though is why aren’t those recipients giving the money back to FTX? This was not SBM’s money nor really FTX’s money, it was FTX’s clients’ money. It’s all nice to give the money to a charity and that makes those politicians look good but I wonder if FTX can claw this back at one point considering that these donations were done after the politicians knew what happened and knowing it wasn’t FTX money in the first place. I think it’s rather shady to accept the money but actually way more shady to pass it to a charity instead of giving it back to the rightful owner. (Btw disclosure, I had no money at FTX 🙂 … but still I think those that did. should get as much money back as possible)
Dude uses an Alzheimer/Depression patch off label to do his dirty work. These only on paper billionaire$ are not only high on hubris and their own egos, they're doing drugs to help them lie, cheat and steal. Take a look at what Elon's drugs of choice are, to allow him to go days without sleep, demand the impossible of his company's staffs. The guy's on something funky that's making him nuts! I think Silicon Valley tech bros are ALL taking drugs of some kind to chase their flights of fanaticism and money.
SHAME on ALL the recipients of SBF largesse - Dems and GQP. But it does highlight the desperate money grabs dominating politics today. I'd venture that Congress critters spend 10% of their time in DC and 90% scrounging for Dollar$ to fund their campaigns. Thanks SCOTUS for allowing corporations and paper billionaire$ to OWN politicians. Now the question is: was the return of "donations" made in FTX crypto or real dollar$?? Waiting! Too bad Congress can't "just say NO" to all the money swimming around to capture their votes! A reckoning with stopping the inflow by lawmakers is NECESSARY to STOP all this crap! American voters and taxpayers KNOW Congress is doing what big donors want, not what the voters want. GREED - it's the name of the game, and a game it is!
Wonderful painstaking research and reporting! How amazing that Beto O'Rourke was so instantly responsive--we need him and people of his character and intelligence in the offices he ran for!
Curious if the NYTimes or other major newspapers have reported these facts (or have since done so and given you credit)?
Can I just say that that was a really classy move on Murkowski's part? There's nothing wrong with giving some windfall funding to food banks and organizations that help people heat their houses and so forth, but as the song says, "hearts starve as well as bodies / give us bread, but give us roses." Helping out a writer's retreat is pretty darn enlightened, along those lines. And what the story didn't mention is that Storyknife is a WOMEN writer's retreat, one of the very few in the English-speaking world. I'm a diehard Democrat, but I find much to like about Sen. Murkowski.
So appreciate this short, sweet and to-the-point researching and reporting.
Goes down well.
This has been exposed and covered extensively by mainstream media ONLY because of bankruptcy and some influential VCs and lots of retail investors lost monies buying product promoted by stars and on business programs like CNBC Squawkbox. Yet, there are 1000s of Co's legally buying politicians and apparently Supreme Ct justices and their wives everyday to get the legislation and court rulings they desire without a peep of coverage from mainstream media as it's the norm. Does anyone see the big picture? Our system is broken and corrupt!!!
What is happening here?!?!?
Beyond the lack of journalist / media doing good investigative and objective reporting like Judd, this is the other big reason our democracy is in decline (and the 3rd being citizens lack of basic understanding in civics).
Well done Judd & staff. I am so happy that I ran across your work in my internet wanderings. I guess the issue I have with the Sam Baked & Fried situation is, how many others are out there doing what he did but keeping a much lower profile? They are out there. Conniving and seeking new ways to grind the people of this great nation down!
Thank you for naming names.
Great report. Keep pressing those who declined to respond or didn’t respond, and follow any lead on the dark donations. We want to know every last cent. As the country focuses on voting rights, the logical companion is campaign finance reform.
Is it really OK to give away stolen money? I would think that the campaigns should be returning or holding it so that it can be collected and returned to the lawful owners.
I'm curious as to why it's okay to just give away these tainted donations to one's favorite charity, instead of waiting to see what the bankruptcy court orders. Thinking of all those poor dupes who lost their money to Bankman-Fried's schemes. Though why anyone believes that unregulated "currency" is a safe investment, I will never understand.
Shouldn’t the politicians give the money back to the shareholders that were defrauded? Also did all that money turn into actual bills that passed, ie did the spending work?
Great report, Judd! I find the silence of some recipients the most damning critique of our current money-based political system and also, of course, another reproach to Citizens United.
Do we need one more ounce of evidence that money must be kept out of politics?! We need to finance this through taxes and be allowed to audit all candidates. Campaigns should be limited to 4 months not years!
We continue to be a plutocracy without changes.
Another great piece. Thank you.
One thought I had reading this though is why aren’t those recipients giving the money back to FTX? This was not SBM’s money nor really FTX’s money, it was FTX’s clients’ money. It’s all nice to give the money to a charity and that makes those politicians look good but I wonder if FTX can claw this back at one point considering that these donations were done after the politicians knew what happened and knowing it wasn’t FTX money in the first place. I think it’s rather shady to accept the money but actually way more shady to pass it to a charity instead of giving it back to the rightful owner. (Btw disclosure, I had no money at FTX 🙂 … but still I think those that did. should get as much money back as possible)
On another note, re SBF:
https://slate.com/technology/2022/12/sam-bankman-fried-ftx-emsam-patch-testimony-arrested.html
Dude uses an Alzheimer/Depression patch off label to do his dirty work. These only on paper billionaire$ are not only high on hubris and their own egos, they're doing drugs to help them lie, cheat and steal. Take a look at what Elon's drugs of choice are, to allow him to go days without sleep, demand the impossible of his company's staffs. The guy's on something funky that's making him nuts! I think Silicon Valley tech bros are ALL taking drugs of some kind to chase their flights of fanaticism and money.
SHAME on ALL the recipients of SBF largesse - Dems and GQP. But it does highlight the desperate money grabs dominating politics today. I'd venture that Congress critters spend 10% of their time in DC and 90% scrounging for Dollar$ to fund their campaigns. Thanks SCOTUS for allowing corporations and paper billionaire$ to OWN politicians. Now the question is: was the return of "donations" made in FTX crypto or real dollar$?? Waiting! Too bad Congress can't "just say NO" to all the money swimming around to capture their votes! A reckoning with stopping the inflow by lawmakers is NECESSARY to STOP all this crap! American voters and taxpayers KNOW Congress is doing what big donors want, not what the voters want. GREED - it's the name of the game, and a game it is!
Wonderful painstaking research and reporting! How amazing that Beto O'Rourke was so instantly responsive--we need him and people of his character and intelligence in the offices he ran for!
Curious if the NYTimes or other major newspapers have reported these facts (or have since done so and given you credit)?
Well done Judd ! I think this action was one of your best! Right to the point and timely!
Can I just say that that was a really classy move on Murkowski's part? There's nothing wrong with giving some windfall funding to food banks and organizations that help people heat their houses and so forth, but as the song says, "hearts starve as well as bodies / give us bread, but give us roses." Helping out a writer's retreat is pretty darn enlightened, along those lines. And what the story didn't mention is that Storyknife is a WOMEN writer's retreat, one of the very few in the English-speaking world. I'm a diehard Democrat, but I find much to like about Sen. Murkowski.