The Trump Crime Family's Grift Bank

 

If you haven't read about this latest Trump Crime Family get-rich-quick grift, Christopher Bates at Electoral-vote.com has a brief summary of the "World Liberty Bank":

"The griftwatch is eternal with this president. We could easily write an item about grifty behavior from him and/or his kids every single day, and not run out of things to cover. The only reason we don't is that it quickly moves into beating-a-dead-horse territory. Everyone should know he's on the take, at this point, and that the powers that might hold him accountable (outside the court system, sometimes) are not currently doing so.

"This story is sleazy enough, however, that we just could not let it pass. World Liberty Financial (WLF) is, of course, the Trump family's crypto business. However, it cannot legally issue its own stablecoins (bitcoins tied to reserves of some commodity, commonly U.S. dollars) because it is not a bank. Instead, it has to rely on a middleman and, of course, the middleman ends up with some of the profits and a lot of the power.

"The owners of WLF (including the Trumps, who hold 38% of the company in their own names) do not want to give up their profits or power. So, they have come up with a solution: World Liberty Bank. WLF applied for a charter with the Treasury Department's Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and yesterday federal officials who work for Donald Trump gave preliminary approval to Donald Trump to open his own bank.

"It is not a done deal yet. There are still hoops to be jumped through, and maybe the Trumps won't be able to jump through them all. Or maybe it will take long enough that by the time final approvals roll around, the Department of Treasury will no longer be under the control of Trump, and will say "no." These are possibilities, though we are not at all confident in them.

"If the Trumps do get to run their own bank, particularly if Trump is still president (and Todd Blanche is still AG), the possibilities for grift are endless. Trump was already bandying about ideas for a third Trump-branded cryptocurrency. Imagine how many different coins they might issue, and how much they might fleece the rubes the base for, especially if the wolf is guarding the henhouse. Trump also has a habit of ordering his businesses to transfer funds to his personal accounts, and then having the businesses declare bankruptcy. This is what happened with his casinos and it could happen here. Perhaps most obviously, a Trump-run bank would allow for money laundering on an industrial scale. The first 50 accountholders would all be Russian oligarchs.

"It is clear, at this point, that Trump does not give a damn about hiding his corruption. He was more subtle during Trump v1.0, but now all bets are off. Maybe this is a variant of his usual strategy of muddying the waters with so much crap, it's hard to focus on any one bad act. Or maybe he's just gotten more desperate, since his time as president (and maybe his time on Earth) will soon run out. The Democrats are going to try hard to make this stick to the President and his Party in 2026. We do not know if they will be successful, but we do know that Trump has given them an embarrassment of (purloined) riches to work with."

We see the primary business for this "bank" would be to launder money for oligarchs and criminal organizations around the world, with the Trump Crime Family getting their beak wet at every transaction.  The voiding of this charter needs to be among the first acts of a new Democratic administration (if we get there and elect a junkyard dog Democrat as President).  Hoping for prison for some or all of the participants in this outrageous, unprecedented scheme may be too much to hope for, but it's sure goddamn deserving.

(Image:  Alexandra Citrin-Safadi/WSJ)