I am really surprised he was found guilty. Will he serve time? Will he get the "Epstein treatment" for what more he might know? With ties to Ukraine, what other corruption is happening with the Democrat ties? They are going all out to keep Ukraine happy?
Sam Bankman-Fried was just one facet of an orchestrated effort among FTX executives to interfere in U.S. elections.
Following a month-long trial, former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried was convicted in federal court on Thursday on seven counts related to defrauding investors of billions of dollars.
Thursday’s conviction came after it was discovered last November that FTX and Bankman-Fried’s cryptocurrency trading firm Alameda Research had notable overlaps on their balance sheets. This called into question FTX’s liquidity, prompting users to withdraw $6 billion from the company and leading to its bankruptcy. Bankman-Fried, or SBF, ultimately admitted to “funneling billions of dollars in customer funds to his own hedge fund,” which “upend[ed] the entire cryptocurrency sector.”
Federal prosecutors went on to file charges the following month.
According to CNBC, the 31-year-old was convicted on Thursday of “wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud against FTX customers and against Alameda Research lenders, conspiracy to commit securities fraud and conspiracy to commit commodities fraud against FTX investors, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.” SBF — who pled not guilty to the charges — now faces up to more than 100 years in prison.
The former CEO’s time in federal court may not be finished, however. According to The New York Times, SBF is facing a potential second trial regarding a separate batch of charges that include “campaign finance violations.” A campaign finance charge against the crypto guru was originally included in federal prosecutors’ first batch of indictments but was withdrawn following a dispute over extradition rules with the Bahamas, where FTX was headquartered.
If approved, the second trial would take place sometime “early next year,” according to the Times.
Election Interference at its Worst
It didn’t take long after FTX’s implosion for reporters to discover that SBF was the second-largest individual donor to Democrats during the 2022 midterms, with the former CEO having dumped nearly $40 million into entities affiliated with Democrats throughout the cycle. But what has since come to light in the months that followed is how SBF was just one facet of an orchestrated effort among FTX executives to interfere in U.S. elections.
Throughout their investigation, federal prosecutors discovered that SBF unlawfully stole and used FTX customer funds to “make more than $100 million in political campaign contributions before the 2022 U.S. midterm elections.” Central to this scheme were two members of FTX’s “inner circle“: Nishad Singh and Ryan Salame, both of whom acted as “straw donors” to donate money on SBF’s behalf. The ultimate goal, according to a communique authored by Salame, was to “‘weed-out’ anti-crypto Democratic and Republican lawmakers.”
Singh and Salame’s FEC records show that both executives made dozens of big-dollar donations to various political campaigns and PACs ahead of the 2022 elections. While Singh’s donations were directed towards Democrat entities, Salame’s were poured into Republican ones. Documents released by prosecutors last month reportedly show that SBF and the two aforementioned executives gave $50 million of the stolen FTX funds to “dark money” groups “that do not publicly disclose the names of donors” in the lead-up to the 2022 election.
Even more damning about FTX’s electioneering operation is that it appears to be a family affair. During his testimony in last month’s trial, Singh — who “pleaded guilty to fraud and campaign finance violations” earlier this year — detailed how members of SBF’s family were instrumental in steering the flow of political donations.
In his role as a “straw man,” Singh permitted Guarding Against Pandemics, a left-wing lobbying group run by SBF’s brother Gabriel, to make political donations using funds “originating from Alameda” under his name. Singh furthermore admitted to being a member of a Signal group chat that included SBF, Gabriel, and their “political advisors,” who would “frequently direct that a donation be made in Singh’s name.”
Also involved in the political operation was Barbara Bankman-Fried, Sam and Gabriel’s mother. Heavily involved in Democrat Party politics, Barbara is the founder of Mind the Gap, a left-wing super PAC that backs Democrat candidates and causes. Leading up to the 2020 election, the group issued a memo informing leftist donors that “the most effective tactic” to score “additional Democratic votes” is to donate to nonprofit voter registration groups that target demographics favorable to Democrats, such as racial minorities and college-educated women.
Among the organizations recommended to donors included the Voter Participation Center, the Center for Voter Information, and Everybody Votes (also known as the Voter Registration Project), all of which were founded by Democrats. It’s worth mentioning that partisan nonprofit voter registration is explicitly prohibited under federal law.
Regarding her involvement in FTX’s political operation, Barbara sent a communique to SBF and Singh in April 2021 in which she suggested using the latter as a straw man to funnel $1 million into Mind the Gap.
“I’m assuming that Nishad would be the better person to have his name on [the donation],” she wrote. “We’d have a slight preference for that on our end, now that my connection to Sam is publicly known, because we don’t want to create the impression that funding MTG is a family affair.”
FEC records show that Singh did, in fact, make a $1 million donation to Mind the Gap in April 2021.
Barbara also warned her son in an August 2022 email to avoid leaving behind evidence when dolling out political donations, recommending that SBF “substitute someone else’s name.”
“I’m skeptical how long that will help,” Barbara wrote. “One of these days soon, some reporter is going to think to look more closely at FEC reports.”
https://thefederalist.com/2023/11/03/how-sam-bankman-fried-and-his-crypto-empire-used-dark-money-to-influence-u-s-elections/
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Joe Biden's soul brother: Sam Bankman-Fried
Well, that was fast.
A jury of his peers found crypto-king fraudster, Sam Bankman-Fried, CEO of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX, guilty on all seven charges stemming from defrauding investors.
According to the Daily Mail:
Sam Bankman-Fried's parents broke down in court on Thursday night after their son was found guilty of embezzling $10 billion of his clients' money, in what the prosecutor said was 'one of the biggest financial frauds in American history.'
Bankman-Fried now faces up to 115 years in prison.
The 31-year-old, who founded crypto exchange FTX, was convicted on all seven counts against him. The jury reached their unanimous verdict in less than five hours.
Yet there's not that big a shock factor and the reason for that is a certain deja vu. Bankman-Fried's crimes sound a lot like Joe Biden's, and we've already had a bellyful of those, watching him get away with them time and time again, with impunity. It was what Bankman-Fried expected, too, but didn't, having robbed the wrong people. Yet the striking similarities to what they did make the two seem like soul brothers.
What Bankman-Fried did was an amazingly brazen fraud, running a monetary exchange and then stealing money out of people's accounts without their knowledge, which is kind of like what a bad blue government will do. Presumably, it was to pay debts but he also shelled out for a lot of Democrat political coffers and campaigns -- stating that he thought it a cheap investment.
It says something that Bankman-Fried, like Biden was indeed interested in politics, leftwing ones, just like Joe Biden.
He was, most notably, the Democrats' second-largest political donor, taking money from customers' accounts to finance them, and seems to have thought he would be gaining something in exchange for it.
During his testimony Singh walked the jury through the $100million that was spent on political donations, including $5million to Joe Biden, though he also gave to Republicans too.
The court heard that Bankman-Fried regarded such donations as a good return on his money and a cheap way to gain influence.
What's most vivid was how inattentive he was, which sounds a lot like Democrats as they seek to spend more money.
In the words of the prosecutor, cited by the Mail:
'...You know who was responsible. Sam Bankman-Fried. He spent his customers' money and he lied to them about it.
'This was a pyramid of deceit built by the defendant on a foundation of lies and false promises, all to get money. Eventually it collapsed, leaving thousands of victims in its wake.'
He added: 'The answer is clear - he took the money, he knew it was wrong. He did it because he thought he was smarter and better and could walk his way and talk his way out of it. But today, with you, that ends.'
Better and smarter? Sounds like Democrats all over.
Here's another thing that resembles Biden: He made his fraud operation a family operation, even employing his own father for a spell. Biden did that too with Hunter, James and various other characters within his family mafia.
Meanwhile like Hillary Clinton, and various irresponsible Biden cabinet officials, Bankman-Fried on the stand didn't recall...
Roos said he was able to perfectly recall what the inside of the Alameda Research offices looked like and the thought process behind renaming NBA team Miami Heat's arena to incorporate the FTX name.
'He was a completely different person under cross examination,' he told the jurors.
'Suddenly he couldn't remember a single detail about his companies. It was uncomfortable to hear. It happened over 140 times.
'He had to be asked and re-asked. He lied about big things and he lied about little things.
And like Joe Biden, he gaslighted:
'He told you he didn't know what was going on and he didn't realize that what was happening was wrong.'
He added: 'To believe the defendant, you would have to ignore the testimonies of his partners in crime, including Caroline Ellison. You would have to ignore the documents.
He said white was black and black was white and expected you to ignore the evidence of your own eyes. Where have we seen that before? That's right -- the Biden administration. Just ask what's going on at the border.
It ought not be surprising that with this package of damning details -- he actually had delusions of becoming president:
On Thursday, Sassoon said Bankman-Fried stole the customer assets in pursuit of 'money, power and influence' and believed he could one day become president.
Gesturing toward Bankman-Fried, she said: 'This is somebody that wanted to be president of the United States, who thought he should be president of the United States.
Which sounds a lot like Joe Biden, Joe Biden all the way, delusions of absolute power built on a foundation of absolute corruption. Bankman-Fried never cheated at an election, but he cheated at other things and expected that his money would shield him enough to get away with it the way Democrat politicians do.
It tells us that in a sane world, Joe Biden would be convicted easily of these same kinds of crimes, what with paycheck after paycheck from foreign sources making their way into his bank accounts and bribery being exposed all over from the House investigators.
Bankman-Fried sounds a lot like Joe Biden when his crimes are laid out. Don't be surprised if at the end of his term. Joe Biden pardons him.
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