Usually presidential pardons are reserved for people, except when they (apparently) aren’t. Experts said tRump appears to have acted within his powers, but no one has ever pardoned a corporation. “Putting corporate pardons on the table strengthens Trump’s corrupt and authoritarian power over corporations,” said Rick Claypool, research director for consumer advocacy group Public Citizen’s president’s office. “This has the potential to trigger a lobbying frenzy for any corporation that has faced federal enforcement.” This was a terrible thing to do!
“Trump’s pardon of HDR Global Trading, the owner and operator of crypto exchange BitMEX, was issued at the same time as pardons for three of the company’s co-founders and one of its employees.” The company and the four employees, including influential Bitcoin booster Arthur Hayes, pleaded guilty to violating the Bank Secrecy Act, which requires businesses to take steps to prevent money laundering. Hmmmm. “Prosecutors said the company pretended to pull out of the U.S. market to avoid complying with the law, but knew its withdrawal was nothing more than a “sham,” even seeking out U.S.-based influencers to market its platform.”.
Now isn‘t that *interesting? Agent Orange isn’t going to get anything done, not that he does much anyhow, because the corporations will be saying “us too us too!” or “Pardon me!” “Pardon me!” They’ll be lined up around Washington! The mind boggles trying to imagine what it would be like. By the way, HDR Global Trading was fined $100 million for violating an anti-money laundering law. I don’t think I’d mentioned that yet. And that leaves other “corporations” with the possibility of getting away with the same sort of thing. I think all of you understood what I mean.
One longtime critic of the federal government’s lenient approach to corporate crime said Trump’s pardon sent a dangerous message. “Putting corporate pardons on the table strengthens Trump’s corrupt and authoritarian power over corporations,” said Rick Claypool, research director for consumer advocacy group Public Citizen’s president’s office. “This has the potential to trigger a lobbying frenzy for any corporation that has faced federal enforcement.” Wonderful. That’s just … exciting? And by the way, HDR Global Trading is incorporated in the Seychelles, an Indian Ocean island nation that has been dubbed a tax haven by the Tax Justice Network.
BitMEX was not the only company to catch a break. Separately, Trump on Friday commuted the probation of Ozy Media, an online outlet that collapsed under allegations of fraud by its founder Carlos Watson two years ago. Ozy was also released from having to pay fines or restitution. Oy. Now, scholars of presidential pardons do say this is within the president’s rights. “It’s absolutely clear to me that a president can pardon corporations. The power to pardon plainly extends to any entity capable of being convicted of a crime,” said Frank Bowman, a University of Missouri law professor. Yet while they said presidents have relieved companies from fines and other consequences of conviction as long ago as the 19th century, they struggled to think of any prior pardons.
Frank Bowman also stated that he was not alarmed by a corporation being pardoned — but by the larger pattern. “Trump now seems to be systematically pardoning corporate malefactors left and right without respect, really, to any real serious consideration about the merits of the cases, the larger policy implications of issuing these pardons,” he said. One piece of good news: He noted that one company that would not benefit from Trump’s novel exercise of the pardon power was the Trump Organization, since it was convicted of tax fraud and business records crimes on the state level. “Trump can’t pardon his own company. Otherwise, he would.”
Does this not sound disturbing? It bothers me, but then I’m probably a wimp looking at the down sides of everything, not just the upsides. I guess we’ll have to see how this all shakes out, good, bad, or in between. Who said “may you live in interesting times” anyhow? Don’t they know better?
*****And now, please read a very special request from our awesome boss******
Zoomers, if you have any spare change, please, we could use it. We are now entering month five of Trump Depression Syndrome, the moniker given to the phenomenon of a lot of Democrats tuning out from politics to save their sanity. I understand and respect that. I also know that somebody has to stay on the front lines, or there won’t be an army left to fight this war. So, that’s us. Please. We could use your help. And thank you for coming here to read about all the events. Ursula
🤪 Trump has always had a skewed vision of corporations. He thinks they are all just like the “corporation” he ran (into the ground). Let’s take a closer look…
🤨🫧 Amazing how people still try to stay in that bubble…Trump is a rich, successful businessman AND the government should be run like a business! I know so many people who have confidently spoken these delusions and lies since 2015. Then they climbed into that bubble and that’s that.
I have been trying these days to reach inside the bubble. OK, then, I don’t like or agree with the analogy, but let’s run with it! Trump is Chairman of the Board and CEO, the Cabinet is the other corporate officers (CFO, COO, General Counsel, etc.), Congress is senior and middle management, and civil servants are the employees of the corporation. But, that leaves out the other, most important stakeholder, the rest of us are the shareholders; the investors in the business. Any corporation that wants to succeed must give the shareholders a decent rate of return. Some of us are finally starting to demand better dividends, but too few of us are doing so.
I want to remind the bubble people that Trump has never run a large, publicly traded corporation with people he had to please. He ran a tacky little family business and everyone, mostly traumatized dependents, answered to his whims alone. He lied to banks and lawyers in order to find the money to keep going as he failed over and over. He never stood in front of a shareholders meeting trying to justify his existence to outraged people who had lost the value of their investments. So, he runs the US the same way!! The problem we shareholders face is that we have all our money in this one failed corporation. We have nowhere else to put our money and we must get sufficiently angry at the Chair who has ruined our life savings!!
Whether Trump is a Chair who should get a vote of no confidence and be replaced or a despot who must be ousted (my view), we’d better get busy! These are not normal times and I do not feel comforted that another election will happen in 2026. You do not rid yourself of dictators in an election!! 😳🤬✊️💪
Who said “may you live in interesting times” anyhow?
I believe that is an old Chinese curse.
while that origin is apocryphal, it certainly makes sense as a curse