Not a lot of discussion about the #bannon indictment today. It seems like a slam dunk case for the government. Here are some key points: THREAD

The original structure of "We Build the Wall" didn't work, and GoFundMe asked that they return the $20,000,000 raised or fix problems with the overall mission, which promised to give the money raised to the government. GoFundMe suspended the campaign because this was unworkable.

GoFundMe suspended the campaign and told Kolfage he needed to give the money to a legitimate nonprofit. So he reached out to Bannon and the gang.

Bannon and company took control of the fundraising campaign and created a 501(c)(4) organization. This involved creating a nonprofit and filing with the IRS, as well as creating bylaws and conflict of interest policies. They also reiterated the initial pledge to GoFundMe

that Kolfage would not be paid in about ten different ways ("Kolfage will take no salary"/"will personally not take a penny of compensation from these donations"). So reps made to both GoFundMe in response to legitimate inquiries, plus to donors, plus the IRS.

GoFundMe made donors "opt-in" to the revised mission, so there was reliance on these revised statements. Bannon directed these statements be made, and references to the bylaw terms that there would be no compensation to Kolfage were made in solicitations.

Indictment provides that Bannon and company approved the statements, but directed they be made because they expected donors would rely on them to maximize the amount raised.

They have Bannon explaining this in text messages between him and Badolato. The statements, for example, would "remove all self-interest taint" and "gives Brian Kolfage saint hood." Indictment states that donors relied on these statements, and this caused inducement.

A total of $25 million in new or "opt-in" funds were received by the reconstituted effort.

Shortly after the relaunch, the indictment indicates Kolfage entered into a secret deal with Bannon and company to be paid $100,000, plus "20% a month." There are text messages proving the deal exists, as well as Bannon trying to conceal it.

Bannon paid Kolfage through another 501(c)(4) he controlled. But this 501(c)(4) was in turn reimbursed by We Build the Wall shortly thereafter in round trip payments.

To conceal the reason for the payments, Bannon and company paid Kolfage's spouse, and issued her a false 1099 tax statement saying the funds were for "media." So more fraud.

Other payments were disguised through third-party vendors that fraudulently represented they were vendors to We Build the Wall. Kolfage was nominally paid by some as a "consultant" or "social media." There are emails and text messages between the defendants in support.

There were other personal expenses run through We Build the Wall that were extravagant. Bannon's 501(c)(4) overall received over $1,000,000 from We Build the Wall, only some of which was round-tripped back to Kolfage.

We Build the Wall was tipped off to a criminal investigation in October 2019 by a financial institution. Additional steps were taken after this to conceal the illegal activity.

There is a conspiracy charge for wire fraud. This is why the USPS postal inspectors arrested Bannon. The government has significant evidence that the "no salary promises" were made falsely as a means of supporting the scheme.

There is another major charge for conspiracy to commit money laundering.

Anyway, these guys are completely fucked. The government has an extremely strong case and apparently a lot of contemporary evidence from the defendants themselves in the form of text messages and emails.

What is not stated is that one of the actual contractors who built some of the wall sections for We Build the Wall was also awarded a federal contractor under suspicious circumstances in an amount of over $1.7 billion. There are other Twitter threads explaining this at least sets

up what looks like a potential kickback, I guess involving the federal government (and Trump) directly. I won't speculate on this, it's not in the indictment.

Anyways thanks for reading and please follow me! I have like three human followers and would like to get that up to a solid seven or eight.

Also back to law school here: Fraud is knowingly making a false statement, for the purposes of intentionally making someone rely on the false statements, followed by actual reliance. Government has all elements here. Other than a “syphillis insanity defense,” Bannon is done.