Donald Trump’s use of his second presidency to grow his personal fortune has alarmed legal and ethics experts and congressional Democrats as he has reaped an “unprecedented” $2.2bn in 2025 revenues by amassing big cryptocurrency holdings, benefiting from wealthy foreign interests, expanding his Truth Social business and more, while federal oversight of his actions has waned.

Trump last year raked in at least $1.4bn from his crypto ventures according to financial disclosure forms he filed in June. Simultaneously, about one million investors in a Trump crypto scheme suffered almost $3.8bn in losses as their volatile crypto holdings tanked in value.

Monetizing his presidency further this summer, Trump’s Truth Social media business is pushing a new scheme that offers wealthy buyers special early access to his posts for a fee of $100,000 a month, which top Democrats and public interest groups say pose serious conflict of interest and corruption issues.

This is some of why at least some Americans probably wish the Iran plot succeeded

Do you hear the people sing? Singing the song of angry men.

  • Optional@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    I mean . . . Yeah. We know. We’ve been watching it happen every goddamned day.

    Thanks for the reminder Guardian. Maybe you could name and shame a little more? It’s not happening magically. People with names and institutions are doing this corruption, so. Map it out. kthx.

  • ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.one
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    6 days ago

    There is no need to stress. The next Democratic President will issue blanket pardons, will no do investigations, or Presidential Commissions, or anything that sort.

    The Epstein Class always protects each other.

    • InputZero@lemmy.world
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      “Now is the time for unity, and to forgive our neighbors” Says every Democrat after a Republican president.

      “The Democrats are all antifa-terrorists and should be rounded up into a camp.” Says every Republican after a Democratic president.

      • technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        5 days ago

        “The Democrats extreme left are all antifa-terrorists and should be rounded up into a camp.” Says every Republican after a Democratic president.

        Also this.

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        5 days ago

        A bellwether is whether the politician supports abolishing ICE. If they are willing to uproot institutions then that includes presidential immunity.

    • technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      Politicians have been doing the exact same thing as the pedoprez for the history of USA and they will continue to do so regardless of “party” branding.

    • Yuccagnocchiyaki@lemmy.world
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      Sorry, no they won’t. They will be constrained by technicalities and obscure parliamentarian positions that we never heard of until a key issue.

      However, they will have new tech and immunity to attack the progressive left. That won’t be an issue at all

  • Cheebus@lemmy.world
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    5 days ago

    As far as I can tell republicans chose this life for all of us because they were upset that:

    They had to wear a mask during covid. Gay people are allowed to be happy. Obama wore a tan suit that one time. Buttery emails.

    So now we all get to live shit hole life’s because the crabs at the bottom of the bucket decided to yank everyone down with them and install a king.

    If you vote republican, fuck you, genuinely.

            • BCsven@lemmy.ca
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              4 days ago

              Maybe this is why. Lol.

              Grok

              Court records show more Republican politicians have been convicted of sexual offenses than Democrats. Since 2015, notable cases include Rep. Dennis Hastert ® pleading guilty to child molestation-related charges and Rep. Mel Reynolds ® convicted of sexual assault. On the Democrat side, fewer convictions exist—Rep. Bob Filner pleaded guilty to groping in 2013. Data leans heavier on Republicans historically. Check GovTrack for raw numbers.

              • Zephyr@sh.itjust.works
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                4 days ago

                I was thinking more about his pardons of Henry Cuellar, Rod Blagojevich, P.G. Sittenfeld, and Devon Archer who were all facing some sort of bribery or corrupt charges.

  • inmate_p01135809@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    He has set the precedent that presidents and their families can not only continue to run businesses while in office, but make governing decisions that lead to profit for those businesses. Oh, and getting payments for advertisements from the Resolute desk, and putting up paid advertisements on government property. Oh, and punish federal funding to states, companies, Universities, etc. for not following his executive orders, which are not laws, but are being treated as such.

    The only way to remedy this, I figure, is to have a democrat in office do every. single. thing. he is doing in office, until each thing has a law created by the other branches of government to make it illegal going forward.

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      The only way to remedy this, I figure, is to have a democrat in office do every. single. thing. he is doing in office

      If you think Ritchie Torres, Elissa Slotkin, and Pete Buttigieg are going to save the county, you’re going to be very disappointed.

    • technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      He has set the precedent He has done what a disgusting imperial system allows…

      FTFY

      The only way to remedy this, I figure, is to have a democrat in office do every. single. thing. he is doing in office, until each thing has a law created by the other branches of government to make it illegal going forward.

      If both parties are doing the same thing, nobody is every going to stop it. Just look at all of USA history. As a very obvious example, they’re all talking bribes (aka lobbies), doing insider trading, etc. Ofc they’re getting that crypto cash too… Nobody gonna fix any of this ever. It’s a feature not a bug to them.

      • danc4498@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        They only trust the news that reports the things they want to hear.

        I think there’s others that think the things he does for the country are good. And they take the good with the bad. Like lowering taxes (even though mostly the rich benefitted from that). Or whatever the fuck DOGE claimed to do. Or brain worm measles you.

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      7 days ago

      They believe that everyone does it, and that Trump is just better at it.

      That’s why if you point out something corrupt they point to someone else who the think did something corrupt, instead of saying both should be investigated and punished if actually guilty.

      • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Exactly: “Hunter Biden and his laptop! And Hunter sold art, can you even believe it? Hillary’s emails! Bill Clinton gets speaking fees, how is that even possible?”

        • artyom@piefed.social
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          Lol remember when Hillary’s emails was this years-long scandal? And we just rolled over Signalgate in a couple weeks.

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          Yeah the problem I have with it is I can’t tell how many of them are just excusing peoples crimes because others commit crimes or excusing their crimes because they would do the same thing if they could, and point to others doing potentially other crimes as a “well anyone would do it” type of shit. ,

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      “Look at what a good businessman he is!”

      “If it was actually illegal, he’d be in prison!”

      “He’s so savvy to not pay for things when payment is due. Why would you pay if you didn’t have to?”

      “He’s made more money while president than any other president because he’s the first non-politician president.”

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        My personal favorite: “he donates his salary, that proves he isn’t in it to make money. That’s why we elected him!”

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      Don’t forget to take every last cent the family has. Literally leave them with nothing as punishment.

      • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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        Agreed. Because they are not likely to serve full sentences; they should have to come out and live as paupers.

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      And then to die while in prison. He has to KNOW he lost. It’s not enough for him to just die. He needs to die in PRISON

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        I just want him to go away. Punished or not. Dead or alive. I don’t care, as long as I never have to read about him doing any more atrocities.

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    Likewise some analysts are troubled by how Trump has circumvented the constitution’s prohibition on foreign emoluments by accepting a $400m plane as a gift from Qatar, and how other wealthy foreigners have backed some Trump family hotel and golf deals abroad.

    Doesn’t the constitution ban all emoluments?

    Or is this just saying that the other reps are only outraged by accepting foreign bribes, because they all accept domestic bribes…

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    an “unprecedented” $2.2bn in 2025 revenues by…expanding his Truth Social business and more

    What? How does that make money? Is he selling sugar pills that claim to make your penis bigger or sth?

    Edit:

    Canter added that “Trump is increasingly dependent on the presidency to generate business profits since his media company has been losing money over the past several quarters.”

    Trump Media & Technology, the company behind the Truth Social platform, on 10 August announced it lost a whopping $238m in the three months through June as it branched out into new businesses including crypto.

    Oh, that sounds more correct

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        6 days ago

        “You too can enjoy the same insider access as Barron Trump for the low, low price of $100,000 a month!”

  • leadore@lemmy.world
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    And that $2.2B is just what he reported on his taxes–i.e. the technically legal income.

    • Madison420@lemmy.world
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      Well yes and also it doesn’t include the money his family has made from deals made after he got office. It’s on the order of 5bil+.

  • the_q@piefed.social
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    6 days ago

    We could end this in a few weeks if we acted. Everyone wants to hold on to what little they have instead of losing it for a better future.

    • thethrilloftime69@feddit.online
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      People will die. People have kids they need to raise. People have parents they need to take care of. If we burn the system down, all that is over. Your hopes of a good life in your lifetime end with revolution. You basically have to sacrifice an entire generation to burn this system down. Maybe we’ll get there soon, but people are still hoping to make it to the other side in one piece.

      • BenLeMan@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Yeah, let’s make our kids figure this out. It’s not like they’ll be kind of busy dealing with global warming and all those other nice challenges we’ve left them.

      • green_link@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        we sacrificed an entire generation stopping nazis before. we can do it again. they didn’t sacrifice their lives for the rest of us years later to let these fascists rise up again. if they were still here, they’d be standing right up front, ready to do it again.

      • ViceroTempus@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        You’re not wrong in a lot of ways, however that just means we’re kicking the can down the road, and allowing the atrocities going on in our backyards to continue.

        Feels irresponsible and lacks empathy to me.

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        Your hopes of a good life in your lifetime end with revolution.

        I strongly disagree. My life is already pretty fucked up and doesn’t seem like it’ll be getting better without some massive political changes.

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            I think we’ve “been there” since at least the 1930’s in terms of “the majority of people’s lives suck for preventable reasons,” but there’s a lot of propaganda convincing people that their lives are actually awesome.

    • DuncanTheDrunk@lemmy.world
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      I believe part of the issue is that in addition to the regulatory system being captured, the media has been as well. Sure there are some late night shows poking fun, but major news networks are being bought up one after another.

      It’s difficult to organize when half the news pretends this is normal and the other half openly celebrates this degradation of our systems. Unfortunately I fear things will get worse before they get better.

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    4 days ago

    Trump is practically wasting all of our net gain and allowance just to procrastinate our civic regulations, have our privacy dismantled in high oligarchy enforcements and postpone all climate vulnerability and forestation sedimental deployment just to pressure out incriminatingly virulent fuel sources to our atmosphere.

    He’s not governing, He’s dictating!!!

    Actually outranked Hitler, Pinochet, and King Tarquin as the most inhumanely corrupt cretin ever put in leadership.

    And yet his party of gutless and insecure terrorist grifters are not doing anything to contempt his crime streak.

    GOP is officially pro corruption pro sectarianism and pro austerity

  • thethrilloftime69@feddit.online
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    Trump is the most openly American president to ever live. The stuff he does in the open, were happening in secret for decades. The secret is out.

    • lavander@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      Hell yeah! Both parties are the same!

      Who doesn’t remember the Obama beans Ponzi scheme?

      Or Biden cryptocurrency?

      All Democrats are billionaires in fact!

      (/s if not obvious)

      • thethrilloftime69@feddit.online
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        Nah I mean think about how long Senators and Congress people have engaged in insider trading. At least 30-40 years maybe longer. Trump just doesn’t hide his criminal activity and he probably engages in it at a volume never seen before, but a lot of these actions basically amount to insider trading.

        Also both parties don’t support universal healthcare, they both support Israel, they both don’t support workers unions, they both believe in bailing out big business, they both support immigration camps at the border.

        Yeah one doesn’t support having the gestapo abducting and murdering people in broad daylight, but like is that the ONLY thing that needs to end to fix the country?