Whoopsie! It looks like Brietbart head racist in charge and alt-Right champion may have skirted some pretty serious campaign finance laws while working to elect Cheeto Jesus Trump. Huffington Post broke the news earlier this evening that the Democratic Coalition filed an FBI complaint against Trump Campaign Chairman Steven Bannon.
They allege that he violated a federal campaign finance law by coordinating Super PAC activities with the Trump campaign and accepting payments from it after becoming officially part of the campaign. You can't do that.
Here's how it went down:
Bannon’s production company Glittering Steel LLC made the hit job video “Clinton Cash” as a form of propaganda. Then, the Make America Number 1 PAC sent Glittering Steel payments totaling just over $950,000.
The Democratic Coalition provided the FBI with a spreadsheet of all payments made.
The complaint alleges the following:
"On Tuesday morning, the Democratic Coalition Against Trump reported Trump Senior Advisor and Former Trump campaign CEO Steve Bannon to the FBI for breaking campaign finance law. Over the course of the Trump campaign, Bannon was paid $950,090 by pro-Trump Super PAC, Make America Number 1, through his company Glittering Steel LLC, both before and after Bannon assumed his role as campaign CEO.
According to federal campaign finance law, it is illegal for Super PACs to coordinate operations with campaigns. Additionally, there is a 120-day “cooling off” period for when Super PAC employees leave to work on the campaign their PAC was supporting to avoid any potential coordination. Steve Bannon was paid by Make America Number 1 on August 8, 2016, and then became Trump campaign CEO on August 17, 2016, directly violating the 120-day cooling off period. Additionally, Bannon was paid by the PAC after he became campaign CEO, which likely means there was coordination."
This is not shocking. The Trump campaign has reeked of corruption and dirty tricks since day one. Scott Dworkin, Senior Advisor to the coalition, told Huffington Post:
“This is yet another example of the corruption that took place over the course of the Trump campaign. Except now, Steve Bannon has a spot as a senior advisor to the White House. I can only hope that the FBI will investigate this incident without being clouded by Bannon’s new position.”
Numerous investigations trying to determine paper trails have shown that the money appears to be getting funneled all over the place to try to circumvent the appearance of impropriety. The Daily Beast discovered that Bannon has not been paid as reflected on any of the Trump Campaign's expense reports. So how was he getting paid? Was he working for free?
Clearly, the FBI needs to look into this thoroughly and well before Inauguration Day. This is a serious felony, if the allegations are true.
Editor's note:
Steve Bannon was also the head of the Government Accountability Institute, the non-profit "charity" that paid for Peter Schweitzer to write Clinton Cash, as I wrote in April, 2015.
