If Lawyer Basic Pam Bondi has her manner, we received’t study the staggering quantity of taxpayer {dollars} spent turning the Qatari authorities’s “reward” of a jet into the Flying Bribe Palace that President Donald Trump envisions till effectively after it will matter. There’s no non-nefarious clarification for her refusal to launch the Division of Justice memo claiming that it’s “legally permissible” for the sitting president to simply accept a $400 million reward from a international authorities in a well timed method. It’s a refusal that has necessitated the Freedom of the Press Basis submitting a Freedom of Info Act lawsuit to attempt to shake this factor free.
Pam, in case you assume the Emoluments Clause ain’t shit, say it together with your complete chest! Don’t cover your eager authorized evaluation below a bushel! America would like to see the way you, a former lobbyist for the Qatari authorities, determined it wasn’t a battle of curiosity so that you can bless this association. It might even be thrilling to understand how you determined this wasn’t only a $400 million bribe {that a} noncorrupt president would have run screaming from.
On Could 15, a day after stories that Bondi’s signature on an Workplace of Authorized Counsel memo was what cleared the way in which for the flagrantly apparent bribe, the Freedom of the Press basis filed an expedited FOIA request for the memo. Then they waited. And waited. After following up on June 16, they bought a boilerplate response that was equal components brushoff and lie:
Please be suggested that the seek for your request is ongoing and accordingly now we have restricted info with which to offer an estimated date of completion. Till now we have accomplished our search and know what processing have to be performed (similar to consultations with different places of work whose info may exist in any materials we discover), the perfect estimate I can present is the common processing time for requests on this Workplace’s expedited observe which is 620 days as printed in DOJ’s Fiscal Yr 2024 annual report. 620 days from when your request was obtained on this Workplace on Could 15, 2025 can be January 25, 2027. Please keep in mind that that is an estimate based mostly on restricted info and accordingly topic to variation.
Guys: It’s a memo. One memo. That Bondi and Trump have each confirmed and bragged about. There’s no “seek for your request” happening, and the way in which you present FOIA response estimates is to not simply say, “Effectively, proper now the whole lot takes 620 days, in order that’s if you’ll get it. Possibly.” Sure FOIA requests could take inner precedence, sure FOIA requests could also be voluminous, sure FOIA requests could have an effect on scores of departments, and sure FOIA requests may have tons of advanced redactions. That is actually a request for one particular doc the federal government revealed exists by bragging about the way it allowed Qatar to bribe Trump. However per the DOJ, their finest guess as to once they may discover the time to launch it simply occurs to fall after not simply the midterm elections but in addition the seating of the brand new Congress. Helpful
It additionally appears to be a date chosen to get previous the time anticipated to rehab the Qatari jet into the gold-plated monstrosity that Trump’s “style” calls for and to make it viable for use as Air Drive One. Would you prefer to know what number of of your taxpayer {dollars} are going towards this? You’ll be able to’t. It’s a secret. No, actually.
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The administration has categorized the knowledge, however it does seem that the funding stream is popping out of an present undertaking to modernize America’s nuclear missiles. $934 million seems to have been transferred out of that and into an unnamed categorized undertaking, one which even The New York Instances says is “nearly actually” the Qatari jet refurb.
It’s estimated that the work will take a 12 months or two, which implies that the administration has to expire the clock on offering any info which may trigger a public outcry. Trump wants taxpayers to unknowingly give an help to the Qatari authorities’s methodology of securing favorable remedy from him and never cease his gold-plated goals with nonsense like how unlawful this all is. Particularly as a result of Individuals are not precisely wild about this complete factor.
However the longer this stays at midnight, the extra doubtless we’ll all have paid for many of what Trump desires earlier than anybody is the wiser. And keep in mind, irrespective of how a lot of your cash is spent on this factor, in the long run it advantages Trump personally, as it’ll go off with him to his eventual Stationary Bribe Palace—his presidential library.
Sure, the jet will be part of the billions and billions of {dollars} extracted from feckless media firms wanting to curry favor with Trump. It might have been cheaper for media moguls simply to purchase him a jet or two, actually.
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The struggle over this may find yourself the place all these fights over Trump’s corruption do: the USA Supreme Courtroom. You simply know that Justice Clarence Thomas has already prewritten the bulk opinion explaining the way it isn’t a bribe when the president does it. Oh, and in a tiny footnote on the backside: It isn’t a bribe when Justice Thomas lets billionaires with enterprise earlier than the best courtroom choose up his trip tab, so cease bothering him.
Corruption begets—and protects—corruption, and the remainder of us are all actually paying the value.
