A running, citation-first ledger of the documented grifts, self-dealing, market shenanigans, pardons-for-pals, and foreign-money entanglements of Donald J. Trump and his administration. Every claim links to original reporting. Receipts only.
A newly unsealed settlement document — signed by Acting AG Todd Blanche, a former Trump personal lawyer — permanently drops federal tax claims against Trump and bars the IRS from ever investigating pre-settlement tax returns filed by Trump, his family, the Trump Organization, and related trusts. Legal scholars call it an extraordinary use of executive power to shield the president's finances from scrutiny.
Trump's vanity 90,000 sq ft East Wing ballroom is being paid for by a who's who of regulated industries and crypto magnates with active business before the administration — raising blatant pay-to-play questions.
Senate and House Democrats launched a formal investigation into whether a string of Trump pardons and commutations — many going to donors, crypto executives, and politically connected fraudsters — were driven by pay-to-play dynamics, requesting records from more than a dozen recipients.
An interim staff report from House Oversight Democrats documents how Trump and his family used World Liberty Financial, the $TRUMP memecoin, and related crypto vehicles to collect more than $1 billion in payments from foreign governments, sanctioned entities, and criminal interests — calling it “professionalized corruption” unprecedented in the modern presidency.
A single trader placed an outsized Polymarket bet on Nicolás Maduro being captured or removed, spiking the odds just as Trump escalated military threats against Venezuela. Analysts flagged it as a textbook insider-trading pattern, noting Trump's son Eric is publicly tied to one of the prediction-market platforms benefiting from the war-bet surge.
Trump pardoned Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao — convicted of money-laundering violations the DOJ said caused “significant harm to U.S. national security” — months after Binance helped power the Trump family's World Liberty Financial stablecoin, a deal worth billions on paper to the Trumps. 60 Minutes and House Democrats flagged it as a textbook pay-to-play pardon.
Federal regulators opened investigations into a 'consistent pattern' of suspiciously well-timed futures, options, and prediction-market bets placed minutes to hours before Trump's Iran war announcements — strikes, pauses, and ceasefire posts. Reporters identified at least seven separate wagers that paid out massive sums, fueling fears of leaks from inside the White House.
The Trump Organization unveiled Trump Mobile — a branded MVNO wireless service and a gold-colored “T1 Phone” pitched as American-made — while Donald Trump is president and his administration sets telecom, tariff, and spectrum policy. Reporters quickly documented that the phone could not plausibly be U.S.-manufactured at the promised price and spec, the “Made in USA” claim was quietly scrubbed, and the venture routes subscription and licensing revenue straight to the Trump family. Ethics lawyers called it one of the most direct merch-the-presidency schemes yet.
Trump hosted the top 220 holders of his memecoin at a private Virginia dinner — a pay-for-access scheme that ethics experts called the most brazen sale of presidential access in modern U.S. history. Many top holders were foreign nationals.
The Qatari royal family gifted the U.S. a $400M Boeing 747-8 for use as Air Force One and eventual transfer to Trump's presidential library foundation — what watchdogs called the largest single foreign emolument ever accepted by a sitting U.S. president.
While their father set U.S. foreign policy, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump met with high-level officials from at least eight foreign governments — including Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Vietnam, Serbia, Oman, Albania, and Romania — to advance new Trump Organization developments. CREW projects foreign property income alone will exceed $400M in the second term.
Regulators opened an investigation into a flurry of suspiciously well-timed oil trades worth roughly $800 million around Trump tariff announcements.
Hours before announcing a 90-day tariff pause that rocketed markets, Trump posted “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!!” on Truth Social. Lawmakers and ethics experts called it textbook market manipulation and possible insider trading.
Foreign officials and lobbyists are once again routing spending to Trump-branded hotels and clubs, a pattern that drew Emoluments lawsuits in the first term and has resumed with no guardrails.
The Trump family's crypto ventures — including World Liberty Financial and the $TRUMP memecoin — created instant nine-figure paper fortunes while the administration shaped crypto policy. Foreign buyers gained direct financial access to the president.
Jared Kushner's Affinity Partners continues raking in Gulf sovereign wealth while Don Jr., Eric, and Lara Trump headline paid foreign events and crypto ventures tied to administration policy.
New Trump Organization projects in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Vietnam and Serbia — many backed by foreign-government-linked partners — create textbook Emoluments Clause problems.
Trump issued sweeping pardons to roughly 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants, including those convicted of violence against police, alongside a parade of pardons for politically connected fraudsters.
CREW's running tracker documents hundreds of presidential visits to Trump-branded properties — each one a marketing op funded by the public and a direct revenue channel to the Trump Organization.
Trump launched the $TRUMP memecoin days before taking office, with 80% of the supply controlled by Trump-affiliated entities. The token's paper value briefly topped $70B, an unprecedented direct cash conduit from anonymous global buyers — including foreign nationals — to the incoming president.
Through his America PAC, Elon Musk publicly awarded $1 million per day to registered swing-state voters who signed his pro-Trump petition. The DOJ warned the scheme likely violated federal law barring payments tied to voter registration; a Philadelphia judge let it continue through Election Day after Musk's lawyers admitted recipients weren't actually random. Musk spent ~$277M backing Trump in 2024.
LIV Golf, bankrolled by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, held another tournament at Trump's Doral resort, funneling millions to the Trump Organization while the candidate publicly defended the Saudi government.
During Holy Week 2024, Trump began selling branded Bibles for $59.99, taking a licensing fee on each sale while campaigning. Followed a pattern of monetized merch — gold sneakers, NFT trading cards, silver coins — sold directly off his candidacy.
Trump Media & Technology Group merged with a SPAC and began trading as DJT, handing Trump a stake worth roughly $4–6 billion on day one despite Truth Social's tiny revenue. Critics called the valuation a vehicle for anonymous foreign and domestic actors to funnel money to the candidate.
Trump installed daughter-in-law Lara Trump as RNC co-chair and his campaign's Save America PAC continued spending tens of millions in small-donor money on his personal criminal and civil legal defense.