Bannon partner in alleged border wall fundraising fraud scheme hit with new tax charges
Source: Washington Post
By
Matt Zapotosky
Reporter
May 6, 2021 at 6:02 p.m. CDT
An Air Force veteran who prosecutors allege worked with Stephen K. Bannon President Donald Trumps former chief strategist to defraud donors to a fundraising campaign for a U.S.-Mexico border wall has been indicted on new tax charges.
Brian Kolfage, a conservative activist who lost three limbs in Iraq and was the founder and public face of the We Build the Wall fundraising campaign, was charged in federal court in Florida with filing a false tax return. In an indictment, prosecutors alleged that Kolfage claimed to the IRS in his 2019 tax return that he had a total income of just over $63,000 and did not report hundreds of thousands of dollars deposited into his personal bank account from We Build the Wall and other sources.
Federal prosecutors in New York last year charged Bannon, Kolfage and two others with defrauding donors to the campaign, which was publicly supported by several of Trumps allies and raised more than $25 million from hundreds of thousands of donors. In an indictment in that case, prosecutors alleged that the men lied when they said they would not take any compensation from the campaign.
Kolfage and Bannon had defended themselves against those allegations, asserting that the indictment was politically motivated and designed to undermine supporters of Trump, who touted a U.S.-Mexico border wall during his presidential campaign. In January, Trump pardoned Bannon, and Bannon has since been fighting to get the case against him formally dismissed. The U.S. attorneys office in Manhattan is seeking an administrative termination of Bannons case, which would halt the prosecution against him for good but would not clear his name from the docket. Trump did not pardon Kolfage or the others charged.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/brian-kolfage-steve-bannon-tax-charge/2021/05/06/61e070b4-aeb6-11eb-b476-c3b287e52a01_story.html
tanyev
(42,357 posts)Fixed it.
sheepfarm
(38 posts)In January, Trump pardoned Bannon, and Bannon has since been fighting to get the case against him formally dismissed.
...dirty foreigner here, but I thought to get a Presidential pardon in the USA, you had to admit guilt to the charge against you? So why is Bannon trying to get a case against him that he admits he did, dismissed?
Ohio Joe
(21,655 posts)If he is really trying to get it dismissed (he lies... A lot. So if he says it, it is likely not true), he is doing so only so he can tell his followers that 'the deep state' is still after him... If he is lying about it, same deal, rile up the marks.