NEWS

Authored by Paul Sperry via RealClear Wire,

The Internal Revenue Service recently awarded a lucrative contract to help modernize its computer databases to the same Washington firm, Booz Allen Hamilton, that employed the man who pleaded guilty last week to stealing and leaking thousands of private tax returns of wealthy Americans, including former President Trump, according to records reviewed by RealClearInvestigations. 

The massive IRS theft is the third major breach of (more…)

Jim Jordan lost the second round of voting for speaker, as 22 Republicans voted against him, two more than Tuesday's initial vote. The final vote count was 212 for Hakeem Jeffries (D), 199 for Jordan (R) and 22 for 'others' (Scalise, etc.).

Jordan says he's not dropping out…

On Tuesday, Jordan lost the vote after 20 Republican holdouts voted 'no', putting the Ohio lawmaker far short of the 217 votes needed to become speaker. (more…)

On Monday, former FTX engineering chief Nishad Singh testified that FTX had used stolen customer money from Alameda Research to make political donations, even after learning it owed $13 billion to customers. In short, Sam Bankman-Fried was using customer funds to make political donations to Democrats, according to Singh's testimony.

One of those Democrats was failed Texas gubernatorial candidate Beto O'Rourke, who in November of last year reported returning a $1 million donation from SBF just four days before the November election because he was 'uncomfortable receiving such a large, unsolicited donation.'

In truth, the adderall-addicted SBF (or one of his employees) fat-fingered what was supposed to be a $100,000 donation, and instead ended up being $1 million.

In January, the Washington Free Beacon reported that O'Rourke kept the $100,000.

As journalist Molly White (@molly0xFFF), who has provided amazing SBF trial coverage, noted on Tuesday via "X," they FTX was able to get $900,000 back "through the application of social, political, and legal pressure," according to SBF adviser Keenan Lantz, a top executive at "Guarding Against Pandemics" who helped handle paperwork for political donations and other operational matters.

"They'll hang onto it until 11/4 – at which point the refund won't be reported until January," Lantz added.

…which brings up an interesting question posed by Twitter user Matt Beebe, who noted that O'Rourke's fraud – secretly agreeing (more…)