Washington, D.C. — Financial disclosures released this week show Trump gave $45,000 cash gifts to three young aides, roughly a third of their annual salaries, in a likely violation of federal law. Meanwhile, Democrats are building the case they’ll bring against Trump’s ballroom, arch, and other vanity projects when they win back the House this November, and nearly 800 foundations have banded together in a mutual-defense pact to protect each other from the administration’s assault on civil society.
Trump’s Cash Gifts to Aides Raise Huge Red Flags
Trump is handing out $45,000 cash payments to his closest young aides, including his “human printer” Natalie Harp, plus a $20,000 payout to valet Walt Nauta, all quietly logged as “Cash Gift for Holidays” to obscure what looks like a slush fund for personal loyalty. Former White House ethics counsel Richard Painter says the scheme likely violates federal law barring outside supplementation of government salaries, the kind of arrangement designed to buy silence and obedience from the handful of aides who travel closest to Trump. Government ethics veterans say they have never seen anything like it, a scale of secret personal payments from a president to his staff with no precedent in American history. It’s the same corrupt instinct running through this entire administration: buy loyalty, obscure the money trail, and dare anyone to do something about it.
Democrats Are Building Their Case Against Trump’s Vanity Projects
Rep. Jared Huffman is compiling a target list for the moment Democrats retake the House gavel: Trump’s $400 million ballroom, his a 250-foot “Arc de Trump,” a botched reflecting pool renovation the administration tried to blame on a random Olympic canoeist, and a private developer’s land grab inside Yosemite. Huffman is promising to use subpoena power to drag every donor, every dollar, and every favor into the light. This is what two years of a rubber-stamp Republican Congress bought Trump: a free pass to loot the capital for his own vanity while the people with subpoena power looked the other way.
Foundations Form a NATO-Style Pact to Defend Civil Society
Nearly 800 grantmakers have banded together in a mutual-defense pact because the Trump administration has spent eighteen months engaging in nonstop attacks against civil society groups and nonprofits. This comes on the heels of news that the administration is actively weighing whether to strip tax-exempt status from groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center and Open Society Foundations, weaponizing the IRS against anyone who dares fund work this White House doesn’t like. The country’s biggest philanthropies are organizing for the fight of their lives, and it’s one they’ll win in the end.
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