Behind the Bastards - Why Steve Bannon Got Arrested

Episode Date: September 1, 2020

Robert is joined by Miles Gray for an update on the We Build the Wall grift. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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exclusive content, and unique items. So enjoy the festive winter weather at iHeartland on Roblox. Head to iHeartRadio.com slash iHeartland today. What's up? GLA double dollar sign each side. That's right, glass is my loan. Hey, check No Sillings on the Black Effect Podcast Network. No Sillings is a weekly conversation

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Seven years passed. She was presumed dead. Then a tip came in. He said, I think I found your girl. She's alive. She's in New York. And I said, really? The detective on the case, he didn't buy it.

He came to believe that he was dealing with an imposter. Who was this woman, really? Listen to deep cover on the iHeart Radio App, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcasts. Pods of the cast. Shit. That wasn't. That was just sounds.

That was just mouth sounds. I didn't make it. Like the great album by Neil Cicerega, which you should check out. This is Robert Evans introducing his podcast behind the bastards very poorly. Miles, please come in and save me from this. Hello, Bobby.

Good to be here. Miles Gray coming in live and direct from the city of assholes. I mean, angels, Miles, when you when you did your podcast training, yes, which day did they teach you how to do something besides grunt incoherently while introducing a podcast? I don't know.

I mean, I'm not like full disclosure. I I faked all my podcast education. Are you an unlicensed podcaster? I mean, come look, Robert, if anyone I can tell you seven one. God damn it. I did. I did. I'm a fake man. Shame. I just had a mic and someone was like, hey, you're a guy. You podcast. I'm like, yes.

That is how it works. That is just how it works. If you're a guy, you you're given a podcast in the early days. Yeah, they weren't even given. It was just a bunch of like like zombies with mics being like, have this podcast. You're now endorsed by this company that mails you things that you used to buy from the CVS, right? Yeah. Oh, podcast. Oh, boy.

Speaking of grifts, Miles, do you remember that build the wall? We, the people will build the wall. Go find me that raised like twenty five million dollars. How could I forget something that on its face was like immediately visible that this was a con job. You scared. It was such a beautiful. We did an episode about this, which you can check out.

Katie and Cody were the guests on that one, I think. And I don't like them anymore because I work with them on another podcast. So I like them. We're angry at each other now. No, that's it. They're just it's the they're podcasting too much. Be nice to them. So we we talked about them.

And basically, the gist of it is that this guy, Brian Colfage, who is like, he likes to brand himself as the most severely injured airman in US airman in Iraq, which might be true. I mean, I don't know how you like measure that, but he was like horrifically wounded. He was on his way to the gym on a base in the green zone when a mortar landed right next to him and he lost his legs

and like part of an arm, like he got really fucked up like about as badly as you can without dying. Right. So he came back home and he started like a fake news empire on Facebook with like all these right wing news websites. And he's making quite a bit of money before Facebook shut his whole network down because it was like he was breaking their terms of service a bunch with like a bunch of coordinated and authentic activity and stuff.

Oh, like all the right wing Facebook. Yeah, yeah. So they shut him down. And when his money spigot got turned off and there's like articles from people who worked at them at the time, who said the guy has a horrible temper. He could get like violent and stuff at the drop of a hat. He's just a very unpleasant person, which, you know, I'm sure some of that's horrific trauma,

but it doesn't excuse grifting thousands of people, which is what he did next. So he created a GoFundMe for we the people will build the wall. There's now confirmed evidence that they were talking with members of the Trump administration. They had like meetings with them. There was talk of like trying to figure out how to take the funds that they got and roll it over. Or like, you know, there was there was official

correspondence that they had with members of the Trump campaign and like is or the Trump team. And as soon as like this thing took off, which, you know, it was pretty much immediately making raising millions of dollars. A bunch of other famous right wing grifters got on board, including our old buddy, Steve Bannon. Eric Prince was on the the board of the foundation they set up to deal with the money. So like basically when it became clear that,

you know, so the initial idea was like, we're going to raise money to give to the government so that they can build this wall. Because the damn libs won't give it to us. Yeah. And that it became clear that like, that's not really how the government works. Like you can't just you can't just GoFundMe a border wall that would number one, involve like building on massive amounts of private land and like all of this shit. Like you just it's not a thing that gets to be done.

Um, so they changed the the focus of it to like, we're going to actually build the wall. And they they, you know, because they were altering sort of the nature of what they were doing, GoFundMe allowed people to kind of opt in to continue having their money roll over into the new thing that they were doing. And most people who donated agreed to do it. There's a bunch of shady stuff and like their explanation of what they were doing, including the point that like the money will be used either to actually construct the wall or to engage in, you know, lobbying or whatever that will help to construct the wall.

So there's like a bunch of stuff where it's like, oh, so you're going to became very clear, like you're going to find ways to put this in the pockets of the very famous right wing people who have all leapt on to this program, including Steve Bannon and Eric Prince. And, you know, one of the things they repeatedly stated when this all happened is that Brian Colfage, who was founder and the face of the thing, was not going to receive any money, would not be paid, wasn't going to make any a dime off of this. It was just, you know,

doing it out of the goodness of his heart. And then last week, all of these guys got arrested, including Steve Bannon, which is the best thing that's ever happened, that Steve Bannon has now for more than a week been incarcerated. It just, it just slaps unbelievably hard. The thing with that though, like listening to these people, knowing Eric Prince is on that board, right? He should know better than, you should know better than anyone that like building like physical

infrastructure on like in the United States is probably a long shot. Like he, you have a better chance crowdfunding a private air force, I feel like, than being like, yeah, we're just going to build chunks of border wall because, you know, fucking America, I'm a little disappointed in Eric. You know what I mean? Like he should, he knows out of anyone, if you're going to pull some wildly illegal kind of stuff where you're trying to take the place of the government, you got to start out, you got to be a little more surgical.

Yeah, I mean, but he doesn't. Like he's, he's, he's committed so many more blatant crimes than this that he always gets away with it because he's a billionaire. That said, I don't think he was super involved with this. Like I, this was like some side piece for him. Yeah, yeah. You know, but it is, it is. So it's turned into this amazing story where like, again,

like the fucking Steve Bannon's got arrested as a result of this. There's pictures of him now fucking in handcuffs and it's, it's one of the best things that's ever happened. And it was the best thing about it is that it was like the Postal Services investigative unit, which is the first federal law enforcement agency. We all learned when they arrested Steve Bannon. Damn. So I guess, I guess I'll say maybe not all cops are bad.

Like we've got like, I'm willing to make an exception for the post office cops given what happened recently. Yeah, exactly. And then like we said, like everyone with the post office under fire, like if we're in the back, the blue is going to be the Postal Service. Yeah, it's going to be the, these are the ones I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm a hundred percent supportive of arresting Steve Bannon on a yacht. Cut to some like wild clip of like postal, like postal police brutality.

And you're like, what the, even y'all? I thought you were the male cops. No, it's, they actually committed genocide against all these different tribes. They're like, oh boy. I don't know that I've never heard that the post office committed genocide, but like, let's be honest, it wouldn't be the most surprising thing in American history. But that I, let's not make random allegations of genocide against the post office. The Postal Service, no.

Yeah, let's, let's, we've got the charging document, which is the, it's basically like a podcast episode written by a United States district court, in this case, the Southern District of New York, to summarize the government's case against all of the crime doers behind the we the people will build the wall, all caught, and I'm just going to start reading it to you, Miles. We'll skim some parts of it when it gets boring, but like the fact that the fact that you just go, I'm just going to read the fucking, I'm just going to read this son of a bitch.

I'm like, cause I love sometimes, you know, are there these cases, especially in this Trump era where just the like legal description of your, like these amazing, how did they think any of this was going to work? Or they weren't going to get caught. I mean, the thing that's more amazing to me is that they did get caught. Like clearly, whatever else is going on in the world, Steve Bannon and Brian Colfage did not have the, the, the, the clout they thought they had, cause they, they thought they had the cloud that like Roger Stone has,

where we can commit blatant crimes and we will get forgiven for it or will, they'll be too scared of us to go after us. And it just wasn't true for them. And I don't know why entirely, but it's beautiful. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe it was that it was too blatant. Maybe it was that, you know, they didn't kiss the right asses.

I don't know what the, the explanation is, but let's, let's get into it. The grand jury charges, one, Brian Colfage, Stephen Bannon, Andrew Battolato and Timothy Shea, the defendants and others orchestrated a scheme to defraud hundreds of thousands of donors, including donors in the southern district in New York in connection with an online crowdfunding campaign, ultimately known as we build the wall that raised more than $25 million to build a wall along the southern border of the United States to induce donors to donate to the campaign, Colfage and Bannon, each of whom, as detailed

herein, exerted significant control over, we build the wall, repeatedly and falsely assured the public that Colfage would quote, not take a penny in salary and or compensation in that quote, 100% of the funds raised will be used in the execution of our mission and purpose because as Bannon publicly stated, we're a volunteer organization. These representations were false. In truth, Brian Colfage, Stephen Bannon, Andrew Battolato and Timothy Shea, the defendants collectively received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donor

funds from we build the wall, which they each used in a manner inconsistent with the organization's public representations. In particular, Colfage covertly took more than $350,000 in funds that had been donated to we build the wall for his personal use. Well, Bannon, through a nonprofit organization under his control, nonprofit one, received over a million dollars from we build the wall, which Bannon used to, among other things, secretly pay Colfage and to cover hundreds of thousands of dollars in Bannon's personal expenses.

Dude, what is this thing on nonprofit? Oh, that was just in the charging document. It's called nonprofit. I thought of which makes sense because it's a legal document. I was hoping that Steve Bannon is like such a lazy schemer that he's like, oh, fuck, I got to put a nonprofit together to fucking be able to move this money around. I call it fucking nonprofit one. It's like my idea.

I've always wanted to create an LLC for a variety of reasons and call it unlimited liability because there's something in my brain that enjoys the idea of unlimited liability, a limited liability corporation. Fun, limited liability. To conceal the payments to Colfage from we build the wall, Colfage, Bannon, Batalotto and Shea devised a scheme to route these payments from we build the wall to Colfage indirectly through a nonprofit and a shell company under Shea's control, among other avenues.

They did so by using fake invoices and sham vendor arrangements, among other ways, to ensure, as Colfage noted in a text message to Batalotto, that his pay arrangement remained confidential and kept on a need to know basis. So again, committing crimes and texting about it. Yeah. What a hallmark of this group of people. Just like, yep, we make our own receipts here. I know so many people that because of the protests won't text message about

the the shield materials that they're like gathering so that people can build like defensive devices to protect themselves from impact weapons. Like they're paranoid about like gathering fucking like rubber and foam inserts and stuff. And these guys are just like, yeah, I got to go steal the million dollars. You guys like, here's how we'll do it. Right. And also use this fake vendor, like fake is all caps. Use the fake company we set up to illegally funnel money through to do

this illegal thing that we're all doing together. You guys all down for the illegal crimes that we're committing. Right. It's so easy to be a conservative. We are defrauding the American people with our build a wall scheme. Please like, please use the tap back in your messages app and your iPhone to confirm your that you are culpable. I know people who live in paranoia because they're getting followed as a

result of bringing water every night to to demonstrations. Right. And then this is the shit. It was audacious nonsense. Fucking hell. Honor around December 17th, 2018. Brian Colfage, the defendant with the assistance of others, launched a fundraising campaign originally called We the People Build the Wall on a crowdfunding website.

The crowdfunding website is how it's referred to in the document. It's go fund me. According to statements on the webpage for We the People Build the Wall on the crowdfunding website, just a very funny. It just looks very silly in this document. You can't say that without laughing. Yeah. The crowdfunding website. The crowd, like, come on, guys.

We the people crowdfunding. Yeah, this is like when a fucking movie uses some sort of fake Google thing, like a researcher or whatever. It's like, come on, guys, we know it's Google. The campaign was raising funds to donate to the United States federal government for construction of a wall at the southern border of the United States. The webpage also stated that 100% of your donations would be given to the government for the construction of a wall and that if the campaign could not

attain its goal, it would refund to every single penny. The We the People Build the Wall campaign was an immediate fundraising success. Within the first week, Brian Colfage, the defendant with the assistance of Timothy Shea, the defendant raised approximately $17 million. Despite its early success, the campaign also drew scrutiny, including questions about Colfage's background and the campaign's plan to give the money raised to the federal government. Based on those concerns, in or around December 2018, go fund me.

Which they, the crowdfunding website suspended the campaign, which by that point had raised more than $20 million and warned Brian Colfage, the defendant, that unless he identified a legitimate nonprofit organization into which these funds could be transferred, the crowdfunding website would return the funds. At around the same time, Brian Colfage, the defendant, involves Stephen Bannon and Andrew Battalotto, the defendants in the leadership of the campaign. Bannon, a political strategist and former media executive, and

Battalotto, an entrepreneur and venture capitalist, were already working together on nonprofit one, which was a separate section 501c4 organization founded by Bannon with the stated purpose of promoting economic nationalism and American sovereignty. Fascism. We can call that one fascism, right? Economic nationalism. That's very fancy.

Fucking fascist. And he uses his fun, fancy, fascist nonprofit to funnel donations into illegally, which is just very on brand. Within days of becoming involved, Stephen Bannon and Andrew Battalotto, the defendants, took significant control of the fundraising campaign's organization and day-to-day activities. So basically, they took, they immediately took control of we the people will build the wall and by like late December 2018, they were basically in charge

and they created a new 501c4 called We Build the Wall Inc. And they proposed that the money, you know, would be transferred there. A nonprofit, yes. We Build the Wall Inc. Yeah, yeah, a nonprofit to build, to finance private construction of a wall along the southern border. So, yeah, and they gave a bunch of assurances to GoFundMe that, like, this was all legitimate and the money would all go to this new 501c4 they'd

founded in order to induce GoFundMe to release the donor funds. These assurances include, I'm quoting again, these assurances included, among other things, written bylaws with conflict of interest provisions and compensation restrictions precluding insiders like Colfage, among others, from inappropriately misusing donor funds. And I promise that Colfage will take no salary. And will personally not take a penny of compensation from these donations. Colfage, Bannon, and Badalado also agreed that donors would have to opt in

to having their contribution redirected from the crowdfunding website to We Build the Wall. So, they hung themselves here. They like, they made a legal document promising that in no way would, among other things, Colfage get any money from this because it was the only way to get the money. Yeah. And they just assumed it would be fine

because so many other crimes that these people and their friends committed were fine. It's just like, like a, how scumbag men think too, like with sex. It's like, well, what do I got to say to have sex, you know? And after that, I may not mean it, but I'm so just so short-sighted about my own gratification, I will deceive and lie just to get there without any thinking of, like, where that goes after the fact. And I just love that, like, this scam is so fucking American in that,

like, you're weaponizing, like, the fear of black and brown people to then enrich yourself and, like, when really you could give a fuck about any of it. Aside from purely being like, oh, this is great. This is a great group of just dummies to just rinse. Yeah, it's it's evidence of what those of us who are are vaguely aware of, like, objective reality have known for a long time, which is that, like, almost none of these fascists, with the exception of really, like, Stephen Miller and a couple others, almost none of them believe

in what they're saying, it's just the best way to get what they want, which is money and power. Like, if these guys, if their primary concern was a legal immigration, they would have tried to, they would have used this money to in some way fuck over migrants, right? Yeah, like, whether or not it was the wall, that's what they would have done with this huge amount of money. And they would have gotten nothing but praise from the donors,

even if it wasn't a wall, even it was some other way of hurting these people. But they didn't even really care about hurting those people. They just wanted to steal. And it's awesome. It's so good that in this one rare instance, they faced consequences. Yeah, I mean, yeah, you hate to see it and you love to see it. Yeah, you know, it's it. It's so good. It's so audacious.

But again, I don't know. Whatever every time, like, even when we whenever we I come on this show. Yeah, it's where I'm always like, damn, the audacity of these fucking people. But that really is the true DNA of a true historical piece of shit. Bastard is you really you have a you're just all about yourself. And there's absolutely zero consideration for anything, aside for your own like just your very own personal lived experience. Yeah. And it works for them usually because it's an effective strategy

in winning in our system is to only give a shit about yourself and be like sociopathically dedicated to nothing but your own enrichment, right? Like, right, that works in a lot of ways, except for occasionally you get arrested on a yacht by the post office. It's always got to be like, you know, I wonder if you're pissed. You're like, fuck, it's gotta be at least like the feds or something like the fed feds. It's the post. Did you have to wear that hat too?

Like I hope they did. I hope they're they're exactly the same as a normal SWAT team, but with the hats. Yeah, just and not even the tack gear. Yeah, like they don't even have weapons. They're just like very coordinated group of mail carriers that are like, we're if we can do this without what I wouldn't fuck with a group of mail delivery. Well, yeah, I mean, essentially, I mean, the amount of veterans that work for the postal service to I'm like, you're actually dealing with people

with some experience in the military as well. So. Yeah. So, man, beginning in January, 2019, the defendants caused we build the wall to mislead donors, promising them repeatedly that 100% of the funds would be used for construction of a wall and that Kofosh in particular would take no salary or compensation. And obviously, contrary to this, they were immediately misappropriating hundreds of thousands of dollars in funds for their own benefit. Beginning on around January 11th, 2019, and consistent with the

insurances provided to the crowdfunding website, we build the wall, announced that it had changed its mission to the private construction of a wall and that donors needed to opt in. Yeah. And that worked out. And it seemed like, you know, the document is alleging that this worked because of their promise that 100% of the funds raised would be used towards the construction of a wall and that not a penny would be used to compensate Kofosh. They repeatedly made these preference, like they're stating basically

over and over again, they couldn't stop making these promises and they're making these promises is why so many people willing to like donate the money. Right. And it's why it's so easy for us to prove that they repeatedly broke the broke the law. And yeah, I'm sure like the comments of the Trump family helped too, because I remember like Don Jr. was like, look at look at this man. Like, yeah, this is an example of American enterprise or some shit. And like the whole idea. He's a hero. Yeah.

Yeah. He's going to, there's a quote, doing it better, faster and cheaper than anything else. Like, yeah, definitely cheaper and shittier than anything else. If I had to choose between the government spending hundreds of millions of dollars on incomplete sections of wall that are easily breached or torn below the $5 million on nothing, I would, I will choose the nothing also, because I prefer there not be any wall on the southern border or fence. Yeah. And in fact, if we could just spend $25 million a year and have it go to right wing

grifters and have an open border on the south, I would make that compromise. That's something I'm willing to get on board with. Right, right, right. They're like, dude, just take your money and fuck off. Just take your money and like stop fucking with these people. Also, just so you know, we just printed a bunch of that shit. We don't know what, how much it's really worth. Yeah. So Colfage posted messages on social media that included representations such as, we promised 100% of the funds raised only go to

border wall construction. All money donated to we build the wall goes directly to wall, to wall, not anyone's pocket. I'm taking nothing, zero. In fact, Colfage went so far as to send mass emails to his donors asking them to purchase coffee from his unrelated business, telling donors that the coffee company was the only way he keeps his family fed in a roof over their head because Colfage was taking no compensation from we build the wall. He couldn't stop double dipping like none of them have any sort of self-control. They can't fucking double dip.

It's, hey, that, man, again, even when you add the layers of just balls to this where you're like, dude, I'm fucking stealing from you. And then I'm also going to have my shitty coffee company and then he built you for more cash from there. My hat's off to him. Hey, Robert, Robert, you know who doesn't sponsor this show? That shitty coffee company. But you know who does sponsor this show? Oh, the good people at Raytheon. Yes, Raytheon. Miles, you know what's better than a border wall for stopping migrants from crossing the border?

Oh, yeah. Predator drones. Predator drones armed with the new RX-9 knife missile. Yes, the knife missile allows you to knife people from the sky using the power of the federal government and gravity and gravity. Less of a factor. You know, the beauty of Raytheon technology is that it functions equally well in a zero-G environment. So that when in the inevitable future, we have moon refugees, we'll be able to shoot them with knife missiles too, Miles. That's the promise of Raytheon. Actually, you're saying it wrong. It's Greytheon. Let's roll some ads.

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resting on the fact that Brian Colfage specifically got money from this. And none of them they just no one thought anyone would notice anything. I don't I it's I can't get my head around it because do you think because like they were just sort of being like if we hide behind this person whose body was mangled in war and that will sort of get like sort of give him this position where you wouldn't dare question their patriotism. Like in that like they were also sort of like getting really hyped up on that idea too for like the whole sort of grift of it all. Yeah, I think they figured that like they could that

nobody on the right and nobody in the Trump administration would ever allow anything bad to happen to Colfage because he's that but like and it's the same I don't know we'll see how this situation in Kenosha with the mass shooter goes but like the Trump campaign's initial thing was to be like oh he's not affiliated with us in any way we support what law enforcement did in arresting and charging him with murder. You know we'll see because obviously there's folks in the right that when we like adopt that kid as a mascot I don't know what the Trump I think he's actually speaking at the R&C

later. I don't actually know like what Trump wind up doing about this but like the initial thing they did was what their actual initial reaction is which is oh this person's a liability let's jettison them immediately maybe they'll decide against that but like that's what they've done with Colfage like they haven't they haven't made any sort of a stink about the arrest of Colfage or ban and they've just been like yep they shouldn't have fucked up and broken the law we support law enforcement because like they don't give a shit about you. Right. Their hearts must be breaking right now. Yeah. They're like what the

fuck Steve you said it'd be fine. So let's go on to just how fucking blatant this is so the document continues to note in developing the strategy of emphasizing to donors that Colfage would not be paid a dime ban and in battle lotto in a text message exchange discussed how that message would help drive fundraising and opt-ins by prior donors because it would as battle lotto stated become the most talked about media narrative ever since it removes all self-interest taint and gives Brian Colfage sainthood for that reason battle lotto insisted that the statement that Colfage will not take a penny of

compensation be included in the email to we build the walls donors about the opt-in process explaining in an email that his statement was a material item to donors again let us all state clearly in text messages how like that we are committing a crime that we are making legally binding promises that we intend to break let's just all talk about that very clear document that no like don't even use the finesse of like voice messages back and forth some kind of temporary transmission whatever just yeah just cement it's all there I mean they make they made it really easy for the postal investigative service what

are they technically called us p is or something yeah something like that okay yeah shout out to the cops the only cops that I'm supportive of until somebody tells me about the horrible things that they've done and then we'll have another episode all I know is that they arrest fascists on yachts I speak for all of your listeners can you stop can you stop predicting things hey I'm going to choose for a moment to believe that there's a law enforcement agency who just who just arrests yacht fascists I want to believe in something and I'm choosing to believe in this for the moment yeah I mean if you stop

making horrible things about everything and then happening like all of us would be like super appreciative if you could like predict something good yeah I'm gonna predict that the only other thing the post office cops do is arrest people who illegally mail kittens they're just that they're just out there protecting kittens and arresting fascists I've decided to believe this okay making like some of the best like sort of small batch artisanal ice cream you've ever tasted yeah they make ice cream for some reason too and it's it's apparently great so yeah that's a that's a world I want to live so more

over the thing goes on to note the defendants conveyed that others in the leadership of we build the wall and its advisory board which ban and shared would not be compensated for example Colfage wrote on social media I thought it was pretty clear I made a promise that I would never take a penny a hundred percent of fundraising through donations will only go for towards the wall a hundred percent means a hundred percent right board won't see any of that money so they just kept promising what everything they were gonna do was yeah it's yeah cut to their texture they're like a hundred percent means fucking

maybe five percent board will see as much of that money as they want all right so what are we telling this next part's heartbreaking so this goes into like how many of the donors believed what he was saying donors took notice of this core narrative and told Brian Colfage the defendant and others working for we build the wall that it mattered to them some of those donors were wrote directly to Colfage that they did not have a lot of money and were skeptical about online fundraising campaigns but they were giving what they could because they trusted Colfage would keep his word about how their donations would be spent

Colfage also wrote to prospective donors who raised concerns assuring the donors and private messages that he was not being compensated these false assurances successfully induced donors to give money to we will the wall and opt in to have their prior donations transferred to we build the walls new non-profit entity of the original 20 million raised from hundreds of thousands of donors most of the donors agreed to opt in so that I didn't realize but the fact that they even have that that like no no individual donors who didn't have much money personally reached out to Brian with their concerns

and he lied to these people to their faces is it's so sweet yeah perfect yeah so I mean it's so Trump University too you know where people like you know they're it's like their last shot at this is my dialysis money yeah and in this case it's like I want to brutalize the brown people yeah I know but it's just so funny that like even then right they're so committed to this like you know fear of a black and brown America that they're just sort of like you know giving their last material like bit of like wealth they have to this stupid mirage of racism yep yep yep yep yep yep and it's one of those things like people I

do like people ask why I don't do more crowdfunding stuff and it is because like when you do crowdfunding stuff you get donations from people who will make statements like that like hey I believe in what you're doing I don't have much money but and I feel like I felt like a piece of shit every time that's happened so I would rather take I would rather you know be paid by advertisers than then yeah someone give me like their last time or yeah I don't I just don't want to I don't want to I don't want that on my fucking conscience I don't want to like oh and now I'm spending the money you know on grubhub tonight or whatever or

like right it's like oh fuck this was this like I don't want to of course it just no I'm I will I will sell products and services you'll yeah exactly and that's like that's my line I'm not saying it's immoral to crowdfund I think it's fine a lot of my friends make their living that way it just like it fucked me up and I'll probably do something like it again but I'll again repeatedly beg people please don't donate money if you don't have money like it's not important to my rich friends only yeah yeah exactly okay so despite these repeated assurance okay so this is yet despite these repeated assurances the

public narrative correct deliberately crafted by the defendants and others was false in fact although we built the wall spent money on the construction of a border wall hundreds of thousands of dollars were siphoned out if we build the wall for the private use and benefit of the defendants indeed despite Colfage's numerous public statements that he was not taking his salary or getting a penny in compensation within days of launching we build the wall Colfage working primarily with Bannon and battalotto reached a secret agreement whereby Colfage would be covertly paid a hundred thousand dollars up front and

then twenty thousand dollars a month because that arrangement was directly contrary to the defendants repeated public's representations the defendants and others scheme to pass these payments to Colfage indirectly through third parties including entities under the control of Bannon and Shea so yeah this is the stuff that we you know we talked about Bannon made it clear in a text message to battalotto that there would be no deals I don't approve and directed that Colfage be paid indirectly through non-profit one in an attempt to conceal the payments from the public notwithstanding the fact that Colfage

did no work for non-profit one and that the payments from non-profit one to Colfage be funded by bill we build the wall so yeah there's text messages between Bannon and battalotto talking about what Colfage's salary would be he Bannon directs the wiring of money illegally from the campaign to this yeah like they've got Bannon dead to fucking rights it sounds like he's he's discussing here are the crimes we will commit these are crimes because we had like we have to keep these crimes secret because they were legal here's how I'm going to do that and then we have him personally like doing the wire

payments and that's amazing right oh god this next part when Colfage later noted in a text message to battalotto that at least in part as a result of these pass-through payments we build the wall would have to disclose substantial payments oh yes on tax forms battalotto replied better you than me lol stupid pieces of shit yeah lawfully officially I don't know like what did you just that whole sentence I mean wow at every turn like you had to be like wink wink like it almost could have been that you know what I mean like seal the payments Colfage received from non-profit one Colfage instructed battalotto

that the payments should be made to Colfage's spouse and that non-profit one significant and non-profit one subsequently issued a form 1099 falsely stating that it had paid Colfage's spouse for media so hey you know what we should do is falsify some government documents yep I paid you for media okay now if they ask what happened was you held you took some photos of me for Instagram yeah fucking incredible like there was a lot of like those like fake ass vendors was always like vague right like media like social media or some shit yeah for media like you right fucking assholes there after beginning

and around April 2019 and to further conceal payments if we build the wall funds to Brian Colfage the defendant his secret monthly salary of approximately $20,000 was passed indirectly through the third party entities that were purported bit vendors for we build the wall including one under the control of Timothy Shay the defendant starting in around March 2019 Shay who had been involved in early operations for the predecessor campaign to we build the wall and was familiar with its repeated promises proposed in a text message exchange with Colfage paying Colfage and himself out of a veiled shell

corporation to conceal the source and nature of the payments Shay suggested that to conceal transactions where for instance instance $600,000 comes in and he transfers 300k to Colfage they could create companies that hired Colfage and Shay for his service like consulting to further conceal the secret arrangement Colfage told Shay in an email that they could falsely describe the payments from the new shell entity to Colfage as for social media love it love it it's just I mean cuz yeah those forums that it just really feels like when you're like being lazy and trying to do your taxes you're like I don't know yeah that

business internet social media sure and it's just my salary yep it's it's the best that's when like at one point too right didn't they like kind of wise up that like they were kind of being sloppy with it cuz I feel like I remember at the beginning of this year to that yeah okay here we go yeah the memo lines on these payments yes or again on or around May 21st 2019 shell company one received a $30,000 wire from rebuild the wall then it got it you know paid 20,000 to Colfage the memo lines on these payments falsely stated that they were for social media accounts and pages when neither Colfage nor anyone else had

done such work for show have them at least do fake work yeah like put in the asshole make on the fucking Donald Trump subreddit to get you some fucking meme some shitpost or something yeah moreover additional $20,000 payments were made to Colfage and funded with money from we build the wall these payments were made in subsequent months until at least October 2019 when it's discussed below the defendants learned that they might be under criminal investigation oh god that's good that was they must have been dude I can only imagine how much Steve Bannon's stress sweat was just stinking whatever room he

was that you know that you went oh 100% yeah I hope there were respirators left over from the fighting in Portland for those post office guys to like deal with that to board that stinking board that stink yeah I'll donate mine yeah right they're like honestly like we would sort of confiscate this and maybe auction it but yeah we're just gonna have to scuttle this thing we're just we're gonna have to burn this thing in the seat yeah we can't we can't put this in the ocean oh gosh so yeah what kind of like measures did they take when they were like oh guys I think we might be doing something bad that the police are

noticing yeah let's get down to so from from the start of the creation of we build the wall in January to October 2019 Brian received more than 350,000 dollars in donor funds passed in directly with the assistance of the other defendants Colfage use those funds to pay for his own private expenses including among other purposes home renovations payments towards a boat a luxury SUV a golf cart jewelry cosmetic surgery personal tax payments and credit card debt he did problem I mean he has he's horribly injured like it might not even be a vanity thing it might be like a oh like an actual

medical procedure yeah cuz his yeah he's horribly horribly I'm not gonna like like he's committed crimes to get the money but like I don't even know I don't know that it was like a vanity thing yeah yeah that he's something coming up with like a like beautiful full lips and no wrinkles on his forehead I don't see evidence of that it's related to his unless we like really look and it's like oh oh no no somebody got an ass injection they really I mean and you know the guy committed some crimes but like god damn they are these doubles he's triple C thick now whoever's doing his work you know they knew what they

were doing so moreover in addition to Brian Colfage the defendant Steve Bannon Andrew Battolato and Timothy Shay the defendants each received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donor funds from we build the wall which they each used to pay for a variety of personal expenses including among other things travel hotels consumer goods and personal credit card debts in addition to the payments described above to Colfage with respect to Bannon in particular as noted above non-profit one received over a million dollars from we build the wall and while some of that money was used to pay Colfage Bannon was used a

substantial portion of those donor funds for personal uses and expenses unrelated to we build the wall none of these payments were disclosed to the public instead they repeatedly lied to the public about where the money was going indeed as Colfage noted to Battolato in a text message exchange as far as the public knows no one is getting paid and salaries will never be disclosed oh my don't worry we'll crime through it oh my these victims will have no idea of how hard we're crying in bros you know who's not watching us the post office cops oh my they can eat a dick

fuck those guys didn't they like use like encrypted messaging apps too like I felt like that was one of the things like they thought they were getting real smart even though they did all this other shit that can be found I don't know it actually does just as text messages but maybe I you'd have to say right like I would say you'd have to think they would at least be careful enough to use like you know signal or something like they're so blatant about this maybe they were just fucking texting I don't know cuz yeah when you consider like Paul Manafort was like how do you make PDF of my bank account

just googling crimes and see yeah pops up with a question mark how to do fake bank account PDF like what yeah you know what also won't doesn't you know it isn't a crime hmm products and services during the summer of 2020 some Americans suspected that the FBI had secretly infiltrated the racial justice demonstrations and you know what they were right I'm Trevor Aronson and I'm hosting a new podcast series alphabet boys as the FBI sometimes you gotta grab the little guy to go after the big guy each season will take you inside an undercover investigation in the first season of alphabet boys we're revealing

how the FBI spied on protesters in Denver at the center of this story is a raspy voiced cigar smoking man who drives a silver hearse and inside his hearse with like a lot of guns he's a shark and on the good badass way and nasty sharks he was just waiting for me to set the date the time and then for sure he was trying to get it to happen listen to alphabet boys on the iHeart radio app Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast in the summer of 1999 a young woman in South Carolina disappeared in the middle of the night her name was Brooke Henson seven years past she was presumed dead and then a tip

came in that would turn the entire investigation on its head he said I think I found your girl she's alive she's in New York I said really according to this tip Brooke was now a student at Columbia University but the small town detective on the case in South Carolina he didn't believe it so he kept poking around I said I'm calling about a girl you might know named Brooke Henson and he said I wondered when you were gonna call when my son brought her home I knew she was troubled the detective ultimately became convinced that she was a master of deception a spy but who was this woman really listen to deep cover on the

iHeart radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts standing at 8 feet 2 inches tall Charles Byrne was the tallest man in the world in fact it earned him the nickname the Irish giant and when Charles arrived in London in 1782 he caused quite a stir but by May the following year death came calling for Charles in the form of tuberculosis and while most people were ready to mourn his passing one man was plotting with gleeful excitement for a chance to dissect the Irish Giants remains this January Grim and Mild presents will shift focus from the great wide world around us to the universe inside us all

in a journey that will span thousands of years and countless borders we plan to unpack the dark and twisted history of healing medicine so wash your hands set out your tools and prep for surgery Grim and Mild presents bedside manners is available now find Grim and Mild presents wherever you listen to podcasts learn more at Grim and Mild dot com slash presents we're back and we're talking about we build the wall which was the most real thing ever created somebody's gonna like write like some when you say we build the wall I just like imagine like a little song that comes on after that it

has to sound like a really terrible local business out like you're not gonna get a good jingle out of that no no so in or around October 2019 Brian Colfage Stephen Bannon Andrew Baudelotto the other defendants all learned from a financial institution that we build the wall might be under federal criminal investigation the defendants thereafter took additional steps to conceal the fraudulent scheme detailed below for example around that time and in reaction to the potential investigation Colfage and Baudelotto began using encrypted messaging apps on their phone so that's when they started all year

they're like hey guys how are the crimes we're doing going still crime and all right good good crimes everybody keep crime and hard maybe under investigation crime out with your time out like time like the spice that's as good as I could come up with why not moment yeah again the stress sweat you know yeah amazing that's so clear right you find out you're under investigation and then you switch to encrypted message you and as soon as they find out we build the walls website was changed to remove any mention of the promise that Colfage was not being compensated and to add a statement that he would be paid a

salary starting in January 2020 so they stopped paying him secret payments and announced that he was about to start getting a salary after promising the opposite for months for like a year and just hope that that would be okay yeah why not you know maybe just well you hate to see it and you also love to see it it's so good it's just one of the best things that's ever happened yeah I I remember very happy about all this like when it happened wasn't didn't wasn't that like a news headline when they he announced he was getting a salary and that's when people were like hold the fuck on because first ever like the

sort of public percent was like where's that fucking wall you're building it's not there and I was like it's a scheme and then it's like okay that guy's gonna get like a hundred grand and people look what the fuck now yeah what the yeah where's the fucking wall yeah it's blowing over in the fucking wind or whatever it's amazing I wonder I wonder what they thought would happen with this because they weren't building a wall they did like a couple of sampled chunks but like they never did anything meaningful and their whole promise was that like we'll do it faster and cheaper than the government so we'll be able to

actually afford to do it and they were they just gonna like pretend it failed well they had like one certain spots built and then like every engineer and like hydrologist was like this is gonna fucking just fall apart you know that right you didn't build it's not even built the right depth like that none of this is done correctly so I wonder if you know like I'm trying to really put myself in that schema mode like if okay I'm into deep how am I gonna get my way out of it I would probably begin some like NIMBY argument about how like these regulations are like stopping us while I'm slowly building some kind of like

escape pod to leave to some country without an extradition tree yeah I do I do like people have compared this to the famous monorail episode of The Simpsons and I do kind of feel like their plan was just a cartoon drawing of themselves flying to Acapulco with a bag of cash right is there a chance the wall could bend not a chance my bigot friend I think the wall should be the wall symbol to the cars for kids song it should be you know that's here kids 800 walls for big it's yeah amazing so let's get down to the good shit for feature allegations wait this is the good shit everything up until this point

has been like a bizarro comedy of errors few pages because it was all just like repeatedly restating in different ways they committed wire-flot fraud which they did as a result of committing the offense alleged in count one of this indictment Brian Kovach Steven Bannon Andrew battalato and Timothy Shea the defendant shall forfeit to the United States pursuant to title 18 United States code section night dadadadada any and all property real and personal that constitutes or is derived from proceeds traceable to the commission of set offense including but not limited to a sum of money in the United States

currency representing the amount of proceeds traceable to the commission of set offense and the following specific property so it then lists a bunch of different funds contained and wow there's a lot of bank accounts they put this money into God I'm on page two okay so like there's like two pages of different bank accounts they threw money into and then we get into property so number one the real property is described as a 2019 Jupiter Marine boat named warfighter the real property yeah I think that's the yacht that that I'm Colfage got as a result of committing the offense alleged in count two of this

indictment the defendant shall forfeit to the United States any and all property yada yada so yeah they got to give up all the fucking shit that they got warfighter they committed about yeah he loses his boat warfighter I mean that's that's good-looking boat it is it had four engines yeah the irony was like he was sailing in that thing in the 4th of July like Trump boat parade in Florida was he sure was and then he got arrested by the fucking post office and they're gonna take that boat and it's very funny there is something poetic about him in a boat like just decked out in Trump flags with the boat being purchased with

funds he grifted it's just like what would they've he could fully completes the visual circle in that moment it's so much better than I ever thought anything could be I I I've gotten a lot of credit over the last year or so in particular and in predicting a bunch of things and I can tell you honestly never in my life did I expect post office arrest Steve Bannon on a yacht would be yeah would be a that's not on anyone's 2020 being no nobody called this especially not Steve Bannon I guess post office might have predicted it yeah 100% mm-hmm yeah I I so bad you know like there's so many like just dark

messy dimensions about this entire administration but like this sort of falls into like Wolf of Wall Street territory where you just like watch these guys get in over their heads with their greed and then I want like that second act and third act is probably so great when you start seeing it fall apart because I would love to see a dramatic like a dramaticized version of these fucking losers just panicking over the fact that their entire shit has just been exposed and then like all these terrible superficial band-aid fixes to it yeah and I want to state I was wrong a little bit earlier Colfage was um was

was released within hours of being arrested he's on bond at the moment he's pled not guilty and Bannon was released not long on after he was arrested on five million dollars of bond his travel is restricted to New York and Washington DC and he can't use private boats or jets without permission so we'll see we'll see what actually happens here in terms of justice they got arrested it seems like a pretty open and shut case to be honest what would yeah repeatedly bragging about it and as a rule when the Fed when any kind of federal agency does something like this they feel like they have a pretty air

tight case oh yeah and I mean when you but again it's like it's so comedic because yeah the confessions are all there like there I don't know how what lawyers gonna argue that they're not guilty like how are you gonna explain the better you than me lol text like how yeah I'm sure they've got some sort of like whatever they'll try they'll try but I'm just saying it makes me cringe because you're going in there with such like an intellectually bankrupt defense and like I get stressed I'm like oh man you're not gonna like you know sometimes you can get your way I worm your way out of shit but this one is a little too

tough I think if anything it's it's in the sentencing that we really see the lack of justice because I think what they're looking at like 20 years for each charge essentially but really yeah yeah we'll be surprised if it's like you know yeah two years they're gonna get that an Becky treatment oh two seconds I doubt it'll be a crazy amount of time I don't know you know everyone seems to hate Steve Bannon yeah a lot and he committed a bunch of crimes and he has no more friends yeah so you know if Steve Bannon gets anything more than a year I'm gonna consider this a big win because then Steve Bannon's in a fucking

prison for a while and I hate him and he sucks and it would be awesome if he actually faced a consequence for one of the terrible things Steve no friends Bannon is that on your bingo card for 2020 justice for Steve Bannon I never thought I thought he was just gonna live in a fascist castle that he was buying in Italy with an army of brainwashed militants for decades and dying of cirrhosis I thought he's just gonna sit like in a chair just slowly decompose yeah looks like I won't be mean yeah I just assumed he was going to die the death of a successful fascist which is again in a castle in Italy right yeah

but maybe maybe he'll go to prison and reform himself and become the the new face of the green movement I don't think that's likely but it would be kind of funny yeah well you know thoughts and prayers you know thoughts and prayers to Steve and Brian and who are these other guys no more friends so Miles this was fun yes can people find you on the internet if they want to see things that you've done that are reading I mean charging document really I do a daily podcast daily like guys but really you do if you need if you need an escape check my show out with Sophia Alexandra 420 day fiance you know the the bastard the

bastard pods followers love Sophia love get together get just stony baloney and just talk about our favorite reality show because you know that's that's a real escape sometimes so check that out wherever you get your podcasts oh yeah and we do this thing now where I do a terrible Arnold Schwarzenegger impression and then I say Arnold Schwarzenegger is a guest and then pod the podcast app will tag Arnold Schwarzenegger as a guest on the show so if you're Arnold Schwarzenegger fan come by you'll love to hear it you do love to hear it and the other thing you love to do is commit wire fraud which I have on good authority never ends badly

so never my advice to listeners is to go fraud fraud some wires fraud fraud the hell out of it up yeah you find some wires fraud the sons of bitches you get it on well you know or you could like follow Robert on Twitter at I write okay could follow us on Twitter and Instagram at bastards pod leave a tea public store with lots of different merchandise and wash your hands and wear a face mask yeah wash your hands wear a face mask commit a lot of wire fraud just again I can't exaggerate how good an idea it is to commit wire fraud and text your friends about the wire fraud you plan to commit really just get get in there you know

send them letters to about the way I have it on good authority the post office is not watching so and also yeah have those letters notarized as well so you can really just make sure all the correspondences fully locked in and you're not there's no miscommunication yeah yeah be really clear make sure whenever you're committing crimes to outline the crime that you're committing and your knowledge that it's a crime right that's a double jeopardy if I understand what double jeopardy is yeah perfect you should be their lawyer charged yeah I would I would love to be Steve Bannon I will take that gig you

know what I will I will quit podcasting if they want me to defend representative case yeah how would you do it like obviously you know you're gonna lose so would you just try some harebrained shit or would you just be I mean obviously you got to kind of work them to you know miles I think I would take the most asset I've ever taken and just see where that leads me you know I've never been in a courtroom on LSD right but I bet I could defend two people from charges of wire fraud oh yeah yeah well because then yeah when they have to be like and what of this text message can you read this one mr. Bannon

I might turn out to be like that guy who pitched a no-hitter on a head full yeah like that but defending people against charges of blatant wire fraud oh yes that is one of the great tales of Doc Ellis's ride yeah Doc Ellis on so much acid pitched a no-hitter I will be the doc Ellis of fascists committed wire fraud in a court of law that'll be act three of or four of my career yeah absolutely yeah yeah Robert kind of lost himself in those later years but yeah he just kept taking acid and defending Nazis from wire fraud but in a way he was the he was the greatest giver of justice because every single person got the

maximum sentence based off his hair brain defenses and people to this day don't know why these people agreed to have him defend them yeah it really was a baffling choice all around yeah all right well the episode's over go be with Jesus do you love movies will I have the podcast for you hey there this is Mike D from movie Mike's movie podcast your go-to source for all things movies each episode explores a different movie topic plus spoiler-free reviews on the latest streaming and movies in theaters you'll also get interviews with actors and directors to take a look behind the scenes of your favorite movies listen to

new episodes of movie Mike's movie podcast every Monday on the Nashville podcast network available on the I heart radio app Apple podcast or ever you get your podcasts watch up GLA double dollar sign each side that's right glasses Malone hey check no sillage on the black effect podcast network no sillage is a weekly conversation where we share light and perspectives on some of the most uncomfortable topics your ability is the most underrated strengths of all strengths and there's nothing more durable than this in a no-sillage podcast on the black effect podcast network I heart radio app Apple podcast

anywhere you checking out your podcast back in 1999 a young woman from South Carolina vanished seven years past she was presumed dead then a tip came in he said I think I found your girl and she's alive she's in New York and I said really the detective on the case he didn't buy it he came to believe that he was dealing with an imposter who was this woman really listen to deep cover on the I heart radio app Apple podcasts wherever you get your podcasts