Some More News - Some More News: All The Ways Trump Is Using The Presidency To Enrich Himself

Episode Date: November 19, 2025

Hi. Have you had trouble keeping track of all the grifts? The crypto scams, the Trump watches, all the bribes? In this episode, we go through every way Trump is using the presidency to make him and his family billions.Hosted by Cody JohnstonExecutive Producer - Katy StollDirected by Will GordhWritten by Marco Siler-GonzalesProduced by Jonathan HarrisEdited by Gregg MellerPost-Production Supervisor / Motion Graphics & VFX - John ConwayResearcher - Marco Siler-GonzalesGraphics by Clint DeNiscoHead Writer - David Christopher BellPATREON: https://patreon.com/somemorenewsMERCH: https://shop.somemorenews.comYOUTUBE MEMBERSHIP: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvlj0IzjSnNoduQF0l3VGng/join#somemorenews #DonaldTrump #cryptocurrency Upgrade your wallet today! Get 10% Off @Ridge with code SMN at https://www.Ridge.com/SMN #RidgepodIf you’re 21 or older, grab 25% off your first INDACLOUD order plus free shipping with code SMN at http://indacloud.co! Calm your mind, change your life. Calm has an exclusive offer just for listeners of our show- get 40% off a Calm Premium Subscription at http://calm.com/MORENEWS. This is an amazing value.Pluto TV. Stream Now. Pay Never.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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please contact Connix Ontario at 1866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. They made Jimmy Carter give up his peanut farm! His peanut farm! Hi, hey! Ugh! News, listen, we all know that Donald Trump, who I guess is the president, also does a lot of scams and crimes and has a lot of very troubling conflicts of interest.

But here's some news. Let's put it all in one place. I think with all the boat murders and authoritarian roundups and diarrhea videos, it might seem almost quaint at this point. I mean, we talked about this in the literal first episode of this iteration of the show seven gosh darn years ago. Sure, the empire sucks. Trump's violating the emoluments clause

of the Constitution and could have been impeached last year. And sure, he recently told his rich buddy and former advisor about his steel tariff, so the dude dumped a bunch of stock before the announcement, which is just a fun way of saying they did some crimes. Seven years! Oh my God, look at me and talking about Star Wars, Star Wars and Trump all disheveled?

So different back then. Like and subscribe, by the way. Press the button, we're almost at a million subscribers. They send you a gold-wrapped chocolate bar when that happens, and I want the chocolate bar so bad. My point is that, yes, this is an old problem. It's so old, in fact, that I talked about this issue, even earlier before the original iteration of this show even existed.

But that doesn't make it not a problem. If anything, it makes it much worse. It's like a shed you never get around to cleaning and you just stick a tarp over it and try to ignore the sounds of possums mating. And the longer you wait, the more empowered and horny and numerous those possums get.

Like, he could have been removed from office for this any day. So maybe it's time to rip the tarp off, get out the weed whacker, and I guess, murder those baby possums? That's mean. Let's just impeach Trump. Again. Again.

I'm really rich. So shiny. All the ways Trump profits off a bus. U.S. I mean, technically every president benefits from the office. You get your own house for a while. And of course, after your term or terms, you got your book deals, you're speaking tours,

podcasts, or selling paintings to help you and others forget about all your work. war crimes. It's a net gain, unless you're one of the ones who got shot. Point is, President Donald Jackamoff Trump isn't the only president to make a buck off the office or have some conflicts of interest. Most recently, we had the whole thing with Hunter Biden, allegedly using his dad's influence as vice president to obtain more favorable deals with foreign companies. However, there wasn't any actual proof of that. Obama had a little controversy too. Coming into office in 2008, reporters uncovered a mortgage scandal involving a below-market interest loan that the future president received as a U.S. senator.

But the Federal Election Commission found no foul play since that interest rate was available to other customers and businesses. Another Obama enrichment controversy involved investments made in a blind trust that put money into companies backed by a top Obama political donor. But because these investments were made by a financial broker, Obama had no knowledge of where that money was going. In theory. Also, everything I just said is adorable now. And even in those tame examples, they weren't literally the president when it happened.

Because most of the time, the president is expected to refrain from running side gigs while they are president because of the obvious conflicts of interest. It's just not something they did in the past. I mean, except for Garfield. He got his face on everything, it seems. It's weird. We elected a fictional cat in the first place. But I guess we were more progressive back then, you know? R.I.P. Woke.

So let's dive in that Trump hole. A phrase I immediately regret using, but we'll continue to use. And to start getting us off in the Trump hole, I want to highlight how Trump used to make his money before getting elected. because that's actually going to be important. The Sharper Image is one of my favorite stores with fantastic products of all kinds. That's why I'm thrilled they agree with me.

Trump's stakes are the world's greatest stakes, and I mean that in every sense of the word. And the Sharper Image is the only store where you can buy them. Boy, as an aside, he is a terrible performer. Come on, Don, put a little emotion into it. These are your stakes, man! People talk about Trump's stakes, a lot, but they're actually very important for understanding Trump as a salesman, starting

with the fact that he sold freaking steak at Sharper Image of all places. For our younger viewers, Sharper Image was a semi-fancy gadget store that was basically Spencer's Gifts for the upper middle class. Also for our younger viewers, Spencer's Gifts is a shop at the mall that sells silly Chotchkes and black light posters, a proto hot topic that had lava lamps and mugs shaped like a boob. Also, a mall was like a physical version of Amazon that you could eat soft pretzels in. Oh, in the middle class was this third class between dirt poor and having all the money ever. What I'm getting at is that Sharper Image wasn't a place to buy food, let alone perishable

food. But it was a brand that was superficially associated with luxury, not actual luxury, but the cheap Disney Cruise version of luxury, which is, of course, what the Trump brand also is. Because that was the Trump method. Take a cheap thing, slap the Trump name on it, and say it's the most bestest version of that thing, because you, the definitely rich and successful guy, you know what bestest things are. And then you slap a higher price tag on it, let gullible people buy it, and when it eventually or immediately fails, you grab as much money as you can and run. You know, like a grift. Extra points, if you don't pay anyone, along the way, like contractors or venues for your events or charities you're fundraising for.

Point is, you sell crap, whether it be steak or an education, for way more than it's worth, and then you get out of there! Donald Trump has, since the start, simply been selling his name. And not even really his name? Like, back in the 1980s and 1990s, Trump amassed large amounts of debt by buying up casinos, real estate, mega yachts, and even an airline. He did that by convincing friendly banks that he was as much of a moneymaker as his father, Fred Trump. He was a nepo baby, which is fine. We love some of our nepo babies. Look at Jack Quaid, he's a fine young man. But basically, Donald Trump was able to fail again and again because his father had tied their name to success, which eventually he himself would be able to do as well. Because if you can't actually be a success,

successful salesman, well, you can play one on TV. Sir, it is my esteemed pleasure to introduce Mr. and Mrs. Donald Trump. Ron said his client had a rich uncle, but Donald Trump. I like keeping a low profile. See, the joke is that he absolutely doesn't like to keep a low profile. During the 90s, whenever a TV show or movie needed a rich guy character, they They would often just use Donald Trump, who loved to play himself in anything he'd be allowed in. This included but wasn't limited to the brief superhero series, Nightman.

I want you to call this bank and tell them they're about to have a very special guest. Man, TV sucked! You could call this vanity because it is, but this was actually really smart branding for Trump. He essentially made himself the shorthand for a rich guy. Oh, and I'm gonna marry Donald Trump, says the sarcastic diehard character. Instead of actually being super rich and successful, he became a mascot for being rich and successful. A monopoly guy, Scrooge McDuck, Richie Rich, the Ronald McDonald of luxury. Donald McDonald, a walking sharper image for upper middle class people to admire and actual

rich people to ignore. And he slapped that name on everything like the aforementioned steaks, but also vodka and dietary supplements. And to really illustrate this, Trump even licensed his name and image for a series of luxury condos and hotel developments without actually investing his own money or being in charge of building them. What I mean is that while Trump could throw out some design ideas or help with the marketing or show up at events, he wasn't actually the official developer for these specific hotels and condos. Really think about that. Trump, the man who is supposed to be this expert on hotels and luxury, wasn't actually the person in charge of building these units, but rather the Mickey Mouse mascot being slapped

on the ads. Because he's not actually good at that stuff. It's like one of those celebrity chef restaurants if the celebrity chef didn't know how to cook and did, like, hate crimes. It's like wall burgers. I could have just said it's like wall burgers. And of course, once the 2000s hit, Trump found a brand new way to spread this false image of success. The one place anyone can thrive, regardless of talent. Trump hosted the apprentice, money, money, money, money. Trump hosted the Apprentice on The Failing NBC until 2015 when he was fired for being racist about Mexican immigrants, which will be great foreshadowing in whatever biopic Adam McKay comes up with.

This is all to say that there's a clear through line here for Trump simply using the name Trump to make money without having proven that his name is actually associated with profit, which I guess it is because it worked. It's a paradox, you see. The name Trump makes money because Trump makes money because the name Trump makes money. And then people voted for him because Trump makes money. Again, it's not stupid, but it's also very stupid. The grift is brazen, but surprisingly effective, like shoplifting in a hazmat suit.

And there's a very good chance that running for president was simply another effort to boost his then-failing brand without Trump actually thinking he'd win. Well, congratulations, it worked, and now we're all in the Trump hole. The dark, dank Trump hole. There's spiders in there. So it's only natural that Trump would use the presidency as a way to boost his brand. It's actually the least surprising thing he's done. And yet, even less surprising is him using it for hotels and apartments and other constructions. Just like he did with those condos I mentioned,

Trump's name is mostly used as a label for other companies to license, including foreign governments and investors that are developed. large-scale hotels and luxury properties. The Trump Organization has at least five real estate deals with Saudi real estate company Dar Global, one of which Trump International Oman is partnered with Oman's state-owned tourism group, promising investors both hands-off investment expertly managed by Trump to generate income on top of lifetime residency visas. This is along with developments in Dubai, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia. The New Yorker estimates that these licensing and management deals being made in the Gulf are bringing in a minimum of $105 million. Vietnam also struck a deal with Trump to build $1.5 billion luxury golf courses and hotels.

And while that's all well and good for Trump, the scammy business mascot, I probably don't have to stress that this is a president now. It is the United States president, now the mascot of the Republican Party being used as an international brand while he's the president. I know it seems normal now, I guess, since Trump is a TV real estate guy and has been president once before, and nobody seems to be willing or able to stop him from doing all of these things that are obviously weird for a president to do. But it's very weird. It's abnormal, actually, for a president to be developing all of these opulence. resorts overseas in order to curry favor with others or to allow others to curry favor with him or to generally enrich himself. It's so weird that right now there are protests in Serbia over a project being developed by a company linked to the president's son-in-law Jared Kushner. He's just Trumpifying our government, like literally redoing the White House in his tacky brand image, putting out shitty AI videos like this. Gold and future a brand new light.

Feast and dance the deal is done. Trump Gaza, number one. Trump Gaza, shine, bright. Golden future, a brand new light. Feast and dance, the deal is done. Trump Gaza, number one. Hey. No.

No for so many reasons. One being that it hallucinates Elon Musk dipping a smaller pizza into a bigger pizza, I think. Anyway, grotesque beyond comprehension, like looking into Kathulu's yawning Trump hole. Also, I guess it's all our fault. Not us specifically, we're perfect. But our government could have stopped this. We actually had four years between Trump terms and could have made some new laws about it,

you know? So it's only natural that in his second term, Trump has completely ramped this up with at least 12 overseas deals. This includes new investments in older properties, such as Trump National Doral, which was approved for a new condo development shortly after the 2024 election. Like, technically, this is all through Trump's sons. Remember that? Remember when he said that he was passing the business onto them? Does it feel like that actually happened? Trump feels so safe from consequences that he himself attends corporate ceremonies during diplomatic trips, such as when he attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new golf course with his name on it,

while he was in Scotland to discuss European Union trade deals. That's three golf courses he owns in Scotland, by the way. The president, who is supposed to be representing America, but has countless financial ties to places that are not America. The president who has spent a third of his presidency at his own properties using taxpayer dollars to promote his business when he's supposed to be doing president stuff. He's just flying around in a jet we pay for, doing his side hustle, we pay for that.

It's the company car and he's using it for personal stuff. He's hosting official government events at his fucking hotels, making foreign governments and the Secret Service pay millions at his properties using our tax dollars. Our money, give it back! Just add it to the doge checks, I guess. But again, no one stopped him. Like, why shouldn't he hold a great Gatsby party while everyone loses their snap benefits? It's not like anyone will do anything about it, apparently.

Also, not even a nice-looking Gatsby party. Look at it. Looks like the outside of a mall. I know this doesn't really matter, but I can't stress enough how tacky and cheap his aesthetic is. Not that I'm Johnny Moneybags, my home looks like a crime scene, actually. But it's such a superficial idea of class and luxury. It's no different than like the goop brand taking over the White House, which I guess is kind of happening too. But real estate is old news, of course.

In fact, even though his properties are thriving, it's not even the primary way that Trump makes money anymore. And so after the break, we're going to talk about what that is and also some other stuff one imagines. We, we say a lot of things. Here are some ads. If you're longtime followers of the showdy, you know-dee the problems I've had with wallets. It got so bad I resorted to hiring a 90-year-old tortoise to carry around my cash and cards in its mouth. But with all apologies to Banjo the Tortoise, I've now found a new permanent wallet that I've simply fallen in love with. And even lust?

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And thanks to Indicloud for sponsoring today's episode. I'm about to dig into some candy rope. Yum. Hey now, hi. Before that break, we just did and came out. back from we were discussing how Trump made his money before becoming president and all the real estate stuff that he did after he was president. But as I said, that's not really the main way he makes money anymore. We'll get to that. Eventually, I got all day! But first, we should talk about all the shitty merchandise.

Gold sneakers, gold watches, Bibles, and guitars, remember Trump guitars. I think at first everyone accepted that political candidates will sell stuff to raise money. But then it just kept escalating. No one stopped him after all. Like that mouse who got that cookie and then everyone found out he was friends with a pedophile sex trafficker. Terrible mouse. So we had the hats and like, sure, hats, I get hats. But he didn't stop there.

He didn't stop at hats after he lost the 2020 election. He just kept selling stuff. Only now it was to pay for his growing. legal fees and just to get paid. So again, that's kind of fundraising, I guess. But now in his second term, he's just fully selling whatever he wants with his name, face, and slogans all over it for whatever. And he does this with two websites seemingly designed to compete with each other. First, there is Donald J.Trump.com, which is run by Trump's joint fundraising committee. And then there's trumpstore.com, which is the Trump Organization's for-profit shop.

Now, I'm no Shoddy Lock Holmes, but I would deduce that these websites are similarly named and have similar products to likely, possibly allegedly make it confusing for Trump supporters to know which site goes to Trump's campaign. versus Trump's pocket. Not to say there's ever even really been a difference between the two, but recent financial disclosures showed that Trump acquired a minimum of $27 million from MAGA products. He makes so much money doing this that he actively protects his grift by suing any third-party sellers for trademark infringement, especially if they sell any Trump holes. This included a private equity firm that announced a Trump

themed instant pot that was willing to donate all of its profits to a Trump presidential library, but still had to back off when the Trump organization threatened to sue. In other words, even if they are raising money for Trump the president, he will still sue, presumably because he doesn't get a personal cut. Oh yeah, as an aside, the president loves to sue everybody and scare them into settling. He's had lawsuit settlements with Meda, CBS, and others that are allegedly going to Trump's presidential library fund, while others have not made it clear whether the money is going to a nonprofit or Trump himself. But anyway, Trump is not only continuing his personal merch game during his presidency, but is still making bank with his name

and likeness. A 2024 report found that Trump licensing his likeness to sell Save America coffee table books, sneakers, and fragrances made him $5.5 million in royalties. The companies with which he's doing business are often shady LLCs with vague or conflicting information on how they exactly operate. For example, the best watches on earth LLC, a company that might as well be named definitely not scammy watches, all we really know about the best watches on earth is that they are located in rural Wyoming. And that's pretty much it. Probably because businesses in Wyoming aren't required to give a lot of information when they register, including who owns the company. So we don't know who's in charge. It could be Trump. It could not be Trump or something between

those two things. Some kind of mutant quasi-Trump abomination, an Eric Trump, if you will. We just don't know, but we do know that the best watches on earth are selling Trump watches at a grotesque markup, including one product priced at $100,000 that cost less than $20,000 to make. And we know that Trump is absolutely involved in this product because he has straight up done ads for it. Hello, everyone. It's President Donald J. Trump, and it's Trump time. Check out this red beauty. It's one of my new watches. it proudly on your wrist and everyone will know exactly what it's for, who it's for, who it represents. It's really going to be something special. It's for your favorite president.

Get your watch today at gettrumpwatches.com. These make a great gift. It's Trump time. God, it's just so embarrassing. Fun fact, someone ordered one of these for over 600 bucks and got one that said romp on it instead. It's like a Simpsons gag. But I guess that's better than not getting a watch at all, which has also happened to a lot of people. Again, it's just tacky, man, this is the president. After someone tried to assassinate him, he put out a fucking cologne about it and advertised that Jill Biden wanted to bone him. President-elect Donald Trump releasing a new product this weekend.

On a post to Truth Social, he announced his new fragrance line titled, fight, fight, fight, yeah, the collection includes a cologne, a perfume, both selling for about about $199 on GetTrumpfragrances.com. This is not a joke. Eh, it's kind of a joke. The man has no shame gland. He lost it in the war he didn't fight. This past summer, while Trump was the president in the White House governing, the Trump Organization announced a new mobile phone plan and a $499 smartphone. Trump Mobile offers a $47 per month plan that includes unlimited talk, text, data, et cetera, but also telehealth and pharmacy benefits? Also, why does it cost a weirdly specific amount? Oh, damn it. I'll give him that one,

but the added fees bump up that clever cost to $64 per month anyway, because even the smallest detail needs to have a scam behind it. Also, Trump Mobile, sounding. like he's creating his own cellular network, but he's super not. It's actually a mobile virtual network operator, or MVNO. MVNOs don't provide cellular service, but rather resell it through established carriers, in this case, T-Mobile. This means that if there's a network congestion issue on T-Mobile's end, they'll favor their users and throttle those that are using MVNOs like TrumpMobile. So direct T-Mobile users, that pay as low as $15 per month could get better service than Trump mobile, despite that costing

over four times as much. Also, the Trump phone doesn't exist. Did we mention that? It still doesn't exist despite people paying deposits for them? Because in addition to Trump historically making money by stiffing contractors, he also wants to stiff you the customer. Of course, if the phone did exist, which it may never, it would probably be like a Nokia painted gold. Because this is all just Trump Stakes, which by the way, were actually just stakes made by a subsidiary of the meat supplier, Cisco, which just supplied all the meat at Trump casinos at the time.

It's not special. It's just bulk meat he slapped his name on. Like Eric Trump. He's just selling his name, taking cheap wares and painting them gold, which you may have realized years ago is his entire political career as well. If he could, he would just literally sell the name Trump.

Like as, I don't know, like, like, if you could just sell, like, fake digital money where the only value is the brand, like a logo as a coin. Like if you took a coin, all right, now hear me out, okay, and you scanned that coin into the World Wide Web and... And so we're in kind of, excited on a lot of fronts. And I think America will be the crypto capital of the world.

And, you know, I fully support it. My father fully supports that our family, you know, is fully embracing it. President's son Eric talking about the Trump family's venture into cryptocurrency, which has made the president a major crypto dealer when he's also industry's top policymaker. Huh. Interesting. A crypto coin. What even is that? Is that what skeletons use for money? That can't be. That's bones and worms. because of that thing. Okay, and might I add, shit. I guess we're gonna have to talk

about the president's crypto scam, and the main way he makes his money now. And to do that, we also have to describe what, like, crypto is? Let's do a segment. Cody describes what, like, crypto is? So, sadly, and firstly, no. Cryptocurrency isn't called that because it's ghoulish.

I mean, it's goolish, but not Vincent Price goolish. It's an offshoot of words like cryptography, aka secrets, encryption and so forth. It's digital currency that has no ties to any central bank making it secret money, which is cool, like hackers. Unfortunately, the people using it are not cool, like the bad guy in hackers. It runs on a blockchain, which is a network made up of a bunch of decentralized computers, so it doesn't really live in any one place. Basically, it's pretend money that exists because a bunch of people agreed that it exists and has a specific amount of value, also known as money. Except unlike regular money, there are a bunch of different brands of money, and they all

go up and down in value based on investor speculation and supply and demand dynamics, which I guess also is just money. Although you can't pay taxes with it, also there are still transaction fees. So it's not even that different from banks. Those fees go to various things, including the platform you're using to trade the coin. Remember that part! Ultimately, the IRS treats cryptocurrency as property rather than actual currency. Because it's Beanie Babies!

It's all just Beanie Babies, Pogs, and Mint On Card Food Fighters action figures. To our younger viewers, it's Pokemon cards, Labuboos, and it could be what 6-7 means I am too scared to find out. The point is that it's gambling, casino rake included, or I guess investing. It's a very fickle, highly volatile investment that has limited regulations that are currently in flux around the world, has no safety net, gets lost frequently, and is the go-to method to shadow fund criminals and hate groups and online gamblers. Again, it's cool in theory. It's like anarchist bucks, but instead of being used to get into some cool bondage

Club to learn about the Matrix, it's mostly being used by Wall Street types and the literal president of the United States to get around laws. This is why cryptocurrency is frequently used as a pump and dump scheme, which is when people talk up their cryptocurrency to maximize its value, sell it off for real money, and then watch its worth fall down to nothing. It's money, but worse. The internet strikes again. This has been our segment.

Cody describes what, like, crypto is? So hearing me describe that, you can hopefully already see why the president should not be doing crypto on a personal level, or trying to make it a part of the government, besides the legal part with all the stealing and crimes and scams. It kind of ruins crypto. It's like your parents trying to hang out at your basement grope party. I'm 40, Ma! Stop embarrassing me in front of my foot! Cryptocurrency should be something cool kids do to undermine authority. But instead, it's been hijacked by the wealthy to remain wealthy and avoid regulations.

And that includes the president, Donald Trump. Because after that Trump coup that happened, but I guess we're all okay with now, people actually weren't okay with it when it first happened. It actually made it harder for his family to access financial markets and ventures. because that's what's supposed to happen when someone does a light treason. Or to hear Bizarro Hunter Biden tell it. Right, it came from a hard asset family. That's what we did. We built and, you know, sold and held real estate forever. And for a long period of time, I had access to everyone in the world

that I could pick up and, you know, the phone and speak to any banker and get a loan almost instantly and, you know, everything was sort of easy. And then all of a sudden we got into politics and we made our opinions known. and you put that little R next to your name, and all of a sudden that became really difficult. And I sort of realized very quickly just how much discrimination there is in the ordinary financial markets. Yes, the R is the problem. You know how Republicans famously have trouble in the financial world? Also, just realized that crypto is probably really good for drug deals as well. Anyway, it really was the perfect partnership.

During the Biden years, the crypto industry was hit with countless violations and regulation attempts, which naturally pushed investors toward Trump's re-election campaign. Trump, also being a crime guy who likes bribes, naturally began to pump up crypto in return. And in late 2024, the Trump boys announced the family would officially enter the cryptosphere with World Liberty Financial, which allowed anyone with WLFI coins a vote in certain business decisions like shareholders in a company. And while at first sales were low, like really low, like only two $2.7 million of coins were sold in that October. Suddenly, around November of 2024, a lot of people wanted these Trump coins, specifically,

a lot of foreign investors from Singapore, South Korea, Hong Kong, and the United Arab Emirates. Oh, forgot to mention before, federal law prohibits foreigners from donating money to presidential or inaugural funds for American candidates. But currently, not cryptocurrency. Not sure why I just brought that up, actually? Maybe I'm possessed. So Trump won. Remember that? Boo! And just days before his inauguration, the Trump organization, Melania, and Trump himself launched their own crypto coins. And boy, it was immediately shady. For starters, only two dozen accounts purchased $2.6 million worth of Melania's tokens. Two and a half minutes before she had even announced them. This caused it to shoot up in value,

after which most of those buyers immediately sold their coins for a profit. 80% of these sales took place in the first 12 freaking hours of the launch. In other words, they did a pump and dump, obviously. And while the they is unknown, you know, because that's why it's cryptocurrency, I will reiterate that a handful of people

purchased it before it was announced, meaning that they must have preemptively known perhaps because they knew Melania or the company hosting it? It could, in theory, not be people in Trump's circle. But I also need to remind you that there are still transaction fees. And the entity in charge of the Melania coin, a company called Meteora, also made at least $64 million in real money through those transaction fees. So you have a small group of anonymous traders making $100 million

seemingly tipped off in advance on top of the extra money going to the company hosting this. The First Lady presumably gets a cut because it's her coin that she launched, but thanks to the third party, she is also legally insulated from any corruption. That means the most innocent scenario is that the President and First Lady are licensing their names to the futuristic version of a shady gambling app and are unaware that it's a scam. Again, the most innocent scenario is that the president is ignorant and gullible. And of course, the exact same situation is happening with Trump coins. He announced the launch on Truth Social and wouldn't you know it, the value jizzed

way the heck up to $6 billion within days of launch. The Trump organization and its affiliates own 80% of the coin supply and have collected millions of dollars in just those trading fees alone. Just the United States president taking a rake. Finally, a successful Trump casino. Again, it's perfect for Trump. He has distilled everything he's done in the past down to this digital frontier,

selling his name and name alone with no product or actual value. Like, even if he wasn't the president, he would absolutely be doing this. But, of course, he is the president. And so we're gonna do more ads, And then we're going to talk about how Trump, the president, is using his position to get extremely, dare I say, illegally rich. Friends, I hate to break it to you, but 2026 is right around the corner and I know the pressure to make most of the final months of the year is real.

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Okay, ads are done. Did we become millionaires? You know what? Hold on. I don't have a banking app. I just write her a lot in my notes, but... Oh, I wish I sorted all these numbers somehow. This is gibberish. Trump the crypto scammer. As I said, it is perfect for him. And better yet, it's through a market that he, as the president, also gets to regulate on a federal level. It's win-win if you don't factor in the rest of the country. So we should probably talk about all the conflicts of interest, which is the nicest way to phrase what he's doing. Because, you know, there are many very obvious reasons why the president of the United States and his family shouldn't be able to have their own secret cyber money that he is also in charge.

of regulating. It's weird, I even have to keep saying that. It's weird to have to point out that this is one of the most brazen conflicts of interest, possibly the most financially corrupt action of a president ever. Like, the president announced this crypto coin right before his inauguration, became president, and then a few months later loosened regulation on crypto investing and operation. After his family made a bunch of money through crypto, how does that not put you in the Phantom Zone. His administration also appointed a crypto industry leader as the head of the Securities Exchange Commission, shattered a Department of Justice Crypto Crime Task Force, and appointed venture capitalist and paid pal David Sachs as the White House Crypto Tsar. And that's all on top

of how being the president just naturally gives him power and influence in the crypto market, allowing him to do things like announce a federal stockpile of crypto earlier in the year. Months prior to that announcement, World Liberty Financial bought $240 million worth of another cryptocurrency called Ether, which was known to be one of the less volatile cryptocurrencies in the market. The day Trump announced the Crypto Reserve, the value of World Liberty Financial's ether investment rose by $33 million, only to later decline in value.

Trump, the president, pumped up the ether, sadly not the knockout, liquid, but then Trump the business guy possibly profited off of it. But wait, there's more, because it's not just that he has power over this market. As I keep saying, this is basically a secret money piggy bank that's unregulated and allows foreign powers to directly pay money to the president. So for example, the UAE has been trying to get AI chips from United States companies for a while. They originally went to Biden, who limited their access to these chips. See, there are concerns about the country's close relationship to China.

But once Trump became president, that deal went through. What happened? Well, as the New York Times would discover, right before this happened, a high-ranking UAE official named Shake to Noon would use $2 billion worth of World Liberty financial tokens, aka Trump tokens, to invest in a crypto platform called Binan. Should be noted that Tenoon is also in charge of the UAE Sovereign Wealth Fund. And according to Binance, this $2 billion was the single largest investment in a crypto company ever recorded, which in turn will make World Liberty Financial tens of millions of actual dollars each year.

Trump would then proceed to fire the people who were concerned about that AI chip sale and green light it. Coincidentally, Shake Tanoon owns one of the tech companies, that was looking to purchase these chips in the first place. So while, technically, there was no direct bribe happening, coincidentally, the president of the United States approved a controversial deal designed to benefit another country at the same time representatives for that country made him a bunch of money. Oh, also, the son of the United States Special Envoy to the Middle East

is the co-founder of World Liberty Financial. Hmm. Cryptpro quo. It's a bribe jar. The president has a bribe jar. He's used it as one several times. Back in April, after the Trump coin had lost value after that initial pump and dump, the president invited hundreds of his meme coin holders to dine with him at his Virginia golf course,

provided that they were the top holders of that coin. He even had a leaderboard and treated it like a competition. member contestants, the more meme coin you buy and the longer you hold it, the higher your ranking will be. The higher your ranking, the closer you will be to the 220 special guests at the Black Tie event to see the president for 23 minutes, no questions or pictures, and we will make sure the food sucks too. Don't you worry about it.

The reported $148 million spent by meme coin holders temporarily surged Trump coin by 58% which in turn meant real money. being made in those transaction fees. Specifically, that dinner announcement alone drew in $1.6 million. And sure, people have been able to pay the president for access in the past. But we used to like, gussy it up a little bit more. We could regulate it a bit too. And now it's just completely anonymous, possibly international, rich people going through

an unregulated market to pay the president directly. For what? His reelection campaign? And it keeps happening in ways that directly affect policy. If a company wants a deal to go through, all they have to do is purchase a bunch of the president's bribe coin. Hey, did you break the law while being rich? Well, good news for you, Richo! Donald Trump has abetted multiple wealthy criminals because they gave him crypto money. First, there was crypto mogul Justin's son. Under President Joe, the SEC, charged Sun with selling unregistered securities and manipulating the value of digital tokens through outright fraud.

But then, earlier this year, Sun just happened to invest $75 million in World Liberty Financial. Not too long after that investment was made, the new SEC requested that the federal judge overseeing the civil suit against Sun paused the case, which ended the prosecution entirely. A few months later, Sun purchased $100 million in Trump meme coins as a thank you. I mean, because he just loved them so much. Son, the fraud guy, is now a freaking advisor to World Liberty Financial. Wow. America, right? So much opportunity. And then, of course, there was this. Don Jr. and Eric have formed World Liberty Financial with the Whitkoff family. Right.

Helping to make your family millions of dollars. It's in that context that I do want to ask you about crypto's richest man, a billionaire known as CZ. The government at the time said that CZ had caused significant harm to U.S. national security, essentially by allowing terrorist groups like Hamas to move millions of dollars around. Why did you pardon him? Okay, are you ready? I don't know who he is.

I know he got a four-month sentence or something like that, and I heard it was a Biden witch hunt. Ooh, I'll help you out there, sir. you seem very confused and feeble. You pardoned Chengpeng Zhao because his company Binance, which we already mentioned in a separate scammy context moments ago, had a multi-billion dollar deal with World Liberty Financial, your crypto scam thing. You're welcome. Maybe write that down so you don't forget next time. This is a good moment to note that Trump might not know anything about this crypto stuff, by the way. I don't think he even knows how to turn on a computer, a task that he has repeatedly praised his son Barron for accomplishing. It's more likely that his kids or other slightly

younger people around him are running this clown show in his name. Much like he banked off his father's name, the Trump name will once more be passed on as this hollow symbol of value. Because it is. To be fair and be, it now has value. As of this video, the Trump family is worth roughly $5 billion in real money. The grift is complete. All those rich people who didn't take him seriously before certainly have to take him seriously now, and you too can make money the Trump way. All you have to do is spend decades failing upward by making your name a brand, then become president real quick, then use a manipulate and unregulated market to take bribes from international billionaires in exchange for selling out the American people and collapsing the economy.

It's that easy. Ah, I don't know, man, it's just, it's so bad. I know you know it's bad, but it's hard to really portray how bad this all is. It's why the Emoluments Clause exists. The president can't take bribes, and that seems pretty reasonable to say, if a president's goal is personal enrichment, that president is likely not going to be doing things that are beneficial to the citizens of their nation. Unless the citizens' needs happen to align with whatever is making the president

money? Like, Cutter just fucking gave the president a $400 million jet. That's one of those pesky emolument things. And in return, Trump has given Qatar a virtually unprecedented guarantee of protection and U.S. defense if they're ever attacked. It's kind of like NATO, which Trump hates, but with the free $400 million jet, which he loves. Also may be relevant, but literally two days after filming this, it was reported that Trump would cut the 39% tariffs on Swiss imports in exchange for Switzerland investing $200 billion into the United States after a meeting during which Swiss officials gave Trump a gold watch and a literal engraved gold bar. Guys, Jimmy Carter gave up his peanut farm. That wasn't for nothing. That was to avoid Jimmy Carter

forcing American consumers and companies to become obsessed with peanuts and make him money via peanuts. Of course, in this case, Trump's preferred industry is just scams. He's helping himself and the scam industry. He's also uniquely able to get away with this stuff. He's done it his entire life and he has ported that ability to his time at the White House. Literally, when the House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer was asked about the Trump family's crypto scams, He said it's okay because, quote, they're admitting they're doing this. See, they're holding a big sign that reads,

doing crimes, which makes it all above board, right? He's donating his paycheck to renovate the White House. See, he gives back. He doesn't need the money on account of the hundreds of millions of dollars. He's, you know, scammed from so many people. But still, oh, well, nevertheless. Or counterpoint,

Nevertheless, by which I mean, here's an idea. Maybe he should just like go to jail. I'm just brainstorming, but even if Trump is just auto-pinning through his finances now, we kind of have to recognize that this is all very obviously illegal and push for consequences. I know that's a cop out to say, like obviously that would be nice, just like it would be nice to fly the Millennium Falcon

with Space Bigfoot. But even before his rise into politics, Trump and his family kind of represent everything wrong with the wealthy in America. You might notice that in all of what I just said, all the ways Trump made money involve him never producing a single worthwhile product or giving anything in return. It's just a series of financial and social cheat codes where he used an inflated personal brand to run sweaty scams that compounded into enough money and power to shield him from consequences. There are so many Trumps out there, but only one is like the mascot for

unearned wealth and power, and only one that is using the office of the president for the first time ever while he's the president to amass, massive personal wealth. We kind of need to nip this one in the bud, you know, because it sure would be nice for me to not be referencing this episode seven years from now. When I'm, I guess, Still doing this show? God! That sucks. Please like and subscribe and maybe everyone mail me $1. Would that work?

Is that how scams work? I wish I knew how to do scams. I'm so bad with money. Siri, get me money. Send $1 to me. Call... Get... The bank...

...to give me money. Well, I don't know why you're charging me. I only use my phone to ask for money. What? You send me money! I'll call them back. Thank you so much for watching. Make sure to like and subscribe. And check out our podcast called Even More News.

It's on this channel twice a week or at the podcast place. You can go and you can be like, one of those twice a week, please. And they will, they'll know what you're talking about. Check out this show, Some More News is a podcast if you don't want to look at me. And we've got the patreon.com. I have some more news if you want to go there. We've also got a merch store at the URL that's on the screen. There's merch.

And here are examples. You see? And we've got other examples, which, just kidding, it's just like the image there. I think this is maybe in that, I don't know. Is this from there? Either way, you can get this too, or you can get this twice. I don't know. Bye.

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