Trump Uses the Presidency to Enrich Himself Through a Corrupt Crypto Scam: An Executive Watch Roundup
Our mid-May selection of the president's latest and greatest assaults on the rule of law
As The UnPopulist’s regular readers know, we launched Executive Watch, a new project that tracks presidential abuses of power, earlier this year. We are actively building a one-stop, comprehensive, fully searchable database that anyone who wants to keep track of all the executive abuses emanating from this White House can do so with the click of a button. (You can also find the tracker on the website of the Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, our publisher.)
Below is our biweekly selection of new entries posted in Executive Watch. We’re covering everything from Trump’s flagrant attempts to leverage the office of the presidency for personal enrichment to his gutting of a regulatory provision prohibiting government workers from campaigning on behalf of MAGA on official time—and that’s just for starters. We document many more of his abuses below.
You should bookmark this page that contains a chronological scroll of the abuses and this post that sorts and lists them under our 5 P categories:
After reading this roundup, tell us in the comments: Which of these abuses do you take to be the most troubling, and why?
May 5, 2025
Trump’s Son Opens a Private Club for Businesses to Pay for Access to his Dad
Category: Personal Grift
The Trump family’s businesses are an obvious conduit for financial influence on the president. The New York Times describes a whirlwind tour of Eastern Europe and the Gulf States in which Trump’s sons set up real-estate deals. But nothing is as blatant as Donald Trump Jr.’s Executive Branch club.
Here is the Times’ description:
At $500,000 a person, the private membership club is slated to open by this summer in Georgetown. …
The club soon likely will be jammed with Trump family friends, business executives and members of the Trump administration, but will be off limits to members of the public and most members of the news media. …
The founding members of the club, which has already sold many of its membership slots according to organizers, include Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, the cryptocurrency executives whose company, Gemini Trust, had been targeted by the S.E.C. until Mr. Trump named new agency leaders, who in April put a hold on the federal lawsuit.
Jeff Miller, a lobbyist and top Trump fund-raiser, is another founding member. In the first quarter of this year, he has registered to represent 39 new corporate clients, including the crypto firm Tether, an overseas operation that was a longtime target of U.S. regulators until recently, when it began to establish itself as a major force in Washington and explore opening a U.S. office.
The other owners at the new club, besides Donald Trump Jr., include Zach and Alex Witkoff—the sons of Mr. Trump’s Middle East envoy—and Omeed Malik, who leads 1789 Capital, a Florida-based venture capital firm that recently hired Donald Trump Jr. as a senior executive. The investments for 1789 Capital have included companies such as Plaid, a digital finance firm that had lobbied the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau related to a new set of banking rules—until Mr. Trump’s team effectively shut down the agency and stalled enforcement of the regulation.
The families of presidents have often exploited their supposed access to the president for financial gain. But the answer to that problem is not to do it even more brazenly. Donald Trump Jr.’s club is, in effect, openly setting up a marketplace for buying favors from the Trump administration.
May 2, 2025
Businesses Pouring Billions Into Trump's Memecoin Venture to Buy Influence Is the Very Definition of Graft
Category: Personal Grift
A logistics company loudly announced its intention to buy $20 million of Donald Trump’s useless “memecoin” cryptocurrency, openly describing this as an attempt to influence the president—though it looks like this tiny little company is itself trying to be a meme stock.
This just highlights the role of Trump’s memecoin as the center of a carnival of influence-peddling.
The BBC covers the most flagrant example:
The price of Donald Trump's cryptocurrency has soared after the US president promised to host two special events for its top investors.
The website for the $Trump meme coin says its 220 biggest holders will be invited to a private gala dinner with the president on 22 May, describing it as the "most EXCLUSIVE INVITATION in the world." …
As well as the gala dinner, which will be held at the Trump National Golf Club in Washington DC, there will be "an ultra-exclusive private VIP reception with the President" for the top 25 coin holders, the coin's website said.
Trump tokens in circulation are currently worth a total of around $2.5bn. They were first released just days before his inauguration on 20 January.
Cryptocurrency has struggled to show it can be an economically productive investment rather than pure speculation. But it does serve with perfect efficiency as a quasi-legal way for favor-seekers to transfer wealth directly to the president of the United States.
April 26, 2025
Trump’s Mass Deportation Campaign Comes After American Children
Category: Policy Illegality
The Washington Post provides an overview of U.S. citizens caught up in Trump’s deportations. His administration’s determination to eliminate all due process for deportations has led to some particularly egregious cases, including forcible expulsion of U.S. citizen children.
The Post has another report on that:
Three U.S. citizen children from two different families were deported with their mothers by Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the early hours of Friday morning. One of them is a 4-year-old with Stage 4 cancer who was deported without medication or the ability to contact their doctors, the family’s lawyer said.
According to their lawyers, both families were taken into custody while attending routine check-ins this week in New Orleans as part of the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program, which allows individuals to remain in their communities while undergoing immigration proceedings. Lawyers say the families were taken to Alexandria, Louisiana, a three-hour drive from New Orleans, where they were prevented from communicating with their family members and legal representatives and then put on a flight to Honduras.
The cases have renewed concerns that the Trump administration’s expedited deportations are violating the due process rights of both citizens and noncitizens. …
Hours after the deportation, U.S. District Judge Terry A. Doughty, a Trump appointee, issued an order expressing his concern that the girl had been deported against her father’s wishes while stressing it is “illegal and unconstitutional” to deport U.S. citizens.
Immigration enforcement has been used to create a lawless police state that would supposedly only target illegal immigrants. But its very lawlessness guarantees that this police state inevitably targets citizens, too.
April 25, 2025
Trump Guts the Hatch Act's Prohibition on Government Employees Campaigning for MAGA on Official Time
Category: Power Consolidation
For 80 years, the Hatch Act has banned electioneering by government employees while they’re in the office or on the clock. Now the Trump administration is “reinterpreting” the Hatch Act in a way that guts it—but only if you’re MAGA.
The New York Times reports:
The Office of Special Counsel, an agency involved in enforcing the restrictions, announced the changes to the interpretation of the Hatch Act, a Depression-era law devised to ensure that the federal work force operates free of political influence or coercion. The revisions, a resurrection of rules that Mr. Trump rolled out at the end of his first term but that President Joseph R. Biden Jr. repealed, could allow for the startling sight of government officials sporting Trump-Vance buttons or “Make America Great Again” hats.
Critics have said the law was already largely toothless, and officials in the first Trump administration were routinely accused of violating it, with little punishment meted out. And the changes do not roll back Hatch Act restrictions entirely, but do so in a way that uniquely benefits Mr. Trump: Visible support for candidates and their campaigns in the future is still banned, but support for the current officeholder is not. …
The Office of Special Counsel issued other opinions on Friday that will weaken enforcement of the law, by removing an independent review board, the Merit Systems Protection Board, from its role reviewing claims of violations. The office—which historically was independent but is now led by a Trump official after Mr. Trump fired its leader, starting a bitter court fight—will review accusations and send findings to the White House, which is unlikely to take action against its own backers.
The Hatch Act was an attempt to end the last vestiges of the “spoils system” in which federal jobs were given as rewards for political loyalty. It underscored the idea that government employees serve the people of the United States, not a single political leader.
This does not fit with Donald Trump’s view of the presidency as a mere springboard to kingship.
April 25, 2025
Trump FBI Arrests a State Judge for Allegedly Defying the Immigration Police State
Category: Power Consolidation
Referring to the “Trump FBI” is itself a problem, since the agency is supposed to enjoy independence from presidential meddling. Not so under Director Kash Patel, a Trump crony who lacks the background and experience of previous FBI directors and was appointed solely for his loyalty.
Now we see the result: The FBI has arrested a state judge for allegedly obstructing the ICE arrest of an immigrant when he showed up for a hearing in her courtroom. As usual, the local papers were already on the case—see earlier reporting from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
But a Washington Post report puts the story in a wider context:
According to reporting by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, ICE agents arrived in Dugan’s courtroom last Friday during a pre-trial hearing for Eduardo Flores Ruiz, a 30-year-old Mexican national who is facing misdemeanor battery charges in Wisconsin.
Dugan asked the agents to leave and speak to the circuit court’s chief judge, the Journal Sentinel reported. By the time they returned, Flores Ruiz had left.
“We believe Judge Dugan intentionally misdirected federal agents away from the subject to be arrested in her courthouse, Eduardo Flores Ruiz, allowing the subject — an illegal alien — to evade arrest,” Patel wrote in his post.
Judges in some jurisdictions across the country have criticized ICE’s efforts to locate and detain migrants at courthouses. They say those efforts have made migrants unwilling to show up as victims or witnesses in unrelated hearings because they are afraid they might face arrest. …
Within days of Trump’s return to the White House in January, a top Justice Department official directed federal prosecutors nationwide to investigate and potentially charge state and local officials who impede the president’s immigration enforcement agenda.
“Federal law prohibits state and local actors from resisting, obstructing, and otherwise failing to comply with lawful immigration-related commands,” wrote Emil Bove, then acting deputy attorney general.
In this case, the process is part of the punishment. It is highly unusual for a defendant like this, who is not a flight risk, to be subject to arrest instead of being requested to turn herself in for processing.
This is part of the Trump administration’s effort to dragoon state and local law enforcement and legal systems as instruments of federal power and to stamp out any local resistance to his anti-immigrant police state.
April 24, 2025
In a Classic Move From the Authoritarian Playbook, Trump Orders a Politically Motivated Investigation of a Democratic Fundraising Platform
Category: Power Consolidation
Donald Trump’s policies have caused his approval ratings to sink, making it likely that Republicans will lose their majority in the House in the next election. So the natural next step is for Trump to make it harder for Democratic Party candidates to raise money for their campaigns.
The New York Times reports:
Mr. Trump called for an investigation by Attorney General Pam Bondi into ActBlue, which is used across the Democratic Party’s ecosystem to collect donations online. The inquiry is ostensibly meant to look into possible illegal donations made by people in someone else’s name, known as straw donations, as well as hard-dollar contributions from foreign donors. Mr. Trump asked for a report on the results of Ms. Bondi’s investigation within 180 days.
Mr. Trump’s action represents a threat to one of the key financial cogs of the left, potentially hindering Democrats’ ability to compete in elections. It is likely to please elements of his base, for whom ActBlue has become a top target. …
Regina Wallace-Jones, the platform’s chief executive, … wrote that the looming threat of an executive order or memorandum from Mr. Trump had already damaged ActBlue and its allies.
“The current strategy of distraction and exhaustion is effective,” she wrote. “We see this across the country and are not immune to this ourselves. The flow-on effect from the initial innuendo of the [executive order] caused many in the ecosystem anxiety and distress.”
There is no specific evidence ActBlue has enabled illegal campaign contributions and no more reason to suspect it than any other fundraising platform. But the process is the punishment, and the purpose is simply to bog down ActBlue with the time and expense of defending themselves.
April 23, 2025
Trump Wants to Send Undocumented Aliens to the Salvadoran Gulag Without a Hearing
Category: Policy Illegality
The right to due process and a trial is guaranteed in the Fifth, Sixth, and 14th Amendments to our Constitution. But its roots go back a thousand years, even before the Magna Carta. Yet Donald Trump now says it has to be thrown out because he wants to deport a lot of people.
ABC News reports:
Amid a tense legal battle over deportations, President Donald Trump is now arguing undocumented migrants should not be given a trial where they could challenge being removed from the country.
“We’re getting them out, and I hope we get cooperation from the courts because you know, we have thousands of people that are ready to go out, and you can't have a trial for all of these people,” Trump said in the Oval Office on Tuesday.
“It wasn’t meant, the system wasn’t meant—and we don’t think there is anything that says—Look, we are getting some very bad people, killers, murderers, drug dealers, really bad people, the mentally ill, the mentally insane, they emptied out insane asylums into our country, we’re getting them out,” Trump continued. “And a judge can't say, ‘No, you have to have a trial.’” …
Immigration matters are routinely dealt with in a limited hearing or other proceeding before an immigration judge—not a full-blown trial as Trump suggests.
His comments came after the Supreme Court, in a brief order issued early Saturday morning, temporarily blocked the administration from deporting a group of Venezuelan migrants alleged to be gang members under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act. …
Also front and center of Trump’s deportation effort is the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a migrant living in Maryland who was erroneously deported to El Salvador’s infamous CECOT mega-prison.
It is true that deportations are often done with less procedure than a full jury trial, though the constitutional basis for this is doubtful. But the Trump administration is not just deporting people. It is sending them to a foreign prison—and Trump wants to do it with no process at all.
April 11, 2025
Crooked Crypto Exchange Invests in a Trump Venture In Exchange for Having a Federal Money-Laundering Investigation Dropped
Category: Personal Grift
I suppose we should stop being shocked by reports of massive conflicts of interest in the Trump administration. But it’s worth keeping in mind the sheer magnitude of the money being siphoned to the Trump family in exchange for political favors.
The Wall Street Journal reports:
Executives from cryptocurrency exchange Binance met with Treasury Department officials last month and discussed loosening U.S. government oversight on the company, while it was also exploring a business deal with a Trump family crypto venture, according to people familiar with the talks.
The Binance executives asked Treasury officials in Washington to remove a U.S. monitor that oversees the exchange’s compliance with anti-money-laundering laws, some of the people said. The move would mark a first step toward returning the company, which in 2023 pleaded guilty to violating those laws, to the U.S. market.
Binance has also been in talks to list a new dollar-pegged cryptocurrency from World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture backed by President Trump’s family, other people familiar with the discussions said. Listing the token, known as a stablecoin, could catapult it into a huge market and potentially bring in billions in profit for the family.
It almost makes President Clinton’s selling sleepovers in the Lincoln Bedroom in exchange for a big campaign donation seem wholesome by comparison.
It goes without saying that federal regulators cannot be assumed to be making unbiased decisions when their boss has such a vast personal financial stake in the outcome.
April 11, 2025
Trump Orders Harvard to Implement Viewpoint Diversity or Else!
Category: Presidential Retribution
Executive Watch has previously documented the Trump administration’s abuse of executive power to put pressure on Harvard University. But it’s worth taking a moment to examine the administration’s central demand against Harvard.
Here is the crucial passage from the administration’s April 11 letter:
By August 2025, the University shall commission an external party, which shall satisfy the federal government as to its competence and good faith, to audit the student body, faculty, staff, and leadership for viewpoint diversity, such that each department, field, or teaching unit must be individually viewpoint diverse. …
Every department or field found to lack viewpoint diversity must be reformed by hiring a critical mass of new faculty within that department or field who will provide viewpoint diversity; every teaching unit found to lack viewpoint diversity must be reformed by admitting a critical mass of students who will provide viewpoint diversity.
Does this really apply to “every department or field”? Does it mean that the Harvard Center for Geographic Analysis has to hire a “critical mass” of flat-earthers? Does the Harvard Medical School have to hire a “critical mass” of anti-vaxxers?
Maybe so, but we can assume the Trump administration is more concerned with political ideology, and this is a straightforward demand for Harvard to hire only new faculty that is ideologically approved by the Trump administration, as represented by its appointed political overseer.
March 24, 2025
Trump Defies Congress and Eliminates a Website Requiring him to Show that he Was Spending Appropriations as Intended
Category: Policy Illegality
If Donald Trump were really concerned with government “efficiency,” you would think he would be eager to demonstrate his transparency about funding. Instead, the White House has taken down a website required by law that lists upcoming congressionally mandated spending.
Roll Call has the news:
As of Monday morning, the Office of Management and Budget was no longer making “apportionments” of previously enacted appropriations available on the website it set up for that purpose after Congress mandated the requirement starting in 2022. The site now simply says: “Page not found.” …
“This is in direct violation of federal law,” said Faith Williams, director of the effective and accountable government program at the Project on Government Oversight, known as POGO. “The apportionments database is a critical tool for Congress and the public to hold the executive branch accountable for its spending.” …
The law was in part a response to actions taken during the first Trump administration, whereby then-Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought, through delegation of authority to political appointees at the agency, directed agencies to withhold the obligation of funds to Ukraine using apportionment footnotes. Vought is once again the White House budget office director after his party-line Senate confirmation vote earlier this year.
So if you’re keeping track, the White House has ignored the will of Congress by taking down a site intended to prevent the administration from ignoring the will of Congress. It sure looks like “ignoring the will of Congress” is a central theme of this administration.
© The UnPopulist, 2025
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How many will have to become disabled or die first?
Gee this is great, after watching the Democrats operate unopposed and working to enrich their enablers it is great to see our President make a mockery of all the party players in DC. Just look at all the multimillion dollar houses in McLean and Potomac occupied by Democratic Party former government officials and media mouthpieces. Oh and in DC Foxhall Road is lined with homes of Democratic operatives. Our President is just showing America what 80 years of corrupt Democrats in power leads to, and establishing that there is a new sheriff in town.