771–780 of 1001 posts
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Yes! This will be the time they finally push back on Trump.
Midterms are coming up next year. If they are afraid their association with Trump might take them down, they'll crack. Honestly I suspect fear of Trump is really their only motivation right now.
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then you know nothing at all about the case: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMEJTORMVN4
I wish you would link to text rather than video. This channel owner may be very well informed, but I don't want to subject myself to the performative yelping of some guy sitting in front of a smoke machine with mood lighting. Except where original footage is concerned, video is about the worst medium for communicating complex facts the sensory stimulation is a distraction from the content. This presenter might be a g…
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# Trump's Pardon of CZ: A Timeline of Alleged Corruption
*Author's Note:* This situation represents what appears to be straight-up corruption that everyone should oppose, regardless of political affiliation. This isn't about politics—it's about the facts.
## Background: The Original Charges
*November 21, 2023* Binance and Changpeng Zhao (CZ) both plead guilty in a historic $4 billion plea deal. They admitted to lacking proper anti-money laundering controls and willfully looking the other way. The charges specifically involved allowing terrorists, cyber criminals, and child abusers to use their platform.
*April 30, 2024* CZ is officially sentenced to four months in prison.
## The Trump Connection Begins
Shortly after sentencing, Donald Trump wins the presidency and announces the launch of *World Liberty Financial*—his major crypto project. This will become crucial to understanding the alleged corruption.
## The Suspicious Timeline
### March 12, 2025: The MGX Investment A company called MGX invests $2 billion into Binance, specifically in cryptocurrency (the exact type wasn't announced initially).
### March 13, 2025: The Wall Street Journal Report The Wall Street Journal reports that Binance has been reaching out to Trump allies since the previous year to strike a business deal with the family as part of a plan to return to the US. Possibilities included: - The Trumps taking a stake in Binance - A deal through World Liberty Financial
### March 25, 2025: USD1 Stablecoin Launch World Liberty Financial announces a stablecoin called USD1.
*Why stablecoins matter:* They're incredibly profitable because they farm yield from treasury bills while people use them. The major players are USDT and USDC. However, it's extremely difficult to launch a new stablecoin—people don't trust or use new ones easily.
### May 1, 2025: The Key Revelation The $2 billion MGX investment into Binance was conducted entirely in *USD1* (Trump's stablecoin).
*Why this matters:* - There was no reason to use USD1 instead of other currencies - They could have used BNB (Binance's own coin), which would make more sense - The only reason to use USD1 is to benefit World Liberty Financial - Stablecoins are backed by treasuries, so holding $2 billion in USD1 generates *$60-80 million per year* in risk-free revenue for World Liberty Financial (from 3-4% treasury yields)
### A Few Days Later CZ announces he has applied for a Trump pardon. *Timing: right after announcing the deal was done in USD1.*
### June 2025 World Liberty Financial announces a partnership with PancakeSwap (associated with Binance) and a $1 million reward trading campaign to increase USD1 usage.
## The AI Chips Connection
### September 15, 2025: New York Times Investigation The New York Times reveals suspicious timing around the MGX investment:
1. MGX deposited $2 billion into World Liberty Financial 2. Two weeks later, the White House agreed to allow the UAE access to hundreds of thousands of advanced AI chips 3. Many chips would go to G42, controlled by the same sheikh connected to MGX
*Official response:* The deal was "totally unrelated to any government business." But MGX clearly benefited from one side of this arrangement.
## The Polymarket Betting
### October 11, 2025 A whale linked to suspicious insider trading activity on Hyperliquid was connected to a Polymarket account called "big winner 01." This account started betting that Trump would pardon CZ by the end of 2025—a seemingly wild bet with only a couple months left in the year.
## The Pardon
### October 23, 2025 Trump pardons convicted Binance founder CZ.
*White House response:* Press Secretary Caroline Levitt claimed Trump "exercised his constitutional authority" and that CZ was "prosecuted by the Biden administration and their war on cryptocurrency."
*The reality:* The charges had nothing to do with politics. They were about anti-money laundering violations and allowing money to flow to criminals. Binance's own chief compliance officer had internal chats noting they should probably not allow money to Iran, North Korea, Syria, Cuba, and Crimea.
The Wall Street Journal reported the pardon will likely pave the way for Binance to return to the US.
## The Bottom Line
The problem isn't just loosening crypto enforcement—it's making the president's family such obvious beneficiaries:
- Nearly all of USD1's success came from this inorganic $2 billion investment - The market cap spike for USD1 directly corresponds to the Binance deal - It's a clear pay-to-play scheme happening in plain sight
*The author's conclusion:* This appears to be blatant corruption where deals were made to profit from the pardon, regardless of one's political views.
What if some criminal blatantly says "I'll give you $1bn if you pardon me" and Trump does it? Is that enough for something to happen? Because it seems like that's the only place we can go from here...
According to SCOTUS[0], as long as it's a "gratuity," it's not a bribe and not illegal. No. Seriously.
https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/06/supreme-court-limits-scop...
Unpopular opinion: America needs/ed this. They nerve truly believed that a Ceaușescu, Hitler, Stalin, Mao were possible in the US. Maybe one or two generations will suffer, but this is a required lesson, for the future maturity of the nation, long term. Assuming they come out in one piece at the other end, of course.
You believe the US on the path to killing tens of millions of its own citizens for the sake of some ideology like Mao, Stalin, and Hitler because a non-violent white collar criminal was given a shortened sentence? Interesting.
Do you not believe that Trump, who threatened extrajudicial killings of drug smugglers today [1], isn't going to abuse that power to murder any citizen he doesn't like?
Do you not believe Trump is a fascist, white supremacist, rapist, 34 time convicted felon, rapist, and pedophile?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> There should be a limit There is, and the Constitution says the limit is impeachment and removal from office by Congress. That won't happen unless we fix how we talk about the ones responsible, to wit: The Republican Party pardoned these criminals. The Republican Party is snatching Americans off the streets. The Republican Party is using the military to murder people on boats. The Republican Party is demolishing do…
I don’t think the majority of voting Americans have problems with any of those acts though. Think Joe you pass in Walmart cares about what happens to the White House ballroom?
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You believe the US on the path to killing tens of millions of its own citizens for the sake of some ideology like Mao, Stalin, and Hitler because a non-violent white collar criminal was given a shortened sentence? Interesting.
Do you not believe the GOP eliminating SNAP, medicare, and social security will lead to the deaths of millions of Americans? Do you not believe that Trump, who threatened extrajudicial killings of drug smugglers today [1], isn't going to abuse that power to murder any citizen he doesn't like? Do you not believe Trump is a fascist, white supremacist, rapist, 34 time convicted felon, rapist, and pedophile?
I would suggest not equating libertarian policies with systemic genocide. How about we calm down?
>Do you not believe that Trump, who threatened extrajudicial killings of drug smugglers today [1], isn't going to abuse that power to murder any citizen he doesn't like?
I don't see any evidence of that yet
>Do you not believe Trump is a fascist, white supremacist, rapist, 34 time convicted felon, rapist, and pedophile?
I think he's a 34 time convicted felon, but I haven't confirmed the number.
Is white collar crime / financial fraud just not going to be a crime in the US any more?
Coffeezilla video about this is up already https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMEJTORMVN4
What do you think of this counterpoint from Balaji? "CZ deserves his pardon. His show trial of a prosecution was a combination of regulatory railroading and ethnic persecution for being Chinese-Canadian. Imagine if Macron was held personally responsible for every crime committed by the 67M citizens of France, and you'll get the absurdity of holding CZ personally responsible for the actions of a few of the 250M+ Binan…
When did this happen?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
When Obama really increased the number of pardons, a lot of contemporary opinion writers said stuff along the lines of "this is a dangerous precedent and we're lucky that the pardons are fairly popular and sane." Now we're seeing unpopular, not sane pardons. When democratic norms erode like pardons becoming more acceptable, it's like laying tinder and kindling for a fire. You still need a fire; a bad actor who is wil…
I don't buy it. A president that will literally direct his AG in public to prosecute his political enemies is simply not bound by norms, period. To pretend that he'd never have pardoned Zhao but for Obama's "increased number of pardons" is, to be blunt, ridiculous on its face. And in context, you're doing exactly what I mocked above, tut tutting about civil behavior and norms and The Discourse while the system burns…
It feels like HN is slowly turning into reddit with the comment section becoming mostly snide remarks Instead of just commenting about being dismayed with the state of things, how about step back and speculate as to why he did this pardon, and what the implications of it are. I don't know the answer to either, but I surely didn't learn much from what used to be an insightful, intelligent crowd