Federal authorities have reportedly charged former White House advisor Steve Bannon with defrauding “hundreds of thousands” of donors with a campaign that was purportedly set up to build a wall along the U.S. southern border, the Daily Wire reported.
The three other organizers and executives of the We Build the Wall campaign were also taken into custody: Brian Kolfage, Andrew Badolato, and Timothy Shea. The We Build the Wall campaign had raised a staggering $25 million since it was first announced in 2019.
The Daily Wire reported that the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) had announced the indictments and arrests in a press release on Friday. Each person involved is charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering. The four men charged could each face up to 20 years in prison.
“As alleged, the defendants defrauded hundreds of thousands of donors, capitalizing on their interest in funding a border wall to raise millions of dollars, under the false pretense that all of that money would be spent on construction,” Acting U.S. Attorney Audrey Strauss said in a recent statement.
“While repeatedly assuring donors that Brian Kolfage, the founder and public face of We Build the Wall, would not be paid a cent, the defendants secretly schemed to pass hundreds of thousands of dollars to Kolfage, which he used to fund his lavish lifestyle. We thank the USPIS for their partnership in investigating this case, and we remain dedicated to rooting out and prosecuting fraud wherever we find it.”
Leaders of ‘We Build The Wall’ online fundraising campaign charged with defrauding hundreds of thousands of donors https://t.co/cH2abWm2Ph pic.twitter.com/NKxfKXkcEX
— US Attorney SDNY (@SDNYnews) August 20, 2020
Kolfage is a disabled Air Force veteran who worked with Bannon to sell We Build the Wall’s mission and raise an impressive amount of funds, much of which was reportedly used to support the men’s lavish lifestyles. Kolfage allegedly took $350,000 from donor funds while Bannon is said to have misdirected more than $1 million.
We Build the Wall was sold to donors first as a way to fund President Donald Trump’s push to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico before it became a private venture to build the wall after Kolfage said the federal government would not accept the funds. Kolfage insisted that his nonprofit’s bylaws barred him from being able to take a salary, and Bannon sold the campaign as “a volunteer organization.” Early reports raised skepticism about the operation after Kolfage refused to publicize the bylaws of his organization that he had cited.
It was reported that the New York Field Office of the United States Postal Inspection Service (UPSIS) aided in the investigation spearheaded by the SDNY.
“The defendants allegedly engaged in fraud when they misrepresented the true use of donated funds,” said Philip Bartlett, inspector-in-charge of the USPIS’s New York office.
“As alleged, not only did they lie to donors, they schemed to hide their misappropriation of funds by creating sham invoices and accounts to launder donations and cover up their crimes, showing no regard for the law or the truth. This case should serve as a warning to other fraudsters that no one is above the law, not even a disabled war veteran or a millionaire political strategist.”
The Post Millennial reported that Bannon served as the chief strategist for Trump for about one year before being let go. Bannon is widely considered to be the person credited with masterminding the policy and legislative views of the president, with some suggesting that Trump did not have a sculpted idea about policy before he met Bannon back in 2011. The former chief strategist has been a huge supporter of the populist movement—a political movement that began to spread across Europe shortly after Trump took office in 2016.