The US Securities and Exchange Commission has shut down the auditor of Donald Trump’s social media company, accusing it of “massive fraud”.

The US regulator charged the firm, BF Borgers, and its founder, Ben Borgers, on Friday with falsely representing to clients that its audit work would comply with US standards, and fabricating documentation.

It said Borgers, one of the most prolific auditors of US public companies, was responsible for “one of the largest wholesale failures by gatekeepers in our financial markets”.

Without admitting or denying the SEC’s findings, the firm has agreed to pay a $12mn penalty and Ben Borgers to pay $2mn. Ben Borgers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Borgers has expanded rapidly to become auditor to hundreds of small and microcap companies — including the former US president’s Trump Media & Technology Group — but the SEC said that three-quarters of its audits were faulty.

The agency said it was stepping in to permanently close what it called a “massive fraud” and “sham audit mill”, and it told Borgers’ clients they would need to check past financial statements in case they contained errors. The firm’s “deliberate and systemic failure” to meet professional standards affected more than 1,500 company filings, the SEC said.

As Donald Trump weighs his running-mate options, it’s not a secret that House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik and Sen. J.D. Vance are among the contenders. The result has been an unfortunate race to the bottom, in which the New York congresswoman and the Ohio senator have gone back and forth for months, each trying to one-up the other in the hopes of impressing the former president.....

It also meant, of course, that it was Vance’s turn to come up with a gesture that his party’s presumptive presidential nominee might like. It was against this backdrop that, as The Hill reported, the Ohioan appeared on CNN last night.

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) said Wednesday he is “skeptical” that former Vice President Pence’s life was endangered during the Jan. 6, 2021, riots at the Capitol.

In context, Kaitlan Collins asked a good question that we’ll hopefully hear repeated in the coming weeks and months with other Republican contenders: “You said you’d certainly be open to [the vice presidential nomination] if he did offer it to you. Considering that, does it give you any pause whatsoever about taking that job when you see how he treated his last vice president?”.....

A Washington Post analysis published two years ago highlighted the specific instances in which “Pence’s life was in particular danger on Jan. 6, 2021.”

In fact, rioters were eager to target Pence when they arrived on Capitol Hill, but Trump also lashed out at his then-vice president during the riot. As one former White House aide said in recorded testimony, that had the effect of “pouring gasoline on the fire.”

Maybe Vance ignored the revelations from the Jan. 6 investigation. Maybe Vance knows the truth and is choosing to ignore it in the hopes of boosting his national prospects.

Either way, the record is clear, and there's no reason for the GOP senator to be "skeptical" of the truth.

But the presumptive GOP nominee hasn’t just focused on his bond with suspected and convicted insurrectionists; Trump has also shed fresh light on his own actions and intentions related to the assault on the Capitol. NBC News reported:

Former President Donald Trump acknowledged Wednesday that he told the Secret Service he wanted to go to the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, depicting a different tone of an event that became a contentious detail of a former White House aide’s testimony before the House committee that investigated the attack.

The former president’s point was to push back against Cassidy Hutchinson’s 2022 testimony, when the former aide described a scene, which had been described to her by Tony Ornato, in which Trump went a little berserk after his Secret Service detail told him he was being taken back to the White House after his speech at the Ellipse, not to the Capitol.

At his rally in Wisconsin, Trump described different details, but effectively confirmed the underlying claim.
https://twitter.com/BidenHQ/status/1785755870338384383

......And, by his own admission, he wanted to join them.

As for what Trump intended to do if he got his way — which is to say, if the Secret Service followed his directive and brought him to Capitol Hill — as we’ve discussed, it’s probably safe to say that once he was inside the halls, presidential oratory wasn’t the plan. It’s not like Trump intended to use his powers of persuasion to convince members of Congress to ignore the election results and give him illegitimate power he hadn’t earned.

It’s more likely he had a different kind of confrontation in mind, which is precisely what makes the acknowledgements such as the one he made yesterday important.

And after the press observed that there was nary another Trump in attendance despite the defense’s characterization of the former president as a family man, one Eric Trump strode into court behind his dad on Tuesday and took a seat in the first row, aside Trump campaign chief Susie Wiles.

On one hand, Donald Trump’s third child, and current co-head of the businesses bearing the Trump name, is the family member many would have pegged as the one most likely to show up. After all, he is known among reporters for his quiet loyalty to his dad, often placing a gentle hand on his father’s shoulder or back. And he also is recognized, even among some of Trump’s sharpest critics, for his manners and his calm; during the civil fraud trial prosecuted last fall by New York Attorney General Letitia James, in which Eric was also a defendant, I saw him approaching James and shaking her hand with apparent sincerity. The contrast between Eric’s practiced politesse and his father’s constant complaints about the AG was not lost on me.

Yet Eric is equally insistent that the Trump family businesses, as well as his father alone, have been unfairly persecuted. And while not as comfortable in the media’s glare as older brother Don Jr., Eric increasingly has taken on a more public-facing role in defending his dad......

As Davidson read from that email and recalled Cohen’s “highly unusual” insistence that only Cohen could retain a copy of that agreement, Eric Trump didn’t much seem like a Trump to me. Instead, in that moment, he was neither the heir to an American real estate dynasty nor a second-generation fraudster. He was simply a criminal defendant’s son who seemed to be seeing, for the first time, key evidence of the alleged conspiracy that, according to prosecutors, would turn garden-variety fake business records into 34 felony counts. (The elder Trump has pleaded not guilty to all charges and denies that he had a sexual relationship with either Daniels or McDougal.)

The defense wants the jurors to believe that Trump is someone, just like any of them, with a spouse and kids he adores. But watching Eric absorb the details of the Daniels deal, not to mention his reliving the underlying allegations, I saw only one dutiful family man — and his name was not Donald Trump.

As Donald Trump considers possible running mates, it’s been a few weeks since House Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik made any grand gestures intended to impress the former president. As The New Republic noted, that changed yesterday.

Representative Elise Stefanik is mad at special counsel Jack Smith for doing his job and prosecuting Donald Trump. In an ironic move betraying a complete lack of self-recognition, Stefanik on Tuesday filed an ethics complaint against Smith for “illegal election interference.”

Yes, the New York congresswoman, rumored to be in contention for her party’s vice presidential nomination, filed a complaint against the special counsel with the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, accusing Smith of trying to “rush” the prosecution of Trump’s federal election subversion case.

Stefanik, who almost certainly knows better, also issued a statement that referred to the pending criminal case as “illegal“ for reasons she failed to explain......

Which came on the heels of Stefanik responding to Trump’s classified documents scandal by criticizing the National Archives, helping launch an effort to "expunge" Trump’s impeachments, and joining a partisan crusade against federal law enforcement.

Which came on the heels of Stefanik filing an ethics complaint against the judge overseeing Trump’s civil fraud trial in New York and pressing the Justice Department to prosecute Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer who has since become a fierce critic of the former president.

I continue to believe that no one should want to be vice president this badly.

When Trump sat down with Time magazine’s Eric Cortellessa, the reporter reminded him that more than 800 Jan. 6 participants have been sentenced through our judicial system, and most of them pleaded guilty. Others were convicted by juries. “Will you consider pardoning every one of them?” Cortellessa asked.

“I would consider that, yes,” Trump replied.

Apparently surprised, the Time reporter added, “Really?” to which the Republican said, “Yes, absolutely.” (He went on to share some related and bizarre ideas about the police “ushering” rioters into the Capitol, and a nefarious “they” who “destroyed” evidence that would’ve made him look better.)

As an NBC News report added, Trump was referring to Jan. 6 defendants “caught on tape brandishing or using firearms, stun guns, flagpoles, fire extinguishers, bike racks, batons, a metal whip, office furniture, pepper spray, bear spray, a tomahawk ax, a hatchet, a hockey stick, knuckle gloves, a baseball bat, a massive ‘Trump’ billboard, ‘Trump’ flags, a pitchfork, pieces of lumber, crutches and even an explosive device during the brutal attack that injured about 140 police officers.”.....

But as we’ve discussed, it’s also important to acknowledge the broader set of circumstances. In the weeks, months, and years that followed the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, federal prosecutors got to work charging rioters, not just because they committed crimes, and not just to hold them accountable, but also to prevent future attacks. The message was intended to be clear: The United States prosecuted these insurrectionists, so those thinking about following in their footsteps should expect to face legal consequences, too.

Trump intends to silence that message, undo what’s been done, and make clear that criminals who ignore the law in his name need not worry about accountability.

There is arguably no greater example of the Republican’s hostility toward the rule of law.

Conditions at Columbia University took a turn overnight as school officials called in the NYPD, which began arresting those protesting the Israel/Hamas war. As events unfolded, Donald Trump apparently thought it’d be a good idea to call into Sean Hannity’s Fox News program and share an accusation. The Hill reported:

Former President Trump made unfounded claims Tuesday that pro-Palestine protests at Columbia University contained “paid agitators” as nationwide college campus protests escalate. ... Trump claimed in a Fox News interview with Sean Hannity during the police operation that many of the protesters did not believe in what they were protesting for.

“I really think you have a lot of paid agitators, professional agitators in here too, and I see it all over,” the former president said, claiming activism experience he does not have. “You know, when you see signs and they’re all identical. That means they’re being paid by a source.”.....

After the GOP candidate prevailed on Election Day 2016, there was related anti-Trump activism. Those involved, he said in November 2016, were “paid protesters.”

Months later, after the Republican’s inauguration, the activism continued. Trump assured the public once more that these Americans deserved to be ignored — because he assumed they were “paid protesters.”

The following year, Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination inspired another round of progressive activism. The protesters, Trump insisted, were “paid professionals.” (He also made claims about the quality of the protesters’ signs, just as he did on Fox last night.)

Now, the presumptive GOP nominee has returned to the same idea in order to dismiss campus protests.

When right-wing activists engage in activism, the Republican assumes they’re “very fine people“ and “patriots.” When those Trump doesn’t like gather for protests he disapproves of, he assumes they’re “paid agitators” whose sincerity is inherently suspect.

And yet, in 2024, Cortellessa was obviously right to raise the question. What’s more, as NBC News reported, the candidate was obviously wrong in how he answered the question.

Former President Donald Trump said in a new interview with Time magazine that he doesn’t think there will be political violence around the 2024 election because he believes he’ll win — but that it “always depends on the fairness of an election.”

Asked specifically about the possibility of post-election violence, the Republican told Time, “f we don’t win, you know, it depends. It always depends on the fairness of an election.”

Or put another way, if Trump, driven by his ridiculous and evidence-free assumptions, decides that he doesn’t believe the election was “fair,” he’s not prepared to rule out the possibility of political violence.....

A Washington Post analysis, published soon after the “bloodbath” controversy, added, “s it really ridiculous to suggest that the guy who warned of ‘riots,’ ‘violence in the streets’ and ‘death & destruction’ if he were wronged might be gesturing in that direction again? Of course not.”

The repetition becomes definitional: This is who Trump is. He’s a man who believes that reliance on violent rhetoric, imagery, and even veiled threats is acceptable as part of our contemporary political discourse.

What’s more, as Joyce Vance, a former federal prosecutor and an MSNBC legal analyst, recently explained, “We know, and more importantly, he knows, how his followers react when he suggests violence.”

It’s precisely why it’s best not to look away.

Time magazine sat down with Trump twice recently and has now published a new report that shed light on the presumptive GOP nominee’s vision for a second term.

What emerged in two interviews with Trump, and conversations with more than a dozen of his closest advisers and confidants, were the outlines of an imperial presidency that would reshape America and its role in the world. ... He would let red states monitor women’s pregnancies and prosecute those who violate abortion bans.

This might sound like an exaggeration. It’s not.

Keep in mind, as of a few weeks ago, Trump acted as if he’d solved his abortion problem once and for all: The former president effectively said he’d let every state do whatever they pleased. It was his way of trying to avoid responsibility for the mess he helped create.

But the interview with Time magazine forced the Republican to consider some of the practical consequences of his latest position on reproductive rights. From the article:

More than 20 states now have full or partial abortion bans, and Trump says those policies should be left to the states to do what they want, including monitoring women’s pregnancies. “I think they might do that,” he says. When I ask whether he would be comfortable with states prosecuting women for having abortions beyond the point the laws permit, he says, “It’s irrelevant whether I’m comfortable or not. It’s totally irrelevant, because the states are going to make those decisions.”

In other words, if Republican officials in red states start monitoring women’s pregnancies and prosecuting women, Trump has no interest in intervening. He’d simply allow those GOP officials to do as they pleased, regardless of the real-world consequences for the women affected by the far-right agenda......

“Donald Trump’s latest comments leave little doubt: if elected he’ll sign a national abortion ban, allow women who have an abortion to be prosecuted and punished, allow the government to invade women’s privacy to monitor their pregnancies, and put IVF and contraception in jeopardy nationwide,” Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a statement. “Simply put: November’s election will determine whether women in the United States have reproductive freedom, or whether Trump’s new government will continue its assault to control women’s health care decisions.”