It’s not breaking news to point out that President Trump probably is going to try to work the refs some in his upcoming trial in New York.
He’s already informed Americans that the judge is a partisan contributor to Joe Biden and the prosecutor is trying to score political points and potentially move to higher office based on his being able to claim he was the one who brought down Trump.
It’s only fair. The other side is working the refs against him. Trump has accused Alvin Bragg, the prosecutor in New York, of being backed by Hungarian socialist and convicted currency manipulator George Soros. Soros has donated to groups that in turn made contributions nearly identical in amount to contributions those groups made to Bragg’s campaign.
Soros does not deny the contributions, nor their purpose. But Ben Collins of NBC, who embodies much of what is wrong with American journalism today, tweeted over the weekend that “Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Ron DeSantis all have claimed Bragg is ‘Soros-backed’ or aligned since the news of the indictment dropped” but “Soros has ‘never met or spoken to Alvin Bragg,’ according to a CNBC story from last week.”
Ben Shapiro dropped the obvious bomb on Collins’ theory. “Media’s new take drops,” he tweeted. “If you say a prosecutor is Soros-backed, that’s false unless George Soros is literally massaging that prosecutor’s back RIGHT NOW.”
Collins’ tweet points to a larger problem. Democrats do a lot of self-righteous talking about so-called conservative dark money has influenced courts and agency decisions — heck, they even produced a “Captured Courts” report that ridiculously argued Republican donors have corrupted the judicial system. Yet, they have no problem deploying dark money in their policy and political battles.
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Dark money is money raised by non-profits who don’t have to reveal their donors. It enables Americans to sponsor causes without fear of professional repercussions. The Supreme Court that established the precedent on this is entitled NAACP v. Alabama.
Soros throws around a ton of dark money. He owns a large stake in an electric vehicle manufacturer and uses his currency-manipulating fortune to attempt to buy public policy decisions. He fights to re-regulate what Trump deregulated through contributions to the Governing for Impact Fund,which uses an incubator organization known as the New Venture Fund to avoid having to file tax documents or otherwise disclose its activities.
Soros promotes the group’s explicit lobbying activities through the Sixteen Thirty Fund, which operates similarly with help from Arabella Advisors, a radical left D.C. consulting firm. These groups and others similarly situated under the Soros umbrella raised $1.5 billion in dark money contributions in 2020 and 2021, making it one of the wealthiest dark money organizations ever.
Other Democrats have used dark money to finance their green energy crusade as well. The League of Conservation Voters, a radical left front group headed by extreme-left former EPA Administrator Carol Browner, met three times with embattled Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg. Shortly after the third meeting, the group agreed to spend $10 million to encourage support for spending hundreds of billions of dollars to back President Joe Biden’s green energy policies.
Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm’s very first meeting with a non-government official was with Bill Gates to discuss how he might fund efforts to encourage government spending on green initiatives. It soon was followed by proposals from Granholm for additional green spending.
Foreign money is involved as well. Foreign actors, from Russia to China to the Central Asia republics, benefit from an America weakened by higher prices and lower levels of access to oil and gas. The House Committee on Science and Technology suggested in a report that the Biden administration rushed to approve development of the Nord Stream pipeline – a major source of hard currency for Russia – because of donations from Russians and others seeking to undermine the American energy industry.
Next time you pull up to the pump, remember that when dark money was supposedly influencing Republicans, you were paying about $2 per gallon. Now that it’s influencing Democrats to try to cut off supply and force a transition to not-ready-for-prime time green energy, you’re paying a lot more.
The question then is why does Democrat dark money make things worse for Americans. Could it be that the people behind Democrat dark money do not have America’s best interests at heart?
Edward Woodson is a lawyer, political commentator, and host of "The Edward Woodson Show," which airs weekdays on WZAB and streams online at EdwardWoodson.com
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