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News organizations ignore ProPublica ‘bombshell’ about possible witness tampering

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On June 3, ProPublica told the world that witnesses against Donald Trump had received monetary rewards “including large raises from his campaign, severance packages, new jobs, and a grant of shares and cash from Trump’s media company.”

Mainstream news organizations seem to be playing “not my scoop, not my story.” That’s bad for democracy. No Washington Post or New York Times. No traditional TV network news. Or Fox. CNN gave the story cursory attention.

So we’ve republished it in toto. Here’s a high-level summary and a list of media organizations that have reported the story. Trump’s lawyers tried to kill it.

The beneficiaries

Paul Manafort, Trump’s former campaign manager, was sentenced to 47 months in prison; Trump pardoned Manafort.

D.C. insurrection and election denial

  1. Boris Epshteyn, New Jersey: “Epshteyn was involved in assembling sets of false electors around the country after Trump lost the 2020 election, and Epshteyn’s emails and texts have come up repeatedly in investigations… From November 2022 to August 2023, the Trump campaign had paid Epshteyn’s company an average of $26,000 per month. The month after the indictments, his pay hit a new high, $50,000, and climbed in October to $53,500 per month, where it has remained ever since.”
  2. Dan Scavino, D.C.: communications staffer with authority to publish to social media accounts “had an up-close view of Trump during the final weeks of his presidency — a focus of the congressional inquiry into the Jan. 6 insurrection and the criminal probe into election interference.” Trump’s media company that owned Truth Social gave Scavino a $240,000 a year contract “in August 2021, a month after the congressional investigation began.” After being unable to postpone a September 2022 subpoena but before testifying in May 2023, Scavino received “a seat on the board of the Trump social media company [as well as] a $600,000 retention bonus and a $4 million ‘executive promissory note’ paid in shares, according to SEC filings. The company’s public filings do not make clear when these deals were put in place.”

Florida classified documents

  1. Brian Butler, Florida: A valet and manager at Mar-a-Lago with “direct knowledge of the handling of the government documents at the club,” he was “was offered golf tournament tickets, a lawyer paid for by Trump and a new job that would have come with a raise.” He turned them down.
  2. Caroline Wiles, Florida: daughter of Susie Wiles, had worked on the 2016 campaign and followed Trump to D.C. “where she reportedly left one job because she didn’t pass a background check [and] was hired by his campaign. Her salary: $222,000, making her currently the fourth-highest-paid staffer.”
  3. Evan Corcoran: “Corcoran’s notes from his conversations with Trump formed the backbone of the eventual indictment, and his descriptions of those meetings are expected to be a critical component at trial. The lawyer made an initial appearance before the grand jury in January 2023 and appeared again in another session in March… Just days after his March grand jury testimony, the Trump campaign sent two payments to his firm totaling $786,000, the largest amount paid in a single day in his almost two years working for Trump. The firm brought in a total of $1.4 million in that four-week span, more than double its payments from any other comparable period during Corcoran’s time working for Trump.”
  4. Jennifer Little, Georgia: hired to represent Trump, then pulled into Florida documents case. “Little told him, according to news reports, that unlike the government’s prior requests, a subpoena meant he could face criminal charges if he didn’t comply…Just after Little was forced to testify before the grand jury in March 2023, a Trump political action committee paid her $218,000, by far the largest payment she’d received while working for Trump. In the year after she became a witness, she has made at least $1.3 million from the Trump political committee, more than twice as much as she had during the year prior.”
  5. Margo Martin, Florida: “allegedly witnessed Trump showing off what he described as a secret military document, got a significant raise [from $155,000 to $185,000 per year] not long after the classified documents case heated up with the search at Mar-a-Lago… Campaign finance filings show a much larger pay increase for Martin, but the Trump campaign said the filings are misleading because of a difference in how payroll taxes and withholdings are reported by the two committees.”
  6. Susie Wiles: “When Trump was indicted on June 8, 2023, over his handling of the documents, the indictment described Wiles as a ‘PAC representative.’ It described Trump allegedly showing her a classified map related to a military operation, acknowledging ‘that he should not be showing it’ and warning her to ‘not get too close.’ That June, Right Coast Strategies, the political consulting firm Wiles founded, received its highest-ever monthly payment from the Trump campaign: $75,000, an amount the firm has equaled only once since… She also got a 20% raise that May, from $25,000 to $30,000 per month.”

2023 New York civil trial

  1. Allen Weisselberg, NY: Trump’s former chief financial officer “got a $2 million severance agreement in January 2023, four months after the New York attorney general sued Trump for financial fraud in his real estate business. The agreement contains a nondisparagement clause and language barring Weisselberg from voluntarily cooperating with investigators.”
  2. Steve Witkoff: appeared as an expert witness who “defended the Trump Organization real estate valuations at the heart of the case. Two months after Witkoff’s testimony, Trump’s campaign for the first time started paying his company, the Witkoff Group, for air travel. The payments continued over several weeks, ultimately totalling more than $370,000.”

Who’s followed ProPublica’s lead?

In addition to TMV:

  1. Boing Boing: Trump Team paid 9 key trial witnesses handsomely, says new bombshell report
  2. CNN (YouTube channel): Trump’s businesses and campaign have given financial benefits to witnesses, ProPublica report shows
  3. Cardinal & Pine: It sure looks like Trump is paying off witnesses
  4. Daily BeastTrump Trial Witnesses Got Big Raises From His Campaign and Businesses
  5. Esquire: Nine Trump Witnesses Have Recently Received Financial Benefits from His Campaign? How Convenient!
  6. NJ.com: Donald Trump has spent millions in possible witness tampering
  7. Newsweek: Trump’s Inner Circle Got Pay Boost Amid Criminal Trial, Probes
  8. Salon: Trump aides receive “significant financial benefits” after testifying, suggesting witness tampering
  9. Scripps News Service (YouTube channel): Trump witnesses received raises and benefits at work
  10. Techdirt: Trump Threatens To Sue ProPublica For Reporting On Payouts To Witnesses In His Various Cases
  11. The New Republic: Bombshell Report Reveals Team Trump Is Rewarding Key Trial Witnesses

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