A federal grand jury has indicted six people from Benton Harbor on fraud charges.
They are accused of defrauding taxpayers by $1 million via unemployment insurance fraud and small business loans.
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Attorney General Keith Ellison scrambled to defend his oversight of Feeding Our Future after two of his former staff members spoke out in a Star Tribune article published Thursday night.
The article highlights the state’s shortcomings in preventing the fraud and culminates with the analysis of two former senior members of Ellison’s team, both of whom asked to remain anonymous “for fear of retribution.”
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Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose referred 75 people to the Ohio attorney general and county prosecutors for additional investigation and potential prosecution based on accusations that they illegally voted during the 2020 general election.
LaRose’s office states that individuals who allegedly voted in one state and then cast an additional vote in Ohio, violating state law, have been identified.
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After taxpayers lost $250 million in what federal officials deemed “the largest pandemic fraud” in the nation, the government agencies involved are blaming each other.
The Department of Justice charged 47 people with the fraud, alleging they exploited federal money left unguarded by lax COVID rules meant to feed hungry kids.
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Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report, host Leahy welcomed all-star panelist Clint Brewer in-studio to help unravel the specifics surround former Speaker Glen Casada and his aid Cade Cothren’s indictment.
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A Jamaican man was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Raner C. Collins to 160 months, which is a little over 13 years, in prison for leading an international fraud ring that targeted thousands of elderly victims around the United States. As part of his sentence, the court also ordered McIntosh to pay approximately $1.8 million in restitution.
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Former Georgia mayoral candidate Olivia Ware was sentenced to prison for her role in a scheme that stole thousands from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).
The PPP grants were issued to businesses by the federal government during the coronavirus pandemic. The funds were intended to help companies maintain payments to their employees.
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Jason Lary, the former Mayor of the City of Stonecrest, was sentenced to spend close to five years in federal prison for his scheme that stole thousands of COVID-19 relief funds from the federal government.
According to a release from the Department of Justice, the former government official took more than $100,000 from the citizens of his city.
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Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody and the Federal Trade Commission have taken legal action to shut down what they say was a fraudulent scheme perpetrated by a company targeting minority-owned small businesses.
They filed a joint complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida where Judge Marcia Morales Howard issued a temporary restraining order against the company, preventing it from doing any more business.
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Michigan GOP gubernatorial candidate James Craig did not submit enough valid signatures and should not be on the state’s primary ballot, Michigan’s Bureau of Elections contended in a report.
According to the group, Craig, in addition to multiple other candidates running for various office, allegedly turned in signatures that were forged by paid circulators.
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A Wisconsin man was sentenced to serve more than a decade in prison after being convicted on charges connected to a Ponzi scheme with roughly 70 victims.
According to a release from the Department of Justice, Robert Narvett was sentenced for one count of wire fraud and one count of money laundering.
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Two physicians, and the company they manage, agreed to pay millions to settle allegations of a healthcare kickback arrangement with other doctors, according to a release from the Department of Justice.
Specifically, Paul D. Weir, John R. Morgan, and Care Plus Management will distribute $7.2 million to solve the complaint over potential violations of the Anti-Kickback Statute and False Claims Act.
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A scammer that targeted elderly victims has been arrested and indicted for his alleged role in a fraud scheme that stole roughly $300 million.
According to a release from the Department of Justice (DOJ), Abdou Diallo, a Canadian resident, was at the center of an international telemarketing fraud scheme.
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Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich announced Wednesday a proposed consent judgment that will require CashCall, Inc., its owner J. Paul Reddam, and a wholly-owned subsidiary, WS Funding LLC, to pay $4.8 million in restitution to Arizona consumers who took out personal loans with interest rates as high as 169 percent, greatly exceeding that allowed under Arizona law, according to a press release by Brnovich’s office.
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A press release from the Washington, D.C. based Freedom Foundations says that a union for Ohio’s retired teachers improperly received COVID-19 relief funds for which they were ineligible.
“The Ohio Retired Teachers Association alone received over $36,000 in COVID funds,” that press release said.
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Two Florida business owners were indicted on charges related to a fraud scheme that allowed them to collect more than $12 million.
Matthew Pardi and Ashley Lynn Hars allegedly created a series of fake moving companies, often stealing the identity of real businesses. Additionally, they would inflate their record with fake 5-star reviews and dubious claims.
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A Middle Tennessee man was charged in a million dollar investment scheme aimed to defraud unsuspecting investors, the Department of Justice said in a recent press release.
The Hendersonville man who also lived in Gallatin – known as Gregory Michael Vogel and Gregory Michael Schneider – was charged on eight counts of wire fraud and one count of money laundering in relation to an investment scheme.
According to the statement, Vogel was arrested Wednesday morning by federal agents after a join investigation by the IRS-Criminal Investigation and the United States Postal Inspection Service.
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Representatives from the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry and the Office of Administration discussed ongoing fraud and other issues in the commonwealth’s unemployment system Thursday during a House hearing.
Pennsylvania Secretary of Labor & Industry Jennifer Berrier told the House Labor and Industry Committee that “overall the (unemployment compensation) system is in a good place,” but acknowledged a raft of ongoing issues, from hundreds of millions of dollars stolen through fraud to large backlogs of unresolved claims and fraud cases.
Berrier said the unemployment compensation system has processed more than 611,000 claims since the modernized system went live in June, paying out about $3.4 billion in benefits. During the height of the pandemic, the department faced a backlog of 300,000 nonmonetary determinations, or those involving eligibility, that since has been whittled down to 95,000, she said.
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Attorney General Dave Yost (R) is holding a series of forums to spread awareness about elder abuse in the state.
In a press release announcing the next event in the series of forums, called “Responding to Financial Exploitation, Scams and Fraud in Facility Settings,” Yost told the following story of an Ohio senior who was bilked out of his own money:
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What irony!
Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger must be turning over in their graves.
Bernie Sanders must be having sleepless nights.
The left-wing anthem “Which Side Are You On?” is no longer about whether you’re a “union man” or a “thug for J.H. Blair.” It’s about the size of your stock portfolio or when to go public with your start-up.
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An Ohio woman pleaded guilty to charges related to her role in a fraudulent adoption scheme, according to a release from the Department of Justice.
According to the original indictment, Margaret Cole, a 74-year-old woman, ran an international adoption agency based in Strongsville, Ohio.
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The Department of Justice announced this week a man from Smyrna, Tennessee was charged for Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) fraud. Shawn Palmer, who is the sole owner of Palmers Transportation, Inc. was charged with a criminal information which alleges he applied for and received a PPP loan of $514,370.
According to the charging document, in June of 2020 Palmer sent documents to an individual who assisted him to apply for a PPP loan. The documents were then sent to Kabbage, Inc. which was “a lender approved by the Small Business Administration to provide funds under the program which was designed to provide a direct incentive for small businesses to keep their workers on the payroll during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
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The Department of Justice announced this week a Knoxville, Tennessee man was arrested for defrauding COVID-19 economic relief programs. James Waylon Howell pled guilty to “engaging in more than $150,000 in fraud related to the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, and to committing money laundering.” He was sentenced to 18 months in prison.
“This prosecution highlights the Department of Justice’s commitment to aggressively prosecute those who have defrauded these important programs enacted to provide economic relief to those who have suffered financially as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic,” said United States Attorney Francis M. Hamilton III. “Fortunately, the quick and capable work of our federal partners permitted the recovery of a substantial amount of stolen funds.”
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Former Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes was found guilty Monday on four counts: three of wire fraud and one of conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
The jury remained deadlocked on three charges and found her not guilty on four other felony charges.
The former entrepreneur reportedly remained emotionless as the verdicts were read, The Associated Press stated. Her partner, Billy Evans, reacted similarly.
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Friday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed Director of Government Relations for the Beacon Center Tennessee, Jordan Long to the newsmakers line to discuss the annual 2021 Pork Report.
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Two Michigan residents were charged in criminal complaints for conducting an unemployment insurance benefit fraud scheme that stole millions.
The two defendants, Tauheed Wilder and Shuqueni Franklin, are alleged to have engaged in mail fraud, wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and money laundering.
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This week’s Golden Horseshoe goes to the Small Business Administration for millions in Paycheck Protection Program loans it issued to fraudsters who used the money to purchase luxury homes, high-priced jewelry and expensive cars, including a Bentley and two Lamborghinis, according to a watchdog report.
The Paycheck Protection Program had the highest percentage of cases of criminal activity of all the pandemic relief programs, according to the Pandemic Response Accountability Committee’s recent Semiannual Report to Congress.
“A total of 14 OIGs have indictments/complaints, arrests, and/or convictions from April 1, 2021, through September 30, 2021, related to the federal government’s COVID-19 pandemic response,” PRAC reported.
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Two Georgia residents were sentenced to federal prison, following a scheme that sought to steal the identity of elderly individuals.
The two criminals, Durrell Tyler and DeShawn Johnson, both plead guilty to charges of access device fraud and aggravated identity theft.
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Just two weeks after his House floor speech on financial fraud in Congress went viral, Arizona Rep. David Schweikert (R-Ariz.) delivered another epic speech, this time focusing on COVID-19 and President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better bill. Schweikert said the country is about at the point to declare the pandemic over, and he slammed Biden’s “social spending plan” for “economic violence” against the working poor and “laced with budget gimmicks.”
Schweikert explained how the combination of several factors now means the pandemic is about over. Pfizer’s new antiviral medication, which is about to be approved by the FDA, is 89% effective and will be available to millions by January. There are at-home COVID-19 tests and multiple vaccines. He will be putting forth legislation shortly to address this developing situation.
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Rep. David Schweikert (R-06-AZ), known as the wonky numbers member of Congress, gave a speech on the House floor a few days ago about runaway spending in Congress that has gone viral with over 1.2 million views. It’s on Social Security and Medicare running out of money and how the U.S. is headed for a dystopian future if it’s not fixed. He addressed several myths and offered solutions.
He began saying he’s about to say some things most people don’t want to hear, “We call it math.” The biggest threat over the next couple decades facing the country is demographics. “Getting older isn’t Democrat or Republican, it’s going to happen to everyone.” But he says he’s been booed for telling people the truth. “You don’t raise money telling people the truth about what’s going on.” Referring to Congress, he said, “We live in a financial fantasy world in this place … there’s a fraud around here.”
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The Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance (TDCI) held a FaceBook Live where they discussed how to be aware of financial fraud schemes. The group, hosted by PBS Book’s Fred Nahhat, discussed how to spot scammers,
From 2020, Donna Lowry said that “the federal trade commission recorded more than 3.3 billon dollars lost to financial fraud schemes. It was up almost double from the year before.”
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Two corporate executive parents whose children attend prestigious universities were found guilty in federal court Friday for bribing university staff to rig the admissions process, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Gamal Abdelaziz, former chief operations officer of Wynn Resorts Development and John Wilson, a private-equity financier and former chief financial officer of Staples, who were tried together in federal court, each spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to falsify their childrens’ academic and athletic records to gain admission to the University of Southern California (USC), Stanford and Harvard as athletic recruits with the help of scandal ringleader and admissions consultant Rick Singer.
The two men were found guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud and conspiracy to commit bribery involving a school that receives federal funds, the WSJ reported. The jury also found Wilson guilty of aiding and abetting in fraud and bribery and filing a false tax return.
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Tennessee State Senator Katrina Robinson (D-Memphis) was acquitted on Monday on 15 possible fraud and embezzlement charges.
Robinson’s charges stemmed from an investigation into the Memphis-based Healthcare Institute (THI), which the state lawmaker directs.
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According to the Tennessee Department of Finance & Administration, two convicted Tennessee women have been ordered by the Office of Inspector General (OIG) to repay the State of Tennessee on charges involving TennCare fraud.
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A Georgia man is facing a fraud charge after law enforcement officials said he stole more than $99,000 from the state’s Medicaid program.
The Georgia attorney general’s office said Gainesville psychologist Dr. Guy Jordan filed claims for therapy sessions that never happened. Jordan was indicted on Medicaid fraud and false statements charges by a Hall County Grand Jury.
“We will not stop protecting taxpayer dollars, and we thank the Hall County Grand Jury for their work on this case,” Attorney General Chris Carr said in a statement. “We hope this indictment sends a clear message that tax dollars will not be abused.”
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Open Door, Inc. and Alumni Music, Inc., both based in Shelby County, have been determined to not be using their federal Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) funds to provide meals to children, the Tennessee Comptroller’s Office asserted Wednesday.
A probe was conducted cooperatively by the Comptroller of the Treasury and the Tennessee Department of Human Services (DHS) during summer 2020 to ascertain what nourishment the two companies were providing to minors.
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The feds faced another setback in their quest to keep $85 million in assets seized in a raid without charging hundreds of safe deposit box renters with a crime.
U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner issued a preliminary injunction July 16 in a lawsuit by several customers of Los Angeles-based U.S. Private Vaults (USPV), who alleged the FBI denied them due process by providing civil forfeiture notices that lacked “any legal basis” for seizing the contents of each box.
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Georgia Republican gubernatorial candidate Vernon Jones this week, referring to the November 2020 presidential election, asked for a forensic audit of all of the state’s 159 counties. Jones said this in an emailed message this week to his supporters.
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Ohioans victimized by unemployment fraud or were overpaid unemployment benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic could be off the hook for repaying those funds, according to the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.
ODJFS Director Matt Damschroder said late last week if a waiver is approved, claimants will not have to repay money previously labelled as an overpayment and also could receive benefits that have been withheld because of an overpayment status.
Claimants should be notified soon of how to apply for a waiver and processing could begin later in the summer, Damschroder said.
“We understand the hardships that overpayments caused during what is already a very stressful time.” Damschroder said. “Our unemployment program is in a much better position than it was a year ago.”
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Maryland officials say they suspect over 508,000 new, potentially fraudulent unemployment claims have been filed since May.
The announcement Monday followed the state saying it has verified over 1.3 million fraudulent claims since the beginning of COVID-19 pandemic.
The most common means of filing a fraudulent claim is identity theft, according to CNN.
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Republican lawmakers in Michigan released a report Wednesday concluding there was no widespread fraud in the state’s November election, debunking many speculations, but they pointedly warned that the mailing of unsolicited absentee ballot applications creates “a clear vulnerability for fraud that may be undetected.”
“The serious, potential outcomes of these vulnerabilities versus the minor effort to request an application make a strong and compelling necessity to not provide such applications without a request from a voter – as was standard practice until this past year,” the Michigan Senate Oversight Committee concluded. “Therefore, the committee recommends the Michigan secretary of state discontinue the practice of mailing out unsolicited applications.”
The committee also recommended that the state strengthen voter ID requirements, not weaken them like Democrats in Congress have proposed, as the practice of absentee or not-in-person voting grows.
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This week’s Golden Horseshoe award goes to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., the nation’s pension bailout agency that is still reeling from revelations its chief of contracting engaged in a bribery scheme that steered $4.8 million in fraudulent business to a vendor in return for more than $1 million in personal benefits.
The bribery scheme involving the now convicted director of PBGC’s Procurement Department was possible because the agency suffered from several vulnerabilities, including reduced competition among vendors, missing legal reviews and sole-source contracts that evaded bidding designed to get taxpayers the best bargain, the PBGC’s inspector general reported.
“His actions were enabled by internal control weaknesses; specifically, inadequate oversight of PD procurements and a lack of a control mechanism to ensure that PD sent all requisite contract actions for legal review,” the inspector general reported. “Although PBGC began requiring that more contract actions receive legal review after the PD Director resigned in February 2020, it does not have a mechanism to ensure PD complies with this requirement.”
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For as long as politicians have been passing legislation, there have been measurable consequences to that legislation – both intentional and unintentional. Usually, the final impact is not known for years after a law is passed. We could write a book predicting problems with the proposed federal bill, H.R.1, the so-called For the People Act, but the state of Connecticut has given American taxpayers a timely preview of the burdens and waste we can expect from just one of the bill’s many government mandates. Specifically, the requirement that states must mail out ballot applications to all registered voters will unnecessarily spend, and ultimately waste, hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars.
The 2020 elections in Connecticut provide a cautionary preview of this proposed requirement in H.R. 1 to send absentee ballot applications (ABR) to every registered voter. Connecticut Secretary of the State Denise W. Merrill (pictured) did exactly that, spending $7.1 million in federal taxpayer money sending out unsolicited ABRs for the primary and general elections. A total of 3.6 million applications were mailed, yet only 865,000 were converted to actual votes. That’s a cost of $8.20 per ballot returned – by any measure, a poor yield on that investment.
The sad irony about this waste of taxpayers’ money is that the applications were available to voters free of charge either at town halls or on the State of Connecticut website. One had only to pick up the form in person or download and print it in the comfort of his own home. Other states have similarly convenient options for obtaining ABRs and provide for ballot applications to be requested online, by email or by phone. Citizens in these states take responsibility for their right to vote, and the states facilitate their doing so, rather than mandate it.
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Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has suspended Waynesboro Mayor Gregory Carswell Jr. from office after the mayor’s indictment on felony fraud, forgery and theft charges.
Carswell, an evangelical pastor, was elected mayor of the city outside of Augusta in 2017. He was indicted in December on one count of identity fraud, one count of theft by taking, one count of theft by deception and one count of forgery in the second degree. Carswell announced May 17 he was taking a leave of absence as mayor because of his legal troubles and personal issues.
“Of course, you know we have legal issues that are going on, and we want to deal with those, and we want the citizens to have the full confidence and trust and knowing the people they elected are going to do the best things for them,” Carswell said at the May 17 city council meeting.
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A former member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida Thursday won an appeal of her 2017 conviction for corruption, according to several reports.
Former Democrat Rep. Corrine Brown, who represented Florida’s Fifth and Third Congressional Districts over a period of nearly 25 years, had her conviction overturned after the 11 Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the District Court wrongly dismissed a juror after learning that the “Holy Spirit” told him Brown was not guilty of the crimes.
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Just a few short weeks apart, the U.S. Justice Department settled two major fund-raising cases involving foreign money injected into American elections.
In February, a longtime Democratic bundler named Imaad Zuberi, who also donated to Donald Trump’s inauguration, was sentenced to 12 years in prison and millions in fines in a criminal information that alleged he routed foreign money into U.S elections, sometimes through straw donors.
Last week, Nigerian-Lebanese billionaire Gilbert Chagoury, 75, a large donor to the Clinton Foundation, got a fine, no prison and deferred prosecution for allegedly routing his foreign money to straw donors to help Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign and some GOP congressional candidates. An associate also made a secret loan to Obama-era Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who failed to disclose the assistance.
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Monday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed all-star panelist Crom Carmichael to the studio to discuss two articles citing California’s bad government and Chinese infiltration.
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A review of drop box ballot transfer forms reveals that Cobb County violated the Rules of the State Election Board for Absentee Voting that requires absentee ballots from drop box locations be “immediately transported” to the county registrar.
Specifically, the Rules of the State Election Board of the Georgia Election Code Chapter 183-1 for Absentee Voting states, “The ballots from the drop box shall be immediately transported to the county registrar and processed and stored in the same manner as absentee ballots returned by mail are processed and stored.”
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Wednesday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy gave a formulaic breakdown of the alleged election fraud in Georgia.
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The Trump campaign alleges that massive voter fraud, especially perpetrated by computer software, is responsible for the widely published figures indicating Joe Biden won the presidential election. Consensus has spread from the Left, through the Republican establishment (e.g. the Wall Street Journal) to honest Tucker Carlson, that the Trump team has presented no proof and, absent that, must concede. But even the few who adhere to that consensus honestly do so based on neglect of law, facts, and even of the English language.
For Trump’s highly paid lawyers, there is no excuse whatsoever to submit to that expectation.
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