Panama
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BS goes back to reaGan?
see panama papers offhsHore Banks money lAUNDER
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MMA
Laura Loomer takes credit for Trump’s Panama policy
Loomer: Trump “called me” about Panama and he “took my advice, and now you see President Trump calling for the United States to take back the canal” and an “audit of all NGOs”
Written by Alex Kaplan
Published 02/11/25
Far-right activist Laura Loomer, a self-proclaimed “proud Islamaphobe” who has said she is “pro-white nationalism,” stated on her Rumble show that during the 2024 election, she consulted with President Donald Trump on the Panama Canal, migration in Panama’s Darién Gap, and non-governmental organizations. Loomer claimed that Trump then “took [her] advice” on those subjects.
Loomer has a history of promoting virulent xenophobia and anti-Black bigotry, conspiracy theories about mass shootings, and white nationalism. Despite this history, Trump has associated with Loomer, attempting to hire her for his 2024 presidential campaign and traveling with her to both his debate against then-Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris and to a September 11 memorial ceremony. Trump has also repeatedly promoted Loomer’s content online, and Loomer has even claimed that Trump told her, “You’re so smart. ... I read your website every day.” (Trump’s campaign later tried to distance itself from Loomer, though Trump refused to denounce her, calling her a “free spirit” and a “supporter.”)
On her show, Loomer has repeatedly pushed claims that Panama, along with the Darién Gap, is a pipeline for an “invasion” of migrants to America that could lead to terrorism. According to The New York Times, Loomer also traveled to Panama — as did some other right-wing media entities — and she posted reportedly deceptively edited content from her travels, falsely suggesting that “Democrats are encouraging” migration “to create new, illegal voters” and casting international aid organizations as “profiteers making money off human misery.” Trump reportedly reposted one of her videos from the trip on Truth Social.
On February 7, Loomer claimed that Trump “actually called me one day, during the last election season, and was asking me about the Darién Gap, and he was asking me about my videos and my trip to Panama,” and she noted that she urged him to “make it a policy position to take back the Panama Canal” because “the CCP has an enormous presence in the Canal Zone and how they are facilitating illegal immigration, and that’s why we have such an influx of Chinese invaders coming into our country.”
She further elaborated that Trump told her that “he was going to be looking into it” and specifically wanted her “input on the issue of the Panama Canal” and “on the issue of the illegal alien invasion taking place in the Darién Gap and Panama.” She additionally claimed that she “had several conversations with President Trump and also Marco Rubio and other officials in the Trump administration about these NGOs and about the activities in Panama.”
Loomer then claimed that Trump “took my advice,” and boasted, “I’ve been told directly by people who work for President Trump that my videos have played a massive role in opening President Trump’s eyes to NGO corruption and the chaos that is happening down in the Panama Canal Zone.” Last year, Loomer claimed on her show that undocumented immigrants in Panama were being “supported” by NGOs and urged Trump to seize the Panama Canal as a supposed solution.
Ahead of Trump’s second inauguration, he threatened to take back the canal, and Trump’s “border czar” Tom Homan said that the administration would “shut down” the Darién Gap. In early February, Trump also ordered an audit of federal funding to NGOs.
Video
Citation
From the February 7, 2025, edition of Loomer Unleashed, streamed on Rumble
LAURA LOOMER (HOST): Somebody said the Darién Gap story was only Laura. So on top of all the news with USAID tonight, I was mentioning in my monologue how the NGOs are directly tied to USAID because they’re getting their funding through USAID. Well, as many of you know, I’m close with President Trump. I do not work for President Trump. But when I traveled to the Darién Gap last year, and, of course, we crowdfunded all the expenses for that trip here on Loomer Unleashed, I went to the Darién Gap migrant camps, and I uncovered a lot of fraud and a lot of illegal activity by NGOs, including groups like HIAS, that were giving maps to illegal alien invaders who were coming into our country. And these videos ended up going viral.
And believe it or not, President Trump actually called me one day, during the last election season, and was asking me about the Darién Gap, and he was asking me about my videos and my trip to Panama. And I told the president, I said, “I really think that, in your second administration, you should make it a policy position to take back the Panama Canal.” And he was like, “Oh, well, you know, what makes you say that?” And I explained to him the CCP interference and how the CCP has an enormous presence in the Canal Zone and how they are facilitating illegal immigration, and that’s why we have such an influx of Chinese invaders coming into our country. You see they’re coming in through the Mexican border, but they’re getting to the Mexican border through the Darién Gap, and then they’re making their way up through Costa Rica through these buses.
And long story short, President Trump took my advice, and now you see President Trump calling for the United States to take back the canal. Senator Marco Rubio, who is now the secretary of state, has traveled to Panama and the Darién — and the Panama to have discussions about taking back the Panama Canal. And now President Trump yesterday signed an executive memo calling for an audit of all NGOs. And so it’s really amazing because you’re going to see groups like HIAS now get audited.
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And I received a phone call from President Trump who said that he was going to be looking into it and wanted my input on this. He wanted my input on the issue of the Panama Canal, and he wanted my input on the issue of the illegal alien invasion taking place in the Darién Gap and Panama. And so I’m proud that I have had several conversations with President Trump and also Marco Rubio and other officials in the Trump administration about these NGOs and about the activities in Panama. And so I was very excited yesterday to see President Trump sign this executive memo, calling for all of the NGOs to be audited. So this is really incredible and it’s exciting.
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And I’ve been told directly by people who work for President Trump that my videos have played a massive role in opening President Trump’s eyes to NGO corruption and the chaos that is happening down in the Panama Canal Zone.
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09/12/24
01/06/25
09/13/24
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Donald Trump’s ambitious demand that the United States regain control of the Panama Canal would be “a mess” for the country, according to the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board, which added that it is just the latest example of the incoming president’s “bully tactic diplomacy.”
Trump’s “America First” agenda was on full display during a disjointed news conference Tuesday at his Mar-a-Lago golf resort, where he turned heads for again repeating his desire for the U.S. to acquire Canada, Panama and Greenland.
But the trick to deciphering Trump’s remarks “is figuring out when Mr. Trump is trolling and when he means it,” the Journal’s conservative editorial board wrote Wednesday.
“A Greenland deal has potential if he’s artful. Panama would be a mess, and his Canada trolling could hurt the Conservatives,” according to the board. “Mr. Trump often prefers to talk tough, but using the bully pulpit to bully America’s friends is no help against the real bad guys.”
Trump told reporters Tuesday that “the Panama Canal is vital to our country,” adding that it was “a big mistake” for the U.S. to sign over the canal in a treaty under former President Jimmy Carter. But his tough talk on Panama seemed to be a bridge too far for the board, which noted that the president-elect refused to take using military force off the table.
“If he means that, he’s asking for trouble,” the board wrote in their op-ed. “It would turn an ally in the Western Hemisphere into an adversary. Does he want a forever guerrilla war?”
The Journal’s editorial board suggested that Trump’s threats may be aimed at a deal on canal fees “or maybe the Panamanian ports managed by a Hong Kong entity.”
“But he’s simply making it up that Chinese soldiers are running the canal,” the board wrote in a fact check of Trump’s claims the canal is being operated by Chinese soldiers.
They concluded that Trump – who famously penned “The Art of the Deal” with ghostwriter Tony Schwartz – would benefit from a piece of his advice.
“One possible option might be a defense free association compact with Greenland, similar to U.S. arrangements with Pacific island states,” the board wrote. “The subtle art of persuasion would be required.”
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Mossack Fonseca panama papers
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William Ingraham Koch lives five blocks away from President Donald Trump’s…
no lnx
IRS abruptly stopped criminal investigation of Mar-a-Lago member accused of massive tax fraud months after Trump took office
IRS abruptly stopped criminal investigation of Mar-a-Lago member accused of massive tax fraud months after Trump took office
written by David Cay Johnson June 6, 2019
William Ingraham Koch lives five blocks away from President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, where he is a member. The only one of the four billionaire Koch brothers to support Trump, Bill Koch…
David Cay Johnston
William Ingraham Koch lives five blocks away from President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, where he is a member. The only one of the four billionaire Koch brothers to support Trump, Bill Koch even hosted a Trump campaign fundraiser at his Cape Cod vacation home in August 2016. Co-chairs were asked to donate or raise $100,000 for the event; simply attending cost $2,700.
Atop the invitation to Koch’s home? Trump Finance Chairman Steven T. Mnuchin, now Treasury Secretary of the United States, whose duties include overseeing the Internal Revenue Service.
In part one of the Koch Papers, we revealed that Bill Koch has enjoyed hundreds of millions of dollars of untaxed profits from his carbon-based businesses, having shifted profits earned in the United States to a subsidiary in the Bahamas. A 2016 whistleblower complaint prompted an IRS criminal investigation, but the IRS halted all communication with the whistleblower’s attorneys shortly after Trump became president.
In part two, we’ll explore how Koch’s businesses withheld critical documents, stymying IRS auditors. We’ll also publish the contents of the June 2017 email that signaled the IRS had stopped pursuing the complaint against Koch’s businesses, five months after Trump took office.
These documents are among nearly a thousand pages obtained by DCReport@RawStory, which we refer to as the Koch Papers.
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pro pub 619
ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom based in New York. Sign up for ProPublica’s Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox as soon as they are published.
The owners of a 70-story Panama City hotel tower formerly managed by President Donald Trump’s companies are accusing them of stiffing the Panamanian government.
In a legal filing Monday in an ongoing lawsuit in Manhattan federal court, private equity manager Orestes Fintiklis and the company he leads, Ithaca Capital Partners, claimed that two Trump companies failed to pay Panamanian taxes equal to 12.5% of the management fees they drew from the hotel.
The Trump entities were allegedly supposed to withhold those fees in advance and pay them to the government regardless of whether the property was profitable or not. Instead, the Trump companies simply kept the money, the suit claims, “thus intentionally evading taxes.” That and other financial irregularities exposed Fintiklis and the companies he represents “to millions of dollars in liability,” according to the suit, which also claims Trump companies sought to cover up their actions. The filing does not say whether a tax penalty has been levied by Panamanian authorities.
Fintiklis declined to comment...
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http://www.ecowatch.com/pulitzer-prize-storm-lake-times-2355740850.html
In addition, an international collaboration between McClatchy, the Miami Herald and the International Consortion of Investigative Journalists that resulted in the landmark Panama Papers investigation into offshore tax havens was awarded the prize for Explanatory Reporting.
The Guardian listed [no linl] the wide-ranging ramifications of the revelations contained in the Panama Papers:
Iceland's prime minister Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson wasforced to quit after it emerged that his family had sheltered cash offshore. There were demonstrations in Argentina and a small war in Azerbaijan, initiated—some believed—to distract from revelations concerning the president and his daughters.
In China, censors blocked the words "Panama Papers" and jammed the website of the Guardian. In Russia, aides to Vladimir Putin fumed about a western "spy" conspiracy after it emerged that Putin's oldest friend, the cellist Sergei Roldugin, had about $2bn flowing into a network of British Virgin Islands companies.
The founders of the Panamanian law firm, Jürgen Mossack and Ramón Fonseca, were arrested in February. They are currently in jail on suspicion of money laundering following a coordinated swoop by prosecutors across Latin America.
ALEC Touted "Transparency" in Pushing for the Panama Free Trade Agreement
By Jessica Mason — An unprecedented leak of millions of documents has revealed how some of the world's most powerful figures hide their wealth from taxation and public scrutiny.
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