Hello from D.C. I’m here to see the cherry blossoms and take in the monuments. Such a beautiful time of year in our nation’s capital. And yes, fine, I may go to dinner at the Institute of Peace. It was the only place with an open reservation! How would you feel if your date nights kept the lights on at Puck? Don’t worry, loyal readers, I’ll stick some filet in my purse to bring back to you.
Some quick housekeeping before the news: Suzy’s podcast has launched, since I guess there can’t be more than two consecutive months where a member of the Weiss family isn’t commandeering a microphone to tell everyone their thoughts on Ozempic. Suzy’s podcast, I’m told, is about pop culture. It’s called Second Thought and you can watch it here, or follow it here, or if you’re really old-fashioned, read the transcripts here. Now, to the news.
→ Scammers getting scammed: The Trump men have a cryptocurrency venture called World Liberty Financial. For legal reasons I cannot describe it as a scam, so I’ll describe it as a spram. A yam-sc. And now one of its largest backers is suing the group, alleging that they took his money and won’t give it back. From CBS News, a great website:
Cryptocurrency billionaire Justin Sun is suing World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture co-founded by President Donald Trump and his sons, alleging the company illegally blocked him from selling digital tokens worth up to $1 billion.
Justin Sun is also the largest holder of $TRUMP coins, another Trump-backed crypto token. He’s in deep, kids. But for whatever reason, Justin Sun decided to try to see if this fake crypto bank could be a real money bank. And when he reached into the influence-payment pot to pull out cash, did he find any? Well. He says he did not. How much liberty does World Liberty Financial really offer? It’s not a bank, Justin, it’s a DeFi platform, which means money goes in but no money comes out. Like a piggy bank that’s run by the president’s sons and that you’re never going to see again. I don’t know what you were buying with all these investments—I try not to have impure thoughts—but I hope it was worth it. When you put a billion dollars into something called World Liberty Financial or wire money to a thing called $TRUMP, you can probably get off death row. You can probably do one free spouse murder if she is over 50 and going for a Pamela Anderson Makeup-Free look, but she’s not Pamela Anderson. Certainly you can do three full tax returns of financial crimes. But you cannot, under any circumstances, get your money back.
