Vigilant News

Eternal Vigilance is the price of liberty.

Jim Jordan

Big Finance’s Role in the Censorship Industrial Complex
Why the U.S. Treasury might be the state’s next major surveillance player.

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Last month, we reported that the office of Ohio congressman and chairman of the Judiciary Committee Jim Jordan sent a letter to Noah Bishoff, the former director of the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).

RELATED – Jim Jordan Obtains Documents Showing Federal Agencies Flagged Transactions of “MAGA” and “Trump” Supporters

The letter requested clarity on why FinCEN had “distributed slides, prepared by a financial institution,” detailing how other private companies could use MCC transaction codes to “detect customers whose transactions may reflect ‘potential active shooters,'” Jordan’s team was requesting responses from Bishoff.

The slide indicated that the “financial company” was vigilantly searching for terms such as “Trump” and “MAGA,” as well as minor arms and sporting goods purchases, and transactions at pawn shops and Cabela’s, in an effort to detect potential “financial threats”.

Jordan’s letter to Bishoff went on:

According to this analysis, FinCEN warned financial institutions of “extremism” indicators that include “transportation charges, such as bus tickets, rental cars, or plane tickets, for travel to areas with no apparent purpose,” or “the purchase of books (including religious texts) and subscriptions to other media containing extremist views.”

As part of their work during the “Twitter Files,” American journalists Matt Taibbi and his colleagues sought snapshots of the company’s denylist algorithms, or the rules the platform was employing to deamplify or remove users. It was evident that they possessed them due to the frequent allusions to them in documents (for instance, a report on the Russian denylist that included Jill Stein and Julian Assange provided one example).

They were unable to locate anything comparable to the photograph that Jordan’s team has just released:

The highlighted portion shows how algorithmic analysis works in financial surveillance.

  • First compile a list of naughty behaviors, in the form of MCC codes for guns, sporting goods, and pawn shops.
  • Then, create rules: $2,500 worth of transactions in the forbidden codes, or a number showing that more than 50% of the customer’s transactions are the wrong kind, might trigger a response.

Matt Taibbi recently commented on Jordan’s findings in a SubStack:

The Committee wasn’t able to specify what the responses were in this instance, but from previous experience covering anti-money-laundering (AML) techniques at banks like HSBC, a good guess would be generation of something like Suspcious Activity Reports, which can lead to a customer being debanked.

If Facebook, Twitter, and Google have already shown a tendency toward wide-scale monitoring of speech and the use of subtle levers to apply pressure on attitudes, financial companies can use records of transactions to penetrate individual behaviors far more deeply. Especially if enhanced by AI, a financial history can give almost any institution an immediate, unpleasantly accurate outline of anyone’s life, habits, and secrets. Worse, they can couple that picture with a powerful disciplinary lever, in the form of the threat of closed accounts or reduced access to payment services or credit. Jordan’s slide is a picture of the birth of the political credit score.

There’s more coming on this, and other articles forthcoming (readers who’ve noticed it’s been quiet around here will soon find out why). While the world falls to pieces over Tucker, Putin, and Ukraine, don’t overlook this horror movie. If banks and the Treasury are playing the same domestic spy game that Twitter and Facebook have been playing with the FBI, tales like the frozen finances of protesting Canadian truckers won’t be novelties for long. As is the case with speech, where huge populations have learned to internalize censorship rules almost overnight, we may soon have to learn the hard way that even though some behaviors aren’t illegal, they can still be punished with great effectiveness, in a Terminator-like world where computers won’t miss anything that moves.

Jim Jordan Obtains Documents Showing Federal Agencies Flagged Transactions of “MAGA” and “Trump” Supporters
Additionally, those who shop at sporting goods stores and those who've purchased bibles are also being tracked.

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Jim Jordan, chairman of the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, announced on Wednesday that the committee had obtained documents revealing that federal agencies have flagged financial transactions for people using politically sensitive words such as “MAGA” and Trump.”

Jordan elaborated in a letter to Noah Bishoff, a former director of FinCEN (Financial Crimes Enforcement Network) and current anti-money laundering (AML) officer at the fintech company Plaid, Inc., on scenarios in which the transactions of American citizens purchasing bibles or sporting goods stores might be flagged.

New documents obtained by the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government reveal that the federal government flagged terms like “MAGA” and “TRUMP” for financial institutions if Americans used those phrases when completing transactions. Individuals who shopped at stores like Cabela’s or Dick’s Sporting Goods, or purchased religious texts like a bible, may also have had their transactions flagged. This kind of pervasive financial surveillance, carried out in coordination with and at the request of federal law enforcement, into Americans’ private transactions is alarming and raises serious concerns about the FBI’s respect for fundamental civil liberties. -Judiciary.house.gov

“The Committee and Select Subcommittee have obtained documents indicating that following January 6, 2021, FinCEN distributed materials to financial institutions that, among other things, outline the ‘typologies’ of various persons of interest and provide financial institutions with suggested search terms and Merchant Category Codes (MCCs) for identifying transactions on behalf of federal law enforcement,” the letter reads.

“These materials included a document recommending the use of generic terms like ‘TRUMP’ and ‘MAGA’ to ‘search Zelle payment messages’ as well as a ‘prior FinCEN analysis’ of ‘Lone Actor/Homegrown Violent Extremism Indicators,” the letter continues. “According to this analysis, FinCEN warned financial institutions of ‘extremism’ indicators that include ‘transportation charges, such as bus tickets, rental cars, or plane tickets, for travel to areas with no apparent purpose,’ or ‘the purchase of books (including religious texts) and subscriptions to other media containing extremist views.’ In other words, FinCEN urged large financial institutions to comb through the private transactions of their customers for suspicious charges on the basis of protected political and religious expression.”

The Committee declared that senior intelligence officials, including Bishoff, are to be interviewed.

Jim Jordan Foreshadows “Big Moments” For GOP Influence and Biden Family Investigations

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Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan claims that there’s been a seismic shift regarding the ongoing federal investigation of President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden.

In an interview, the Ohio Republican suggested “something is up” with the probe because of a new interest in the story by many of the same media outlets that initially dismissed reports of corruption evidence stemming from materials and emails obtained from a laptop he reportedly abandoned at a computer repair store in Delaware in 2019.

“You mentioned those two stories from the Washington Post 10 days ago. I understand they were four minutes apart. One was at 11:00. One was at 11:04. So two eight-page-long stories four minutes apart from the news organization that said 18 months ago there was no story here, this was Russian disinformation,” Jordan said.

“Remember, it started off as, ‘Oh, it wasn’t his laptop.’ Then it was, ‘Well, it was his laptop, but it was Russian disinformation.’ Now it’s, ‘No, it wasn’t Russian disinformation, but Joe had nothing to do with it.’ And now, finally, it is, ‘Well, Joe had something to do with it, but he really didn’t do anything wrong.’ In fact, that’s what his chief of staff, Ron Klain, told us last Sunday on the Sunday shows,” he added.

“It sure looks like Joe Biden was involved,” Jordan continued.  “So, my, how this story has changed. And now, we find out these text messages and emails that link the entire family, not just Hunter and Joe and — but also uncle, the — Joe’s brother, James Biden, is involved in this as well.”

A report from Politico notes how Republicans are in a strong position to regain control of the U.S. House of Representatives, which will give Jordan extreme power.

Politico reported:

The eight-term Ohio Republican is on the brink of leadership-blessed power in a Republican majority, set to wield the Judiciary Committee’s powerful mallet should the GOP flip the House in November, as is likely. Jordan’s ascension will mark a new pinnacle not only for himself but for the pro-Trump Freedom Caucus — empowering its last original co-founder still in Congress to handle impeachments, immigration, and more.

That perch will give him new chances to wage bare-knuckle political combat against Democrats, with the Biden White House already preparing aggressive pushback to nascent House Republican investigations. But it will also give Jordan an opening to embrace his old-school Freedom Caucus self by choosing issues where his cachet with conservative and younger members paired with an off-the-Hill influence can help him move the party in his more Trumpian direction.

And that influence is real: Interviews with nearly a dozen lawmakers underscore that while other House GOP leaders may run afoul of the party’s base, Jordan continues to wield unparalleled sway within it. His cred within the Trump world and conservative media gives him tools to — when and if he wants — undercut the leadership colleagues who’ve elevated him as he backed them from the minority.

In an interview with Politico, Jordan spoke about “four big moments” in 2023 that he thinks a GOP-controlled House will focus on — the debt ceiling, surveillance reform, funding the government, and the farm bill.

“The old line is, the guy who takes you to the Super Bowl gets to coach the game,” Jordan said. “So I think if we win, I think [Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy] is going to be the speaker. Then it’s important we do what we said we were gonna do, and do what the American people elected us to do.”

The Politico report added: “That approach has left Democrats all but ready to throw salt over their shoulder when Jordan draws near, viewing him as the quintessential Donald Trump acolyte. Speaker Nancy Pelosi blocked him from the Jan. 6 committee, and Democrats have contrasted his treatment of Trump probes with his actions during the Benghazi probe to allege that he spreads misinformation.”

“Democrats see Jordan’s remarks at CPAC earlier this year — where he said that GOP investigations would help frame up the 2024 race and that Republicans need to make sure that [Trump] wins another term — as indicative of how he would run the committee,” the report added.

Guess Who’s Back! Charitable Clintons Reopen Their Pay-to-Play “Global Initiative”

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The Clinton machine has been oiled, primed, and is once again ready to start receiving funds, affecting global politics and business, and skimming off exorbitant “administration fees” to feed the beast.

The global exploits of both the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative are the stuff of legends. The murky history of the Clinton Foundation has been well documented in Peter Schweizer’s Clinton Cash,  the former first family’s Global Initiative has been described by longtime aide Doug Band as “a den of favor trading between Clinton Family members and corporate executives”.

The Clinton Global Initiative, according to disgruntled former aides, was created in 2005 as a way to harness the desire of wealthy execs and celebrities to get close to Clinton to “advance the aims of his foundation”.

CGI is not a traditional charity—unlike Clinton’s foundation, it does not dispense money of its own. Instead, it is a series of collaborations with corporations or individuals to solve global problems, anchored by an annual conference that costs $20,000 to attend. From 2005 -2013, CGI secured pledges worth $74 billion. (By comparison, the Gates Foundation has given away $28 billion since its inception in 1994.) According to Band, CGI was the perfect vehicle for Clinton. 

“It allowed him to train his intellect on wonky dilemmas—improving China’s power grid, bolstering Mali’s market for locally produced rice. And it placed him at the center of a matrix of the ultra-wealthy and the ultra-powerful, the kinds of people Clinton has always taken a special pleasure in surrounding himself with.”

According to attorneys during a 2007 plea negotiation on sex offense charges, it was determined that financier Jeffrey Epstein also formed “part of the original group that conceived the Clinton Global Initiative”, though his name was not mentioned in any of the organization’s founding documents. Worth a mention if only so we know what kind of upstanding moral characters are associated with the CGI founding.

In September 2016, it was announced that the Initiative would be winding down to be discontinued and that 74 employees would be let go at the end of the year, and the initiative sort of petered out from there.

Now, the Clinton machine is officially back in action and has restarted its global pay-to-play operation.

Former President Bill Clinton said on Friday:

Back in December of 2018, In December 2018, the House Oversight Subcommittee on Government Operations held a hearing on Capitol Hill on the Clinton Foundation.

The whistleblowers, Lawrence Doyle of DM Income Advisors and John Moynihan of JFM Associates, argued that according to their research, the Clinton Foundation was operating outside of its bounds as a 501c3 non-profit organization and instead operated exactly like the global fund in Geneva, Switzerland by brokering money and pharmaceuticals.

Mr. Moynihan also stated that 60% of the donations going to the Clinton Foundation were used for “administration fees” which is a stark difference from the industry norm of 10-15% for admin fees.

“The investigation clearly demonstrates that the [Clinton] Foundation was not a charitable organization per se, but in pointed fact was a closely held family partnership,” Mr. Doyle said.

Doyle continued, “As such, it was governed in a fashion in which is sought in large measure to advance the personal interests of its principles as detailed within the financial analysis…and further confirmed within the supporting documentation and evidence.”

Congressman Jim Jordan (R-OH) asked the whistleblowers to elaborate on their claims the Clinton Foundation was operating as an agent of a foreign government.

“They were brokering money and they were brokering pharmaceuticals — they were an agent of money through these donors, they would take a vig (fee), broker the money and then they negotiated these relationships with the pharmaceutical companies — by the same token they were brokering the pharmaceuticals and again taking the vig (fee),” 

Mr. Moynihan then explained to Congressman Jordan that the Clinton Foundation became a hybrid of a private foundation and a public charity which they were not approved to do.

In a shocking admission, Mr. Moynihan said, “Our analysis shows that this hybrid modeled the global fund in Geneva, Switzerland.”

The Clinton Foundation was doing all of this and not paying the same taxes as they would had they been operating as a partnership which means they potentially misled the IRS.

Calls Grow among Prominent Figures to Create a New ‘Church Committee’ to Probe FBI Abuses

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Reposted from Just the News

A half century ago, Americans held grave concerns that J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI and other U.S. intelligence agencies had abused civil rights, improperly targeted enemies and illegally gathered evidence, so Congress set out on a great cleansing mission. It formed a special committee chaired by Idaho Sen. Frank Church that laid bare the wrongdoing, overhauled the bureau and created new guardrails to protect civil liberties.

A growing number of influential figures in Washington are arguing it’s time for another Church Committee after a tumultuous six years in which the FBI admitted it misled the FISA court while spying on Donald Trump’s campaign, had executives who lied, doctored evidence or usurped prosecutors’ authority, and employed agents who dropped the ball on a sexual abuse scandal involving Olympians and overcollected evidence in a raid of a former president’s home.

The revelation this week that the bureau secretly paid a Russian businessman as a confidential informant against Trump even though he was suspected of lying and having ties to the Kremlin’s intelligence agencies only accelerated support for a sweeping, independent probe of the FBI now under the control of Director Christopher Wray.

“I think, frankly, it would be great for the FBI,” Kevin Brock, the bureau’s first-ever intelligence chief, said of the notion of a new Church Committee. “They find themselves obviously in a very challenging situation, some of which they brought on themselves, others kind of imposed upon them.

“But they find themselves in a place right now where well over the half the country believes they’re working on behalf of one political party over another,” he said during a wide-ranging interview with the John Solomon Reports podcast this week. “And that can’t stand … the agency can’t survive if that persists.”

Brock, a former assistant director who helped write the rules the FBI currently uses for informants, is a widely respected voice inside the bureau. But many outside it echo his support for a 21st  century Church Committee or something like the 9/11 Commission that investigated the worst terror attacks in American history.

Former House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, who helped unravel the false Russia collusion narrative, said the highly partisan tensions in Washington these days make it hard for a traditional congressional committee to do the sort of oversight it needs, citing examples of how Democrats thwarted his effort to probe FBI failures in the Russia case. He said that reality makes a blue ribbon commission or select committee a better option to investigate and reform the FBI.

“You know, we weren’t really designed to run these types of investigations,” said Nunes, recalling his time on the House Intelligence Committee. “And for so long, the process actually worked. It was relatively bipartisan for the most part. But when you have corruption at that level, it becomes so hard to run these investigations right.

“You have to ultimately have Congress involved doing a real investigation, and I think it’s going to be very, very difficult if you use just the current committee structure that they have.”

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the likely House Judiciary Committee chairman next year if the GOP wins control of Congress, supports the idea of a select committee like the one Church chaired, even if his panel does aggressive oversight on its own.

“I think that that exercise is definitely needed, whether it’s done in a special select kind of committee or a blue ribbon commission,” said Jordan, who himself has been contacted by five FBI whistleblowers in recent months alleging political manipulation of investigations and even crime data. “That’s even maybe with some members outside of Congress.”

“We need to seriously look at how this all has to change in a way that respects the liberties of the American people,” Jordan said, adding he has increasing concerns about the influence that politically “woke” intelligence analysts are having inside the bureau in shaping allegations and investigations.

The Church Committee ultimately assembled some of the biggest names in the Senate, including three members who ran for president. All brought intellectual and political heft from both sides of the aisles in the aftermath of the Watergate scandal and the end of the Hoover era. Figures like Walter Mondale, Howard Baker, Barry Goldwater, John Tower and Gary Hart were able to find consensus, issuing numerous volumes of reports that exposed intelligence death squads and civil liberty violations that included unlawful snooping and spying.

Ultimately, that committee’s greatest contribution was a series of legal reforms that reined in the FBI and governed two generations of agents to color inside the lines after a dark history of past abuses.

“They pointed out a lot of these abuses and from that gave birth the attorney general guidelines, which the FBI still operates under today,” recalled Brock, who joined the FBI in the aftermath of the Church Committee.

The new, post-Church guidelines “in stark terms stipulated how, and when an FBI agent can open up a case against a subject,” Brock explained. “And those were great bumper pads that were put in place. Now the bureau knew, ‘Okay, we can’t go beyond these boundaries. We’re safe as long as we stay inside these boundaries.’ And it worked wonderfully for years.”

Nunes said one reason outside forces are needed to press FBI reform is that its current leader, Wray, hasn’t been willing to make the sweeping changes the public needs to restore trust, even if he has put in place some new reforms of tactics involving, for example, FISA warrants.

“We cannot trust after all this time, that Wray has done one damn thing to clean up this agency,” Nunes said. “In fact, it’s gotten worse. The American people know it’s worse.”

Whatever solution the next Congress chooses, the status quo is not an option, said Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.”We have to find out what is going on in the FBI,” she told the “Just the News, Not Noise” show earlier this week. “I know a lot of people that work with the FBI are good, hard-working people. But there is a political cabal inside the FBI that has to be dealt with. It’s inside the Department of Justice also.”