Trump commutes 7-year sentence of PE leader David Gentile who defrauded people of $1.6B

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In 2015 and 2016, the defendants, with their co-conspirators, used fraudulent, back-dated “performance guarantees” to artificially inflate the income of Holdings I and GPB AP. The performance guarantees were executed by GPB operating partner Jeffrey Lash for certain dealerships owned by the funds and falsely represented that Lash had agreed to cover a shortfall in profits at the dealerships. In or about March 2015, at the direction of the defendants, Lash executed two performance guarantees falsely representing that he had agreed to cover a shortfall in profits at two dealerships owned by Holdings I for audit year 2014. In April 2016, the defendants and Lash executed another fraudulent performance guarantee for a dealership owned by GPB AP for audit year 2015. Gentile then routed funds from another GPB-owned fund through Lash’s accounts to create the appearance that the performance guarantee had been paid. Holdings I and GPB AP booked the fraudulent performance guarantees in their audited financial statements, artificially inflating the funds’ returns as presented to investors for 2014 and 2015 respectively. After fraudulently inflating their audited financial statements, the GPB Funds raised approximately $1 billion from investors.

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Between approximately August 2015 and December 2018, the defendants also misrepresented the source of the monthly distributions paid to investors.  Specifically, the defendants represented to investors and prospective investors that GPB would pay monthly distributions from income generated by portfolio companies when in fact they used investor capital to cover a significant share of the distributions paid by the GPB Funds.  At the direction of the defendants, the GPB Funds used approximately $100 million in investor capital to cover distributions to investors and maintain the Funds’ distribution rates.   

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Lash, the defendants’ co-conspirator, pleaded guilty to wire fraud in 2023 and will be sentenced at a later date.

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Really? Trump is getting paid millions for pardons.

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one day in the future this administration will rightly be known as the worst global racketeering scheme ever devised and executed.

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All the while being cheered on by people who have been brainwashed into victimhood

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Ok, now this is funny

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That's an easy cop out; Republicans overwhelmingly supported Trump as the Republican nominee.

Now, you're welcome to defend Trump against them all, but only defending him against a hypothetical Harris presidency is disingenuous at best.

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They sprinted to Trump in the primaries first.

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You don't get to ignore that in order to pretend that Trump was always the only option.

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Republicans, en masse, felt victimized in the culture wars and chose the loud mouthed strongman to be their champion.

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When I talk about MAGA, I'm talking about his core base of what I would say is 25-30% of the electorate.

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MAGA has absolutely joined the victimhood olympics, and their grievances are legion. But you know that already.

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With that said, to play ball, here's one specific example: they will tell you, repeatedly, that Christians are by far the most persecuted group in this country, and that it's not close.

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