An account in exchange for a shareholding in the company. This is the deal that Parler allegedly offered to then President Donald Trump to make online paradise for platform rightists and extremists his main social network.
The Trump Organization, which traded on behalf of the president, received an offer of 40% of Parler’s shares if Trump made an account on the platform, although nothing has been finalized, according to documents reviewed by Buzzfeed News and four sources familiar with the deliberations that spoke to the vehicle. Negotiations started sometime last summer and then broke out again in November, after Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, apparently so that he had another online platform to speak with.and profit from) his electoral fraud conspiracy theories. According to Buzzfeed News, it is unclear how much Trump personally participated in these negotiations.
But even if nothing has resulted in the deal, just by entertaining these discussions, the Trump Organization can have serious legal headaches. The whole mess almost certainly goes against anti-bribery laws. It is also triggering flashbacks of when Trump tried to strengthen Microsoft giving the U.S. treasury a share of any TikTok business that it did.
It turns out that when you put a corrupt businessman in charge of a country, he abuses his power to try to make money. Who would say?
According to the vehicle, Trump representatives conspired with Parler to help the platform compete with major social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook. The logic is that if Trump posted his shit on Parler before sharing it on other platforms, Parler served to profit from that exclusivity, while also giving him a direct line to some of his most loyal supporters who had ever been launched. everywhere else online.
G / O Media can receive a commission
Parler presents himself as “the world’s leading platform for freedom of expression”, free from the so-called censorship and oppressive moderation policies of other platforms. Or, at least, it was what it said it was when the platform was still working. It has been down since early January, when Parler was kicked out of Amazon’s web services, as well as Google and Apple’s app stores, for failing to enact meaningful moderation policies that would prevent users from posting the type of content violence that allegedly helped fuel the attack on Capitol Hill last month. While Parler has since found a new web host– Epik, the domain name registrar behind other extremist pits like Gab and the Daily Stormer – the site has remained little more than a bulletin board for a handful of challenging messages from Parler’s administrators and their few chosen right-wing experts.
During a meeting at the White House last year, former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale was the first to suggest that Trump win a stake in the deal with Parler, according to a source familiar with the talks who spoke to the Buzzfeed News. Four sources told the agency that Parscale and Trump’s campaign attorney Alex Cannon met then Parler CEO John Matze and shareholders Dan Bongino and Jeffrey Wernick of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida to discuss a possible deal. According to Parscale, Trump was never present.
“The president was never part of the discussions,” he told BuzzFeed News. “The discussions have never been more substantive. And that was just one of the many things the campaign was looking at to deal with the culture of Silicon Valley cancellation. ”
After the election, the Trump team revisited the idea, according to two people familiar with the matter, but negotiations with Parler soured after pro-Trump insurgents launched a deadly attack on Capitol Hill in an attempt to overturn the election results. Before the deal was broken up, Parler offered Trump Organization a 40% stake in the company, according to a December document reviewed by Buzzfeed News and two sources with direct knowledge of the negotiations. Half of that stake would be forked immediately upon completion of the deal, while the other half would be “distributed in installments over the 24-month period of the agreement”. In return, Trump would agree to post all of his content online on Parler at least four hours before posting anywhere else. Parler also asked Trump to shout Parler whenever he posted on other social media platforms or sent email to his supporters, provided Parler with access to his email lists for promotional purposes, and introduced the company to potential investors or advertisers.
Wernick confirmed in the middle that Parler was in talks with the Trump Organization about installing Trump on the platform, but said the former president was not involved in those discussions. He also contested the Buzzfeed News reports, although he did not elaborate on what information he claimed was inaccurate.
“We talked to several people about the company’s potential stakes in producing certain things,” said Wernick.
Scott Amey, general counsel for the non-partisan watchdog Project on Government Oversight, told the media that the news deserves further scrutiny and “an immediate criminal investigation.”
“While then-President Trump was bragging that the rules of ethics did not apply to him, bribery laws did apply, and the courts held that Trump’s posts on social media constituted official business while he was in office,” he said. it. “His posts were the preferred method for the White House to communicate with the public. If the offer included something of value and Trump planned to post on a social media platform while still in office, it would almost certainly be illegal and he should be held responsible. “
Parler did not immediately respond to Gizmodo’s request for comment.
You certainly didn’t expect Trump’s drama to end now that he left the White House, right? These will probably not be the last under-the-table negotiations that emerged after his tenure, and all we can do is hope that everyone sees the day in court.
[Buzzfeed News]