President Donald Trump called "sad" the arrest of his former adviser Steve Bannon, accused of fraud charges related to a donation fund to build part of the border wall in South Texas, an idea that the president described this Thursday as "inappropriate" and allegedly hiding a fraud scheme.
We build the wall was a donation fund posted on the GoFundMe website that promised to privately help Trump's plans to build a wall on the Mexico border , which this week surpassed the $ 25 million in donations.
According to Forbes magazine, despite distancing himself from his former head of strategy, Trump would have been aware of the campaign and even praised it, according to statements in January 2019 by former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, who was also general advisor of the campaign to build the section of the wall.
[Private organization assures that it began to build a new section of border wall in Texas]
Steve Bannon, former President Donald Trump strategist, in an Aug. 19, 2018 file photo at the White House.FILE - In this Sunday, Aug. 19, 2018, file photo, Steve Bannon, President Donald Trump's former chief strategist, talks during an interview with The Associated Press, in Washington. Bannon has been arrested on charges that he and three others ripped off donors to an online fundraising scheme "We Build The Wall." The charges were contained in an indictment unsealed Thursday, Aug. 20, 2020, in Manhattan federal court. (AP Photo / J. Scott Applewhite, File) AP
And the president's son Donald Trump Jr. publicly called the fundraising project "pretty amazing," according to CNN.
However, this Thursday Trump ignored the campaign. "I don't know anything about that project," he said after learning of Bannon's arrest. He criticized that his former adviser used the campaign to win exhibition.
The man behind the project was Brian Kolfage , an Air Force veteran with three amputations. But his plans appear to have gone beyond fundraising. In addition to the money, he added 3.5 million email addresses of people who support Trump and who are considered sources of donations for conservatives, according to NBC News, the sister network of Noticias Telemundo.
[Trump to celebrate the construction of 200 miles of border wall in Arizona: "COVID-19 is spreading and he will pass through Yuma to receive applause"]
According to former employees and Nevada property, business and public records, Kolfage has repeatedly created GoFundMe campaigns and posted fake news articles on websites that in part sought to collect email addresses of people who could recurrently contribute money.
Kolfage used to organize fundraisers without his name appearing, but the We built the wall campaign had another kind of resonance.
Faced with the difficulties that Trump encountered in obtaining financing for his border wall, with the president even declaring that the construction would be paid for by Mexico, the group behind the campaign vowed to collect money as a volunteer.
A GoFundMe spokesperson told NBC News that all donors would be reimbursed because Kolfage had changed the language mid-campaign , erasing an earlier promise to "refund every penny" if the $ 1 billion goal was not met. Those donors will also be allowed to decline the refund and instead send it to a new charity set up by Kolfage, the spokesperson said.
[Trump transfers hundreds of millions of dollars in military funds to pay for his wall with Mexico]
Kolfage "repeatedly and falsely assured donors that he would not take a peso as salary," said federal prosecutors who filed the indictment.
"In reality, Kolfage, Bannon, Andrew Badolato and Timothy Shea" orchestrated a scheme to defraud hundreds of thousands of donors "and" received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, which they used inconsistently. "
Kolfage pocketed more than $ 350,000 from the We Build The Wall fund , while Bannon used a separate nonprofit under his control to receive more than a million of the donations, federal authorities said.
According to prosecutors, the defendants falsified invoices and made false arrangements with suppliers to conceal illegal money movements.
Kolfage is listed as the founder of We Build The Wall, and Bannon is listed as chairman of the advisory board, on the group's website.
With information from NBC News, Forbes and CNN.