Summary:


In what may be a first in American history, President Trump just expanded the presidential pardon power to include corporations.

Corporations are artificial legal fictions designed to maximize shareholder wealth. Nonetheless, they can theoretically commit crimes and be indicted for them. According to a 1999 memorandum from the Justice Department, the “important public benefits” of prosecuting corporations include “deterrence on a massive scale,” particularly for “crimes that carry with them a substantial risk of public harm,” such as “financial frauds.”

Such public benefits now fall prey to the whims of the president with his pardon of a cryptocurrency company that smacks of political corruption.

On Friday, Trump issued full and unconditional pardons to four individuals and a related cryptocurrency exchange, BitMEX.

BitMEX solicits and takes orders for trades in derivatives tied to the value of cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin. Last summer, BitMEX entered a guilty plea in a Manhattan federal court for violating the Bank Secrecy Act for having operated without a legitimate anti-money laundering program. Prior to August 2020, customers could register to trade with BitMEX anonymously, providing only verified email addresses. The latest in politics and policy. Direct to your inbox. Sign up for the Opinion newsletter

On Jan. 15, 2025, BitMEX was criminally fined $100 million in connection with its guilty plea, which was on top of $130 million in civil penalties previously imposed by the Commodities Futures Trading Commission. At sentencing, the judge noted that BitMEX, which is incorporated in the Seychelles, had claimed not to operate in the U.S. for several years even though U.S. customers comprised a large share of its business.


    • Snowclone@lemmy.world
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      25 days ago

      They still think he’s going to hunt down and stop all the Democrat run baby sex trafficking pizza kitchens.

      • TooManyFoods@lemmy.world
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        25 days ago

        They think he already has, and the only thing keeping them from popping back up into existence is him sitting on the throne.

      • MyMotherIsAHamster@lemmy.ca
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        25 days ago

        Oh my god, I had managed to completely forget about the pedophile pizzeria shit - tabarnak, there’s just too much crazy to keep track of.

        • fubo@lemmy.world
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          25 days ago

          The conspiracy theory was that child-molesters ran the government. To fix it, they elected child-molesters to run the government.

    • LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world
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      25 days ago

      So Trump starts mining company for Bitcoin as they announced. Then once they have a decent amount they start investing all the gold from Fort Knox into Bitcoin as previously stated by the white House to inflate prices. Then uses the money for illegal bribes with anonymous accounts? Something like that I assume

  • twopi@lemmy.ca
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    25 days ago

    If corporations can receive pardons, then corporations should be able to receive the death penalty.

  • jpreston2005@lemmy.world
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    25 days ago

    The longer this goes on, the more I think about Flying Squid, and think he was right to gtfo of dodge

  • Wilco@lemm.ee
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    25 days ago

    April Fools! Right? RIGHT? It’s an April Fools joke isn’t it?

    Aww fuk.

  • Wispy2891@lemmy.world
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    24 days ago

    I’m 100% sure that no money went to Trump and this is purely his goodwill.

    Because Trump is definitely the guy that would support a foreign company that supposedly doesn’t operate in the USA

  • Formfiller@lemmy.world
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    24 days ago

    They don’t face any consequences anyway…so they’re being pardoned from the consequences they don’t actually face

  • BigMacHole@lemm.ee
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    25 days ago

    That’s how you KNOW Trump cares about the Working Class people! By PARDONING the ENTIRE CORPORATIONS that are LITERALLY killing People!

  • OsrsNeedsF2P@lemmy.ml
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    25 days ago

    The article argues against it, but technically pardoning a corporation makes sense. The corporation as an entity exists to allow people to take more risk and not have the consequences ruin them personally. This is literally what they teach you in business law.

    So sure, it’s stupid and BitMEX is obviously guilty, but from a legal perspective, pardoning a corporation makes sense

    • SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world
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      24 days ago

      It’s the exchange he used for Trump coin, and the one the Argentina president used for his scam coin.

      Also Hawk Tuah coin.

      These scams were all connected via the same digital wallets.

    • Dashi@lemmy.world
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      24 days ago

      Easier to launder money and have illicit money activities through crypto than fossil fuels