Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao leaves the U.S. District Court on November 21, 2023 in Seattle, Washington. Zhao pleaded guilty to a money-laundering charge. (Photo by David Ryder/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump has pardoned Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed to ABC News on Thursday.
Zhao pleaded guilty in 2023 to a money laundering charge.
The pardon comes as Zhao made recent moves to boost World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency company that Trump’s sons, Eric and Donald Jr., launched earlier this year.
Leavitt said in a statement that Trump “exercised his constitutional authority by issuing a pardon for Mr. Zhao, who was prosecuted by the Biden Administration in their war on cryptocurrency.”
“In their desire to punish the cryptocurrency industry, the Biden Administration pursued Mr. Zhao despite no allegations of fraud or identifiable victims. The Biden Administration sought to imprison Mr. Zhao for three years, a sentence so outside Sentencing Guidelines that the even the Judge said he had never heard of this in his 30-year career,” Leavitt said in the statement. “These actions by the Biden Administration severely damaged the United States’ reputation as a global leader in technology and innovation. The Biden Administration’s war on crypto is over.”
(WASHINGTON) — Department of Justice officials, citing privilege, did not disclose details on the legal advice given to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem about the decision to continue the deportation of more than 100 Venezuelans to El Salvador in March.
The declarations filed in court Friday are a response to a contempt inquiry initiated by U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg, who is determining whether Noem or anyone else should be referred for potential contempt prosecution.
The court filings Friday were submitted after DOJ lawyers said in a filing last week that Noem directed the deportation flights to continue despite Boasberg’s order to return the planes to the U.S. as he heard a legal challenge to the administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act (AEA) to deport the Venezuelans, whom the Trump administration accused of being gang members.
In her declaration, Noem confirmed she made the decision to continue the transfer of the detainees after receiving legal advice from DOJ leadership and from Joseph Mazarra, the acting general counsel of DHS.
In the filings Friday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, a DOJ official in March who is now a U.S. circuit judge, declined to provide details on the “privileged” legal advice they gave to Noem.
“DOJ has not authorized me to disclose privileged information in this declaration,” Bove said.
Mazarra, in his declaration, said that he analyzed Judge Boasberg’s order that sought to block the deportations and then provided Noem with legal advice.
“DHS had removed these terrorists from the U.S. before this Court issued any order (or oral statement regarding their removal),” Mazarra wrote in the filing Friday.
In a separate filing, DOJ attorneys said it would be “prejudicial and constitutionally improper” to compel testimony from the officials who submitted declarations in advance of a referral for prosecution.
“[The] Court has all the information it needs to make a referral if it believes one to be justified, and further factual inquiry by the Court would raise constitutional and privilege concerns,” the DOJ attorneys stated.
In response to the declarations, Lee Gelernt, the lead attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, which has challenged the AEA deportations in court, told ABC News “the Trump administration is again refusing to cooperate with a federal court.”
In March, the Trump administration invoked the AEA — an 18th-century wartime authority used to remove noncitizens with little-to-no due process — to deport two planeloads of alleged migrant gang members to the CECOT mega-prison in El Salvador by arguing that the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua is a “hybrid criminal state” that is invading the United States.
In a March 15 court hearing, Boasberg issued a temporary restraining order and ordered that the planes carrying the detainees be turned around, but Justice Department attorneys have said his oral instructions directing the flight to be returned were defective, and the deportations proceeded as planned.
Boasberg’s earlier finding that the Trump administration likely acted in contempt was halted for months after an appeals court issued an emergency stay. A federal appeals court last month declined to reinstate Boasberg’s original order, but the ruling allowed him to move forward with his fact-finding inquiry.
U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem speaks during a roundtable discussion in the State Dining Room of the White House on October 08, 2025 in Washington, DC. Trump’s administration held the roundtable to discuss the anti-fascist Antifa movement after signing an executive order designating it as a “domestic terrorist organization”. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Democratic senators are alleging that the Department of Homeland Security potentially violated the Hatch Act by asking airports across the country to play a video featuring DHS Secretary Kristi Noem blaming Democrats for the impacts of the government shutdown.
“This appears to be a flagrant violation of Sec. 715, which states ‘No part of any funds appropriated in this or any other act shall be used by an agency of the executive to branch… for the preparation, distribution or use of any… film presentation designed to support or defeat legislation pending before the Congress, except in presentation to the Congress itself,'” Connecticut Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal wrote in the letter to DHS citing a section from the Anti-Lobbying Act.
The Hatch Act restricts certain political activities by federal employees and by some state, Washington, D.C., and local government workers who are involved or work in federally funded programs. Penalties for violating it include removal from federal employment, suspension without pay, demotion, or blocking a party from federal jobs for up to five years, according to the Office of Special Counsel.
“The law’s purposes are to ensure that federal programs are administered in a nonpartisan fashion, to protect federal employees from political coercion in the workplace, and to ensure that federal employees are advanced based on merit and not based on political affiliation,” according to the U.S. Office of Special Counsel’s website.
In response to ABC News’ request for comment on the call for an investigation, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said “DHS responds to official correspondence through official channels.”
“It is TSA’s top priority to ensure that travelers have the most pleasant, efficient, and safe air travel security experience possible. It is a simple statement of fact that Democrats in Congress refuse to fund the federal government, and because of this, most of our TSA employees are working without pay. It’s unfortunate our workforce has been put in this position due to political gamesmanship. Our hope is that Democrats will soon recognize the importance of opening the government,” she said.
The letter followed a number of airports nationwide declining to play the video, saying their facilities’ policies bar the showing of political content. Some of them also pointed to the Hatch Act.
Among the major airports that declined to show the DHS video are LaGuardia, Newark Liberty, John F. Kennedy, Charlotte Douglas International, Seattle-Tacoma, San Francisco, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta, Chicago O’ Hare, Phoenix International and Colorado Springs.
As of Wednesday afternoon, officials at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport in Michigan and Bismarck Airport in North Dakota said the video was being shown on screens controlled by TSA at the airports and out of their control. Both airports said they were not involved in the decision to play the video. A spokesperson for Detroit Wayne Airport said it has requested that TSA stop playing the video.
The letter to DHS led by Blumenthal and Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed was cosigned by 15 other senators and asks the department to “immediately remove these videos from all TSA checkpoints and cease illegally using federal funds for partisan political messaging.”
The senators also asked DHS to provide information on the funding used to produce the video, including the cost, the approver of the funds, whether anyone from the Trump administration was consulted on the video, and if any outside contractors or organizations were involved in its creation to assess whether any federal laws were violated or funds misused, according to the letter.
A similar letter was sent by Washington Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell, ranking member on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, to the Office of Special Counsel demanding an investigation into the video, adding that the OSC is responsible for enforcing the Hatch Act.
“When viewed in its totality, Secretary Noem’s video can only be reasonably interpreted as a partisan message intended to misleadingly malign the Trump Administration’s political opponents, convince Americans to blame ‘Democrats in Congress’ for the ongoing government shutdown, and influence their future votes — all while omitting the fact that Republicans currently control the White House, U.S. Senate, and U.S. House of Representatives,” Cantwell wrote in the letter.
(WASHINGTON) — Speaker Mike Johnson dismissed the possibility he could change his strategy to end the government shutdown by negotiating legislative changes with Democrats, telling reporters on Tuesday that he doesn’t “have any strategy” to end the impasse in place of the GOP’s lackluster pressure campaign to pass a “clean” continuing resolution.
Johnson on Tuesday pushed Democrats to support the House-passed funding bill and slammed the Democrats’ $1.5 trillion proposal, which extends health care subsidies under the Affordable Care Act and reverses cuts to Medicaid.
against Democrats has so far failed to break the standoff, Johnson reiterated that the House-passed bill is a “clean” continuing resolution — free from legislative gimmicks or political games.
“Why don’t I change my strategy? I don’t have any strategy,” the speaker told reporters. “I’m doing the right thing, the clearly obvious thing, the traditional thing.”
Asked whether he may consider a different negotiation track as the pressure campaign against Democrats has so far failed to break the standoff, Johnson reiterated that the House-passed bill is a “clean” continuing resolution — free from legislative gimmicks or political games.
“Why don’t I change my strategy? I don’t have any strategy,” the speaker told reporters. “I’m doing the right thing, the clearly obvious thing, the traditional thing.”
The Senate is set to vote Tuesday night — its eighth time — on the GOP-backed “clean” continuing resolution that would fund the government. It’s expected to fail again as the shutdown enters its third workweek.
Congressional Democrats representing Maryland and Virginia — where a significant number of federal workers reside — criticized Republicans over the shutdown on Tuesday morning and supported the workers.
“What we have seen happen to our federal employees we will continues to speak out against,” Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, a Maryland Democrat, said. “We want them to know we appreciate them, we appreciate your service to our country, we still need you, we still need what you offer our country and we will continue to work until you can be able to offer it.”
Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland said President Donald Trump and Office of Management and Budget Russ Vought are “viscously” attacking federal employees.
OMB is working on ways to get paychecks to federal law-enforcement officers amid the ongoing shutdown, according to an OMB official. This comes after recent moves to pay members of the military and fund the critical Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children program.
Trump said he’s directing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to use “all available funds” to pay members of the military on Wednesday, Oct. 15 despite the shutdown.
A senior Trump administration official said on Tuesday that the military pay will come from the Department of Defense’s research and development funds — winning approval from Speaker Johnson.
“Look, my understanding of this is they have every right to move the funds around, duly appropriated dollars from Congress to the Department of Defense,” Johnson said Tuesday. “If the Democrats want to go to court and challenge troops being paid, bring it. OK?”
OMB said on its X account on Tuesday that the Trump administration is “making every preparation” to ride out the government shutdown without caving to Democrats’ demands. The agency said they’d continue cutting the federal workforce in the meantime.
“Pay the troops, pay law enforcement, continue the RIFs, and wait,” the post said.
Lawmakers are still in a stalemate with negotiations at a standstill.
“We’re barreling toward one of the longest shutdowns in American history,” Johnson said on Monday.
The record is 35 days and that was set in Trump’s first term.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said during an MSNBC interview Monday that he does not believe the American people will allow the federal government shutdown to proceed much longer because they’ll pressure Republicans to negotiate with Democrats.
Jeffries said Republicans remain unwilling to negotiate over health care as the shutdown continues.
“House Republicans have actually canceled votes for the third consecutive week because they’d rather keep the government shut down than deal with the cost-of-living crisis that exists in the United States of America,” Jeffries said.
