The John Bolton PAC will contribute to each campaign for
a collective amount of $50,000

Edited by: JV Staff

Former Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, Ambassador John R. Bolton, announced on Friday the resumption of the John Bolton PAC and the John Bolton Super PAC. He also announced the John Bolton PAC’s endorsement of the following five federal candidates running in 2020: Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado, Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Rep. Adam Kinzinger (IL-16), and Rep. Lee Zeldin (NY-01). Additionally, the John Bolton PAC will contribute $10,000 to each candidate’s primary and general election campaigns for a total of $50,000. Ambassador Bolton has endorsed each of these candidates in previous election cycles. 

“The John Bolton PAC and John Bolton Super PAC seek a strong, clear, and dependable U.S. national security policy, resting on constancy and resolve,” said Ambassador Bolton. “The experience that these incumbent members of Congress have provides them with a remarkable understanding and knowledge of the threats we face from international terrorism and rogue regimes such as Iran and North Korea.” 

Since 2014, the John Bolton PAC has contributed $1,504,500 to 219 federal and state candidates. During this same time, the John Bolton Super PAC has spent $6,183,797 on independent expenditures in support of strong national security policies.

Bolton was allegedly fired on Tuesday by Trump, although Bolton has tweeted that he had resigned.

In reaction to Bolton’s departure from his post, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX),  a member of the Senate’s foreign relations committee, said in a statement, “I sincerely hope his leaving the White House does not mean that the deep-state forces at State and Treasury — who have been fighting tooth and nail to preserve the Obama Iran nuclear deal — have finally convinced the president to go soft on Iran.”

According to a report in Ha’Aretz, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif constantly referred to Bolton as one of the “three B’s” – three people who according to Zarif are pushing Trump towards war with Iran. They are Bolton, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Ha’Aretz also reported that within the Trump administration, Bolton was considered one of the closest people to Netanyahu and to Ron Dermer, the Israeli ambassador to the US who is based in Washington, DC.

Additionally, the paper reported that Bolton shared Netanyahu’s views regarding Iran, and was involved in the recent discussions between Israeli and American officials about some form of “gesture” to the prime minister from the administration ahead of the Israeli election next week.

Senator Bob Menendez, the top Democrat on the foreign relations committee, told reporters Bolton’s firing is emblematic of Trump’s style.

“He wants people who basically are yes-men. I may not have agreed with Ambassador Bolton on a whole host of issues and his bellicose views, but the one thing about him is he obviously presented counterviews at times for his consideration. That’s not something the president wants,” said Menendez.

Bolton was chosen by Trump in March of 2018 to replace H.R. McMaster, a former Army lieutenant general, as national security adviser.

Trump’s first choice for the position, Michael Flynn, also a retired Army lieutenant general, lasted less than a month in the job before being fired. He was subsequently convicted of lying to the FBI about December 2016 conversations with the Russian ambassador to the United States, and he is awaiting sentencing.

Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, was brought into this administration after a stint as a commentator on the Fox News Channel, which is generally supportive of President Trump.

Bolton, who previously had served in three previous Republican presidential administrations, also held roles in the Justice and State departments.

On Wednesday, a federal jury handed down a conviction in the trespassing case of Yujing Zhang, a Chinese businesswoman who lied to Secret Service agents in order to gain access to President Trump’s Florida estate, known as Mar-A-Lago, near Palm Beach. 

By: Terry Spencer

The 33-year-old Shanghai consultant faces up to six years in prison when District Judge Roy Altman sentences her Nov. 22, according to an Associated Press report.  

Acting as her own attorney after dismissing the public defenders assigned to her case in June, Zhang displayed no reaction when the verdict was read aloud in court.  She then spoke calmly with federal marshals, discussing what would happen with her legal papers. She smiled at her standby public defenders and was led back to jail.

The AP reported that prosecutors and Zhang’s standby attorneys declined to comment. Jury forewoman Shelly Hoffman said only, “You heard our verdict.”

Troubles began for Zhang in February of this year when she paid $20,000 to “Charles,” a man she knew only online, to attend a Chinese-American friendship event at Mar-a-Lago on March 30. It included a promised photo with the president or a member of his family, according to evidence in submission. These kinds of meetings are commonplace occurrences at Mar-a-Lago. Trump has owned the exclusive club since 1995 when he purchased the property of a 1920s mansion that was built by Post cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post.

Zhang’s former public defenders believe “Charles” is Charles Lee, a Chinese national who ran the United Nations Chinese Friendship Association, as was reported by the AP.  It is not affiliated with the U.N. He was photographed at least twice with Cindy Yang, a Republican donor and former Florida massage parlor owner who organized Mar-a-Lago events.

By mid-March, texts the Secret Service found on Zhang’s cellphone showed Charles told Zhang the event had been canceled. For the same price she could attend an event with Bill and Hillary Clinton or one with investor Warren Buffett, although a photo with Buffett would cost $40,000 more, testimony showed. Photos with celebrities like the Trumps, the Clintons or Buffett are sometimes used by Chinese business owners for promotion.

Zhang demanded a refund, the text showed. Prosecutors said that showed she understood the event was off.

Still, Zhang flew to the United States on March 28. A limo driver testified that on March 29 he took to Mar-a-Lago a woman prosecutors said was Zhang. The woman told Willy Isidore she planned to visit the club, but he told her that was impossible unless she had an invitation.

The next day, a taxi dropped Zhang off at the Secret Service screening area across from Mar-a-Lago. The president and his family were at the club that weekend, although he was playing golf at his nearby course and Zhang was never near him, according to the AP report.

The AP reported that agent Krystle Kerr testified Zhang said she was there to visit the pool. Mar-a-Lago managers thought she might be the daughter of a member named Zhang and admitted her.

Receptionist Ariela Grumaz testified she immediately spotted Zhang as an outsider. Grumaz said she knows the 500 members and most of their guests and Zhang was taking photos in the lobby, which is prohibited. She also said Zhang was wearing a long, gray evening dress at 1 p.m., which seemed odd. Grumaz said she stopped Zhang as she tried to walk past her into another room. Zhang told her she was there for the U.N. event, but Grumaz knew no such event was scheduled.

Grumaz alerted the Secret Service. Agent Sam Ivanovich testified Zhang told him she was there for a Chinese-American event and showed him an invitation in Mandarin, which he doesn’t speak. He said a search showed Zhang was carrying four cellphones, a laptop and an external hard drive. She told agents she feared they would be stolen if she left them in her hotel room. However, when agents searched her room, they discovered in the open more electronics gear — including a device to detect hidden cameras — $8,000 in cash and numerous credit and debit cards. She faced no espionage charges, however. (AP)

One of the women who has alleged that she was sexually abused by sex offender and pedophile, Jeffrey Epstein, has told the media that she had procured at least 70 underage girls for him to abuse as well.

Edited by: JV Staff

A new report indicates that Epstein became dismissive of this woman when she got pregnant.       

Citing depositions, the UK’s Daily Mail newspaper identified the victim as LM. She allegedly claimed that Epstein (who allegedly took his own life while at the MCC prison in New York City on August 10th) exploited her and used her as a vehicle to abuse other girls. When she became pregnant she claims that she no longer had his attention and that he was no longer interested in her. 

The New York Post reported that in order to persuade her to stay in his employ, Epstein allegedly bought all of the gifts on the victim’s baby shower registry and had them delivered to her house by one of his female drivers, according to the Mail.

Last week the Jewish Voice reported that in the wake of Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide, federal authorities “have refocused their investigation on the more than half-dozen employees, girlfriends and associates whom prosecutors say he relied on to feed his insatiable appetite for girls,” according to the New York Times.

The paper of record’s review of lawsuits, unsealed court records and depositions, and new interviews, offers “disturbing allegations about how this small cadre of women helped Mr. Epstein lure girls into his orbit and managed the logistics of his encounters with them,” it reported. “The urgency of the investigation into Mr. Epstein’s associates was underscored on Tuesday when about two dozen women offered searing accounts of how he had sexually abused them before a packed courtroom in Manhattan. The judge overseeing the case had invited the women to speak at a hearing to dismiss the indictment against Mr. Epstein in light of his death.”

As more details of the private life of Jeffrey Epstein become known, a more cogent picture forms of a man devoted to his physical pleasures. “Video obtained by Fox News, taken during a 2005 police raid of Jeffrey Epstein’s Palm Beach mansion, shows the convicted sex offender’s eccentric and explicit taste in art, which was displayed throughout the house,” Fox reported. “The art included paintings, sculptures, photographs, sketches and posters.”

Inside the home, Fox continued, “the video showed a wall covered in artsy nude photos of men and women, a painting of a nude woman lying on her back and a photo of a topless woman – who appeared to be Epstein’s ex-girlfriend and alleged madam, Ghislaine Maxwell – lying on a sandy beach. Another photo showed a naked young woman lying on a beach.”

Recent weeks have seen many of Epstein’s alleged victims come forth to tell their tales and vent their angry. As the Associated Press recently reported, “One by one, 16 women who say they were sexually abused by Jeffrey Epstein poured out their anger… lashing out at him as a coward and a manipulator, after a judge gave them the day in court they were denied when he killed himself behind bars.”

Jennifer Araoz, who accused the financier of having raped her when she was 15, is quoted by the Associated Press as commenting, “The fact I will never have a chance to face my predator in court eats away at my soul. Even in death, Epstein is trying to hurt me. I had hoped to at last get an apology, but this evil man had no remorse or caring for what he did to anyone.”

Purdue Pharma has reached a deal for up to $12 billion to settle the thousands of lawsuits it faced for the role its notorious painkiller OxyContin played in fueling the opioid epidemic, according to a New York Post report. 

Edited by: JV Staff

Purdue reached the agreement Wednesday with 23 state governments and 2,000 cities and counties that were trying to hold the company accountable for what many saw as a case of putting greed before people’s lives, as was reported in the NY Post. 

Under the settlement, Purdue will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and dissolve, while the Sackler family will relinquish control of the company.

The Sackler family, ranked by Forbes in 2016 as the 19th richest in America, will pay about $3 billion in cash over seven years as part of the settlement, which does not include any acknowledgment of wrongdoing, according to the NY Post report.

 “While our country continues to recover from the carnage left by the Sacklers’ greed, this family is now attempting to evade responsibility and lowball the millions of victims of the opioid crisis,” New York Attorney General Letitia James told the Post.

Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro added, “This apparent settlement is a slap in the face to everyone who has had to bury a loved one due to this family’s destruction and greed.”

Last week the Jewish Voice reported that the Sackler family may be able to retain most of its vast financial treasure trove as part of a newly put forward Purdue settlement agreement.

The family, which earned riches and then opprobrium for marketing the painkiller OxyContin beginning in 1996 through its firm Purdue Pharma, is said to be hammering out a deal that would allow it to keep most of its money.

“Under a novel plan to relinquish control of their company, Purdue Pharma, and resurrect it as a trust whose main purpose would be to combat the opioid epidemic,” The Washington Post has reported, “the Sacklers could raise most, if not all, of their personal share of the $10 billion to $12 billion agreement by selling their international drug conglomerate, Mundipharma, according to the documents and those close to the talks.”

The forward-looking proposed settlement — built on the projected value of drugs not yet on the market — is expected to benefit both sides in the ongoing litigation. According to published reported, in excess of 2,000 municipalities and other parties are involved in various lawsuits.

“Purdue would produce millions of doses of badly needed anti-addiction medication and overdose antidotes for the public, free of charge; the company would also contribute hundreds of millions of dollars in cash and insurance policies that could be worth more; what’s left of the company, including its North Carolina production facility and other assets, would change hands,” the Washington Post added. “Much of the benefit to the public would be funded by the continued sales of the powerful narcotic OxyContin, the abuse of which is blamed for contributing to the prescription opioid crisis that has killed more than 200,000 people since 1999.”

According to preliminary details, the Sacklers and their company would owe between $10 billion and $12 billion. The company be required, as well, to make its oft-abused drug available to patients for free.

“The move to create a “public benefit corporation” to settle a civil action suit is a “novel approach”, according to John Coffee, a law professor and director of the Centre on Corporate Governance at Columbia Law School, who described the idea as a business run by trustees,” reported The Independent.

“The controlling Sackler family would also give up ownership of Purdue Pharma, based in Connecticut, which they have run since the 1950s, and pay $3 billion of their own money towards to the settlement,” noted The Independent, citing published reports in The New York Times. “The family has been blamed for putting profits above health and safety, thereby fueling the opioid crisis. In recent months, they’ve seen a distinct shift in public persona, including being ousted from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York as a large donor in May.”