971
submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Donald Trump's former White House aide is under fire after a video showed him claiming to distribute fake money to homeless people so that they will be arrested when they spend it.

Johnny McEntee, formerly the White House Presidential Personnel Office under the former president, posted a video on TikTok in which he discusses the purported scheme to "clean up the community."

"So I always keep this fake Hollywood money in my car, so when a homeless person asks for money, and I give them like a $5 bill, I feel good about myself, they feel good," said McEntee, also a senior advisor to Project 2025. "And then when they go to use it, they get arrested, so I'm actually helping to clean up the community and get them off the street."

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] [email protected] 280 points 2 months ago

Truly no level these people won't stoop to.

[-] [email protected] 57 points 2 months ago

Conservatives love SWATing

[-] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago

Punching down is like level 0 for them though. But I still agree with you.

[-] boydster 212 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Didn't George Floyd get murdered because he paid with a counterfeit? And assholes like this are proud of it.

[-] [email protected] 121 points 2 months ago

No. George Floyd was murdered because an asshole cop thought he could choke him out with impunity

[-] boydster 92 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

But why were the police even called?

Before the police were called, Martin and his co-workers made two trips to the SUV that Floyd was sitting in outside Cup Foods, trying to get him to come back to the store, Martin said. He recalled telling Floyd and his friends that the bill Floyd had just used was fake, and that his boss wanted to talk to him.

All I'm saying is, the consequences aren't as simple as "some homeless lowlife goes to jail lol" like the guy in the article seems to feel in his heart. Sometimes a counterfeit bill results in a 9- minute long public execution followed months of societal pain.

ETA: Johnny McEntee! That's the asshole's name. Johnny McEntee is the asshole that is trying to get homeless people into situations involving police over counterfeit money. Police that sometimes decide murder is a best path to justice for poor people with counterfeit money legal issus. Fuck that guy.

[-] [email protected] 43 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Well that's what the situation escalated to, yes, but what was the instigating factor. I know cops really don't need one in practice, but usually they at least make one up.

load more comments (7 replies)
[-] [email protected] 72 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

That is some dark shit to do to someone. The hardest hit people, that are usually mentally unstable, being setup. Fuck'd up

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[-] [email protected] 178 points 2 months ago

Alternate headline: Vapid idiot brags about his incessant need to punch down in order to sexually perform

[-] [email protected] 23 points 2 months ago

crimes against fellow Americans

FTFY

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] Lucidlethargy 145 points 2 months ago

So he's a counterfeiter? I'm sorry, isn't that a federal crime?

[-] [email protected] 65 points 2 months ago

Strangely enough, the secret service covers stolen and counterfeit money

load more comments (2 replies)
[-] [email protected] 44 points 2 months ago

The whole thing stinks as schoolboy level revenge fantasy. I doubt there's truth to it.

Prop money has specific laws and guidelines and is very easily identifiable and therefore do not count as counterfeit.

If a $5 bill does find its way in the economy no one gets arrested probably, someone just made a stupid trade. Otherwise half the store owners would be in jail when attempting to deposit money that happens to contain a fake note here and there.

[-] [email protected] 56 points 2 months ago

Manufacturing prop money for movie purposes isn't illegal. Passing it as legal tender IS. Note that passing and creating are 2 separate crimes. Notably even though he is giving it away he has specifically stated that the aim of this scheme is for it to be used for commerce by unwitting victims.

load more comments (12 replies)
[-] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago

I got passed a fake $100 as a pizza delivery driver one time. Some secret service agents came to my store a few days later, and asked me about where I got it. They took the information I had, and continued their investigation to get to the person that made the thing. It was easy to tell them where I got it. That was the only $100 bill I had been handed in weeks.

[-] [email protected] 35 points 2 months ago

Uhm that's why the secret service was notified.

[-] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago

Not everyone knows that the Secret Service also investigates counterfeiting crimes.

[-] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago

You could say it's a secret service of theirs.

load more comments (14 replies)
[-] [email protected] 48 points 2 months ago

Very disgusting. Glad the Secret Service has been notified.

load more comments (2 replies)
[-] [email protected] 36 points 2 months ago

Can anyone eli5 why the Secret Service would have anything to do with this? Up until now, I thought their sole role was protecting POTUS. Do they prosecute money fraud, too?

[-] [email protected] 136 points 2 months ago

The Secret Service was created to investigate counterfeiting. The president stuff came later.

[-] [email protected] 67 points 2 months ago

https://www.secretservice.gov/investigations

Counterfeiting of United States currency, bonds, checks, and other financial obligations and securities. Distributing or passing of counterfeited, forged, or altered U.S. currency and other financial obligations and securities. Criminals sometimes use online forums to sell bulk counterfeited U.S. or foreign currency.

[-] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago

Well their original charter was to investigate counterfeiting. The presidential protection thing was kind of an add-on. But my impression was that the original function was moved to a different agency and the USSS, originally under the treasury department, moved to Homeland Security. So I don’t know why they would have anything to with this. Unless I remembered that wrong.

load more comments (2 replies)
[-] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago

They basically handle counterfeit money cases, so people spending counterfeit money provided by this asshole would have been investigated by the secret service.

load more comments (7 replies)
[-] [email protected] 32 points 2 months ago

How is this different from the assholes that spread these as "tips"?

[-] [email protected] 53 points 2 months ago

Those cannot be reasonably mistaken for real currency. Carefully so, even.

This person allegedly (from his own mouth) intentionally passed off paper convincing enough to be used in films, as real currency, to people with a high likelihood of mental illness, in the express desire to trick them into using it as real currency so that they get arrested.

Who knows if any of this is true, but from the asses' own mouth, that's a world of difference in intent.

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] [email protected] 53 points 2 months ago

The people who pass these out are huge assholes...but do honestly need it explained to you why tricking a homeless person into using fake money so they are arrested is not the same as some religious nutter attempting to trick you into reading their proselytization?

load more comments (6 replies)
[-] [email protected] 31 points 2 months ago

Like the movement it grew out of. trumpism is designed to be cruel. To be Sadistic. To be brutal. To be heartless. It is not a flaw in their thinking. It is a purposely chosen tactic. As it is something that is desired it will never be punished

[-] [email protected] 28 points 2 months ago

The video in question, since links in the article lead to nothing

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] [email protected] 24 points 2 months ago

"So I always keep this fake Hollywood money in my car, so when a homeless person asks for money, and I give them like a $5 bill, I feel good about myself, they feel good," said McEntee, also a senior advisor to Project 2025. "And then when they go to use it, they get arrested, so I'm actually helping to clean up the community and get them off the street."

Wow... What a fucking cartoonishly evil piece of shit...

[-] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago

So another of Trump's sycophants is committing crime that will get him arrested while Trump (who may or may not be behind or endorse the crime) gets away without consequences. How very typical.

And If memory serves, wasn't the secret service originally invented to fight fraud? Either counterfeiting, mail fraud, or something?

load more comments (1 replies)
[-] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago

@Stopthatgirl7 Arseholes hire arseholes… quelle surprise

[-] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago

Arrest this dumb fucker and throw away the key

[-] [email protected] 13 points 2 months ago

Wow who knew that these obvious piece of shit scumbags were obvious piece of shit scumbags. They're a detriment to our society and republicans elect them to positions of power where they can become even larger detriments to our society.

[-] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago

Shows how stupid this guy is. Obviously it isn't illegal for someone to own "Hollywood money" or else he wouldn't admit to owning it himself. If a homeless person gives it to a store and they accept it, that's on them.

It clearly states on the bills "For Motion Picture use Only", doesn't feel right, and isn't the right size.

[-] xmunk 53 points 2 months ago

If a homeless man accepts a Hollywood bill, believes it genuine, and tries to spend it - they're not at fault for most of the currency related laws. Simply handing a homeless person a fake bill with the intent that they believe it is genuine is the super illegal thing. There's a large mens rhea component to most crimes but especially around fraud... the basis of most fraud cases is inequal information: you purposefully don't disclose a significant quality of the goods being transferred.

I hope this shitheel learns thoroughly that the secret service are really fucking serious about their non-bodyguard duty.

(Also, shout out to Warehouse 13 for being a fucking hilarious premise right in this area)

[-] [email protected] 29 points 2 months ago

The person handing them out, passing the fake bills off as real money to the homeless(even as a donation) is the illegal thing. Spending a counterfeit bill without having known it was fake is not illegal in the US afaik, but you can still be arrested for it because the police don't have to believe that you didn't know.

load more comments (5 replies)
load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›
this post was submitted on 13 May 2024
971 points (99.3% liked)

News

21860 readers
3667 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS