ICYMI: Murphy Details Unprecedented Corruption of Trump White House Over the Last 500 Days
Press (Murphy)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 23, 2026
CONTACT
Deni Kamper
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
MURPHY DETAILS UNPRECEDENTED CORRUPTION OF TRUMP WHITE HOUSE OVER THE LAST 500 DAYS
Watch Murphy’s Full Remarks Here
WASHINGTON–U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) spoke on the floor of the U.S. Senate to expose the nuclear-grade corruption and self-dealing that has defined the first 500 days of President Trump’s second term. Following up on previous floor speeches detailing the staggering amount of corruption in Trump’s first six weeks in office and the first 100 days of his second term, Murphy highlighted the most egregious instances of Trump, his family, and members of his administration using their positions of power to enrich themselves and do favors for their billionaire buddies at the expense of American taxpayers.
Senator Murphy: “Over the last year and a half, our president, Donald Trump, has turned the White House into a 24/7 corruption operation. This is a national crisis, and we should start acting like it. The president’s goal is to engage in so much corruption, so much self-enrichment, to hand out so many favors to his friends, his family, and his political allies, that it just becomes the pitter patter of rain. It’s normal. It’s constant. It’s neverending. Trump’s bet is that if there is a new story of corruption, of self-dealing every few days, that the press will stop covering it, or the public will just stop paying attention.
“This moment is exceptional. It’s a one of one moment, and if it becomes normal, if people stop being outraged at what he is doing to enrich himself, then I fear there is no going back. The White House will just become a place to get rich.
“So, I think it’s time to pull back and see the full picture - to not view this as just one isolated scandal after another, every single one popping up each week or every few days, but to understand the full scope of the illegality.”
A video of Murphy’s full remarks is available here. A full transcript of Murphy’s remarks is below:
Colleagues, over the last year and a half, our president Donald Trump has turned the White House into a 24/7 corruption operation. This is a national crisis, and we should start acting like it. The president’s goal is to engage in so much corruption, so much self-enrichment, to hand out so many favors to his friends, his family, and his political allies, that it just becomes the pitter patter of rain. It’s normal. It’s constant. It’s neverending. Trump’s bet is that if there is a new story of corruption, of self-dealing every few days, that the press will stop covering it, or the public will just stop paying attention.
To an extent, he is, tragically, succeeding.
But he also is betting that the public will just come to the conclusion that this is normal, because all of our politics are this corrupt. That every senator, that every previous president is this corrupt. That is not true. While I disagree with my Republican Senate colleagues’ decision to largely remain silent in the face of this misconduct, it is true that not a single senator - on either side of the aisle - engages in the behavior that our President does. Senators - Republican and Democrats do not trade our votes for cash or for political contributions. We don’t run side hustles like crypto companies. Senators don’t give contracts to their kids just because we can.
And no president, in the history of this country, has done what Donald Trump has done. No president has done 5% of the self-dealing that Donald Trump has done in the last year and a half.
This moment is exceptional. It’s a one of one moment, and if it becomes normal, if people stop being outraged at what he is doing to enrich himself, then I fear there is no going back. The White House will just become a place to get rich.
So, I think it’s time to pull back and see the full picture, to not view this as just one isolated scandal after another, every single one popping up each week or every few days, but to understand the full scope of the illegality.
Last year, I came to the floor to document the first 100 days of Donald Trump’s mind-blowing corruption. Since then, especially in 2026, the pace of his misconduct has quickened, dramatically. And so I am here on the floor today, and I’m going to spend more than a few minutes doing this, laying out what has happened since I gave that last speech. This is the story of the last 500 days of corruption.
APRIL 2025
Todd Blanche Shuts Down Crypto Investigations While Holding Up to $500,000 in Crypto Investments – April 7
And, I’m going to start with April 7th, 2025. This is when the current acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, issues a memo ordering the termination of several Biden-era DOJ investigations into crypto companies. Now, here’s the problem: the then Deputy Attorney General is a major investor in crypto companies, and he works for a president who is a major player in the crypto industry, but DOJ just drops these investigations, signals that the Department of Justice is no longer going to hold crypto companies accountable, but Blanche owns major investments in crypto stocks. The president is one of the biggest players in the industry. Blanche doesn’t actually stop there. He eliminates the entire enforcement team at DOJ dedicated to rooting out crypto-related fraud and money-laundering schemes. This is a crypto investor, who works for a President who owns crypto companies, shutting down the unit at DOJ that holds this industry accountable.
On April 30, USDA Reverses Rule that Protects Consumers to Benefit Trump Donor – April 30
Let’s move to three weeks later, on April 30. Later in the month, a curious announcement from the Department of Agriculture - they are reversing a rule that would require poultry companies to limit salmonella bacteria levels in their products – this is essentially a rule to make it less likely that people will get salmonella poisoning.
Sounds like a strange rule to eliminate.
We come to find out that one of the biggest donors to Trump’s inauguration was a poultry company Pilgrims Pride. They made a donation to Trump that was bigger than practically any other company, bigger than Amazon, Meta or Exxon. $5 million. And after they made the donation, they asked for one thing - the reversal of the salmonella rule. And they got it.
This is pay for play. You make a donation to the president or the president’s political operation, you ask for a favor, and you get it. And we will see, as we wind through these 500 days, this happens over and over again.
MAY 2025
Trump Pardons Son of Major Donor Who Pleaded Guilty to Tax Crimes – May 27
In May 2025, the pardon racket starts. Every member of the Senate should be outraged with this one. You all know what has happened. The president is pardoning people based on their ability to pay either him and his political operation or pay people who are close to the president. On May 27, Donald Trump pardons a man called Paul Walczak. This is a really bad guy. He stole millions of dollars from the nurses and healthcare aides at the nursing home he owned and he used the cash he stole from his employees to buy a $2 million yacht. He got convicted. He went to jail for fraud.
BUT…his mother paid $1 million to buy a face to face meeting with Trump, and 3 weeks after that paid audience, her son was given a full and unconditional pardon that went SO FAR as to relieve him of any duty to repay the $4.4 million he stole from his employees.
This is a new pay for pardons scheme that begins in May.
JUNE 2025
Stephen Miller Holds Stock in Company that received $30 Billion ICE Contract – June 24
In June of 2025, it’s revealed that top administration officials are cashing in on government contracts that benefit their own investment portfolios.. Stephen Miller is more than just the architect of the administration’s hardline immigration policies: He has a personal financial stake in them.
For instance, Miller owns up to $250,000 in Palantir stock, and just a month before Miller’s holdings became public, ICE announced that it was awarding a $30 MILLION contract to…you guessed it…Palantir! To provide “real time” surveillance information to ICE officers.
And you’ll be shocked to hear this. There was no competitive bidding process for that contract. And you will hear this over and over again. Competitive bidding basically doesn’t exist if the President or somebody close to the president wants a contract directed to a friend or to a company in which they invest. Miller overseeing ICE. ICE gives a no-bid contract to Palantir. The investors in Palantir, which include Stephen Miller, get rich.
SEPTEMBER 2025
Trump Crypto Coin Sold to Entities with Connections to Iran, Russia, and North Korea – September 18
Let’s move to September of 2025. In September, we start to learn the danger of Trump’s crypto corruption. I covered this in the first 100 days of corruption. This may be the most corrupt thing that Trump is doing. He and his family own a crypto company that issues several crypto coins. There’s no disclosure on who is buying those coins. The president promotes them, invites people to official events to purchase the coin.
On September 18th, though, we come to find out that Trump made $57 million selling crypto tokens to entities associated with the regimes in North Korea, Iran, and Russia - extraordinary investments being made by entities that are tied in with North Korea, Iran, and Russia into Trump’s crypto companies. It begs the question as we are currently debating an Iran deal that basically exists on Iran’s terms, why was there a flood of money from Iranian regime-backed entities into the Trump crypto companies? Why were they putting that investment in? What did they expect to get from the president?
We’ve never, ever before had this exist. We’ve never had a backdoor mechanism by which foreign governments could just shovel money into the pocket of the president. It exists because of the Trumps, Trump’s memecoin and his stablecoin.
Trump Administration Closes FBI Investigation Into Tom Homan – September 23
On September 23rd, this is a week later, it’s now pretty obvious that there is a pay to play regime in charge of the White House. A week later, on September 23, Trump closes the books on a criminal F.B.I. inquiry into one of his key advisors – Tom Homan. This is his border czar. The FBI had caught Tom Homan red handed engaging in naked corruption - undercover agents had handed him 50,000 dollars in cash in a bag and he agreed to give them government contracts. This was on video! This is the border czar getting a bag of cash, in exchange for contracts, on video.
But the administration, on September 20 [23], just makes the investigation go away because that kind of bribery, that kind of naked graft, is ok in this White House.
OCTOBER 2025
Trump pardons Binance founder who helped stand up Trump crypto company - October 7
We’re moving onto October 2025 right now, two weeks after Homan is let off, maybe the most nakedly corrupt pardon. There’s not a single senator that could defend this. Changpeng Zhao built an entire business on allowing terrorists, drug traffickers, and sex predators to use his crypto currency to evade the law. He went to jail for this. But…he also helped Trump launch his own crypto business, so - who cares about financing terrorists and sex criminals - Trump gives this guy a full pardon on October 7. It’s naked. This is a guy who built a company that allowed terrorists and sex predators to engage in private financing.
He went to jail. He got out of jail because he agreed to help Trump get rich.
Trump Hosts White House Dinner, Gives Government Contracts to Ballroom Donors – October 15
We’re still in October. Later that month, the bulldozers arrive to destroy the East Wing of the House - it’s still amazing to think that actually happened - and the Ballroom corruption racket begins. The word goes out, if you want something from Donald Trump, donate to his ballroom, It’s all he cares about. We know that Donald Trump talks about his ballroom all the time.
As of this month, more than half of the publicly identified donors to the ballroom project have, since they made their donation, won a new or expanded federal contract - totaling more than $50 billion. More than half of the people who donated to the ballroom have, since they donated, and this all just kicked off on October 15, this has only been like eight months, half the people who donated to the ballroom have gotten a new or expanded federal contract worth $50 billion.
NOVEMBER 2025
Trump administration directs federal funds towards rare earth mineral start up with direct financial ties to his son – November 4
Moving on to November of 2025. It’s not just Trump’s corporate donors that are getting rich now. Part of the White House’s daily operations is finding creative ways to funnel taxpayer money to Trump’s kids. This one’s wild.
Trump administration in November, early November, announces a really unusual deal: the government, the Pentagon, is taking a $50M stake in a single rare earth minerals company called Vulcan Elements, and giving them a $620M taxpayer funded loan. That’s BIG money. And the Pentagon doesn’t really do deals like this.
But they do when Donald Trump Jr. is one of the company’s key investors. We come to find out the civil servants in the Pentagon did not want to do this deal – only did it because the White House told them to do the deal. One official said:“The call came from the White House: We have to get this done.”
Before the deal, Vulcan was worth $200 million. Donald Trump Jr. made an investment, his father got the Pentagon to give them the contract and buy the stake in the company, and the valuation jumped overnight – $200 million to $2 billion - Don Jr. 10x’d his profits.
I mean how does anybody in this body justify that? You’ve probably not even heard that story. It barely cracked the news. But in normal times, that scandal alone the President’s son making an investment in the company, the federal government then making a massive investment subsequently, the Pentagon didn’t want to do it, only did it because the president told them to do it after his son made the investment and the value of the son’s investment went up by 10 times that scandal alone would take down a presidency. This one barely gets noticed.
Military bases are now selling Trump-branded wine and cider. – November 7
Three days later, news breaks that Trump has ordered all the markets in U.S. Coast Guard bases and facilities to stock his personally branded wine and cider, directly profiting from his control over our military. Tells the Coast Guard, sell my products.
That’s it. That’s not a complicated one. Just ordinary, ho hum corruption. Nobody even knows that that happened or that exists because this all feels normal now.
Trump Pardons Nursing Home Owner Who Pleaded Guilty to Scamming Patients and Employees – Pardon granted November 14, 2025
Seven days later - you feel this right? The pace now is quickening - Trump releases the head of a nursing home empire, Joseph Schwartz from prison. This guy, similar to the other guy, scammed his patients, his employees, and the IRS out of tens of millions of dollars. He was a tax cheat. People died in his facilities due to his negligence. He was just stealing money from his nursing homes. But he paid a million dollars to Trump-connected lobbyists, and Trump pardoned this fraudster after serving three months. There was no claim that he was innocent. There was no claim that the trial was rigged. No, this guy was convicted of massive fraud. He hurt people, and he got out of jail because he paid the right lobbyists who were connected to Trump. This is how it all works.
It’s not just Trump getting rich, it’s not just Trump’s sons getting rich. It’s about everybody connected to the president getting rich. It’s a pardon-for-cash scheme.
DECEMBER 2025
Trump Administration Revokes Nursing Home Staffing Rule After Industry Donates Millions to Trump Super PAC – December 2
Alright we’re into December now. Two weeks later, out of the blue, the Trump administration revokes a Biden-era rule to ensure that nursing homes have sufficient staffing to meet basic standards of care. We have a lot of evidence that understaffed nursing homes have higher mortality rates, but this rule is now rescinded.
And guess what we find out? We find out that nursing home executives got together, paid to have a private lunch with Donald Trump because remember you can pay millions of dollars to Trump-affiliated political entities and you will get a private audience with him.. At lunch, they asked him to revoke the rule. And he immediately ordered it done. No public discussion. No consideration of the merits. The nursing home executives paid the price to get a lunch, they asked for the rule to be rescinded, and the rules got rescinded. No process. Had the lunch. Paid the money. Asked for the rule to be rescinded. Trump called up and the rule was rescinded.
FEBRUARY 2026
Trump threatens to block new bridge after lobbying by owner of competing bridge – February 10
We’re now in 2026. On February 10th, Trump announces that he is – this one’s wild – he announces on February 10th that he is blocking the opening of a bridge - that is ready to open - connecting Detroit to Canada. It’s ready to open. This is a bridge that’s going to help people on both sides of the border. And guess what we find out? The owner of the existing bridge, whose profits would be harmed by the competitor bridge, donated $1 million to get a meeting, this time with Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick. And this isn’t within days this time, within hours of the meeting with the Commerce Secretary, the owners of the existing bridge got what they wanted. Trump announced he would block the opening of the bridge. A million dollars. A meeting. And the donor gets what they want within hours.
MARCH 2026
Corey Lewandowski extorts DHS contractors – March 19
The next month, we start to see that Trump’s inner circle knows that they can get in on the action. Very few people are closer to President Trump than Corey Lewandowski. And he is, at the same, the special advisor to the Department of Homeland Security. And Lewandowski is basically like “There are no rules anymore. I can do whatever I want.” And so he literally starts to engage in mob-style extortion threats to contractors. He demands direct payments from companies that want DHS contracts for his “protection.” “If you pay me money, I will protect your contracts.” And there's plenty of evidence here from the companies themselves that when they refused to pay Lewandowski for “protection”, mob-style “protection”, suddenly their contracts from DHS dry up. A DHS employee confirmed he received direct instructions not to give a company that didn’t pay Lewandowski any more contracts.
APRIL 2026
DOJ Presses USPS to change rules on shipping guns to benefit Don Jr. company – DOJ request sent January 15, USPS proposed amendment published April 2
Another scheme to help Trump’s kids. For almost 100 years, it’s been illegal to ship handguns through the mail because it’s a lot easier for violent criminals to illegally access guns if they could just get those weapons shipped to their front door. But Donald Trump Jr. bought a huge stake in a company that was going to corner the market on the mail-order sale of guns So Trump’s DOJ got to work and declared that this 100-year-old law is magically, all of a sudden, unconstitutional, clearing the way for another company owned or invested in by Donald Jr.’s company to make big bucks by mailing guns.
Traders with inside information make millions betting on oil futures related to Iran war – April 7
We’re still in April. As the war begins in Iran, Trump’s inner circle finds a new way to cash in - they can place bets, on prediction markets or on futures markets, based on their inside information about the war. This is illegal war profiteering.. Hours before Trump announces the first Iran ceasefire, a bunch of investors - likely inside the White House - placed approximately $950 million on bets that oil prices would fall. When later that day, Trump announced the ceasefire that sent oil prices tumbling by 15%, those investors got filthy rich. You can literally look at the pace of trades that day. There’s this avalanche of trades that happen hours before Trump announces the ceasefire. That can only be because people had inside information. This practice would continue to happen over and over and over.
But why do they think they can get away with this? Why does anyone think they can get away with this? So much of this is illegal. Right? You would say to yourself, ‘nobody would engage in that kind of naked illegal practice. Nobody would award contracts to the kids knowing that doesn’t pass legal muster.’
Trump Promises Mass Pardons to Staff Before Leaving Office – April 10
On April 10, you figure out why they think they’re going to get away with it. On April 10, Donald Trump makes an explicit promise that everybody engaged in this corruption will get away with it. Here's his quote on April 10, as the pace of this corruption increases Quote: “I’ll pardon EVERYONE within 200 feet of the White House.”
So now you understand why people think they can get away with it.
Trump inflates secretive, no-bid award for fountain repair from $3.3m to $17m to the same contractor building the White House ballroom. – Reported April 27, contract granted in January
This is reported on April 27. So we’re still in April. Trump wants to get all his friends involved in the grift now. So Trump gives a no-bid $17 million contract to refurbish two fountains near the White House, including the Reflecting Pool. We’re living with the consequences of this corruption right now as we have a green Reflecting Pool. This is a completely unqualified contractor who is already in over his head because he’s involved in the ballroom. And he gets a new $17 million contract.
Does it really cost $17 million to clean up fountains?
The answer, from the National Park Service itself, is no. In fact, the National Park Service was planning to bid that contract out for one-fifth what Trump gave it to his friend for. But it was a no-bid contract. It just went to Donald Trump’s friend! The value was wildly inflated. And so now Trump’s buddy has an extra $14 million - more than the actual cost of the project. It’s your money! Money doesn’t grow on trees. It’s taxpayer money. It’s supposed to cost $3 million; he gave the contract for $17 million.
We’re still in April.
Trump pressures FDA to loosen regulations on flavored vapes after $5 million donation from Big Tobacco – April 30
Big Tobacco has wanted for years to break into the $6 billion flavored vape and e-cigarette market. But the FDA of course has had regulations to say you can’t sort of run back this old playbook of the tobacco companies marketing to kids. So we haven’t allowed them to market these flavored vape products – bubblegum-flavored vape products. I have two teenagers. I know exactly what’s going on. They are marketing these products to kids and they weren’t allowed to do it, but the tobacco lobbyists did the thing that we’ve talked about over and over again. They made a $5 million donation. And if you make a $5 million donation, you get a lunch with the president or a dinner with the president. So they get this lunch with the president and they say to the president, “I want the vape rule to be rescinded.”
Surrounded by these Big Tobacco representatives, President Trump, like at the moment, calls the FDA commissioner and tells them to rescind the regulations. He calls up Dr. Oz – all of this is happening immediately – tells him to rescind the regulations.
The FDA commissioner resigns in protest - he said he in good conscience, he couldn’t do this. He couldn’t be part of this kind of corruption. But, on Friday, the FDA announced it was bypassing all traditional rulemaking to adopt the exact policy the Tobacco executives asked for the weekend before. Less than a week. Less than a week. No rulemaking. FDA Commissioner resigns.
MAY 2026
Undisclosed Corporations with business before DOT Pay for Sean Duffy’s Travel Show – complaint filed May 11
We’re now on to May.
Not all of the stories of the corruption in this White House require deep, journalistic dives into obscure public records. Sometimes you can just log onto YouTube, where you can find the Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy’s family road trip reality show. Who is bankrolling this stunt?Who is paying for the gas, the hotels, the cameras filming his family vacation? Not Duffy.
It’s Toyota. And Boeing. And United Airlines. It’s all the companies that Secretary Duffy is responsible for regulating. Gas prices are going up, transportation costs are going up, and the Secretary of Transportation is riding snowmobiles in Montana paid for by the companies that he regulates.
Decades ago, that scandal alone - companies you regulate paying for your vacations - would have resulted in a Cabinet member resigning in disgrace. My Republican colleagues know this. This didn’t used to be acceptable. But in Trump’s White House, everyone has their hand out for a payday. It’s encouraged.
Trump touts Dell, gives company $10 billion defense contract after buying more than $1 million in Dell stock – Contract announced May 27j
And then finally in May, we discover another monster corruption scheme. The market bets, based on inside information, have not, in fact, been limited to Trump’s staff and friends. The entire time that Trump has been in office, we discover, he has not been putting his money into a blind trust. He has been personally signing off on thousands and thousands of individual trades. No previous president has done this.
Here’s an example of how it works. Early in the year, President Trump buys $1 million of Dell stock. A couple days later, he boosts the company, Dell, that he just bought stock in. A couple months later, he gives Dell a $10 billion defense contract with the Pentagon. That happens over and over again. The President buys stock, he publicly boosts the company, he gives government work.
I know all of this feels exhausting. 500 days of corruption. But we’ve never ever seen this before. I only listed half of the publicly-disclosed incidents of corruption. And we just can’t pretend this is normal. I’m giving a half an hour to this because this is a serious, serious crisis.
The pay-to-play schemes. The pardons for donors. The contracts for friends. The favors for Trump’s children. The use of inside information to make money. This is not a disconnected series of scandals. This is a system.
Government is supposed to serve us. It is supposed to lower costs, supposed to protect our families, strengthen our schools, make life better for people.
But Donald Trump believes that government exists to serve him—to make him richer, to protect his friends, to reward his donors.
That is why he doesn’t have time for you. He doesn’t have time to solve real problems because he’s making money for himself and his friends.
And he’s betting that the corruption will be so constant that we stop hearing it. That the outrage will just turn into exhaustion, and the exhaustion will just turn into acceptance.
We can’t let that happen.
Because once corruption becomes normal, it becomes permanent.
The White House is not a business opportunity. The presidency is not a license to steal from the American people. The government of the United States doesn’t exist to make Donald Trump rich.
It belongs to the American people. And after 500 days of corruption, Democrats and Republicans in this body, along with the American people, should start acting like it. I yield the floor.
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