Enron was a much more complex, longer, more wide ranging fraud though. This was just straight up "CEO moves client money to his other company" theft. It's almost staggeringly simple and mundane...
The level of regulatory capture and open corruption in the US today vs 2001 is also incomparable. It's functionally two different countries.
Sam recently said on an interview that he donated just as much to the Republican party using dark money channels. I doubt that's going to save him at this point.
Are there independent records of these donations.
Wouldn't be called dark money if there were. Sure he's a lying sociopath, which is why it would make sense that he did donate to both sides.
https://prospect.org/power/congressmembers-tried-to-stop-sec...
https://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/donor_detail/20...
Enron was arguably better at influencing politics than SBF and FTX which allowed them to run unchecked for far longer.
0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enron#Enron's_influence_on_pol...
What does this mean? Enron donated a ton of soft money and lobbied heavily. They had no shortage of friends in Washington.
Enron collapsed right after the 2000 election and before the 2002 primaries. Their outgoing CEO and chairman of the board was co-chairman of Bush's campaign and a personal friend of Bush Sr. and Dick Cheney. One major reason he was retiring was moving into politics, being mentioned as being on the short list for cabinet appointments (Treasury or Energy).
The chief US economics advisor and the chief US trade representative under W. were Enron advisory board members (well, they had to resign from the board when appointed by W.).
My point is, Enron was well connected.
SBF and the gang aren’t going to be able to con more people, the companies are in bankruptcy now so their books are being poured over, and there’s multiple state and federal investigations ongoing. Presumably the Bahamas has some sort of law enforcement system as well. Just because the US hasn’t descended on the Bahamas with apache helicopters in a month or two doesn’t mean “they got away with it”, people need to stop being so hysterical.
"Tell me you weren't alive in 2001 without telling me that you weren't alive in 2001." Such a rosy depiction of the Bush II years is entirely detached from history.