OAN Commentary by: Theodore R. Malloch
Wednesday, April 16, 2025
Where have you heard this name before? John Podesta…
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Most recently Podesta was senior advisor to President Biden for International Climate Policy, a job he took over from the arrogant, super elitist, John Kerry. You saw him pictured lobbying for the Green New Deal and at those fancy, far away COP conferences, playing climate diplomat and czar.
Podesta indeed, has a very long career as a Democrat operative.
He was White House Chief of Staff to Clinton and Counselor to Obama. He had many jobs previously in the Clinton Administration and of course, he Chaired Hillary’s losing 2016 campaign.
You may remember his emails were hacked and exposed which made him look rather idiotic. He was president of the extreme leftist think tank, Center for American Progress (CAP) funded by George Soros, the Open Society Foundations, and labor unions such as the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
Most notably perhaps, if you “follow the money,” as in the movie with that memorable line, Podesta oversaw the disbursement of about $783 billion dollars in clean energy tax credits and incentives which were authorized under the Democrats so-called, Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which in fact had little to nothing to do with inflation—except that it caused more of it.
This story line asks one curious question: how did Podesta get so rich and where did all those funds he distributed actually go?
This government “slush fund” raises serious questions about transparency and accountability. Much of the money apparently went to his cronies that were listed as NGO’s and tax-free charities. But they lacked both sufficient visibility and raise concerns about how the money was spent; on what it was spent; and who and how they got it in the first place.
The massive funding was opaque, to say the least. Bluntly, its effectiveness and integrity are questionable to fraudulent.
Were the funds monitored? Was there any oversight? By whom? Public trust out the window, this huge sum of taxpayer money had almost zero to do with sustainability or clean energy. The cash seemingly went to cronies as payback — and even pay forward.
Example #1 is Stacey Abrams, the leftist Democrat from Georgia who twice ran for Governor and lost convincingly. Her organization got $2 billion in a grant from this fund which was later frozen. This for a social justice organization that went from having $100 in donations to $2 billion in just one day. It had no record or experience in clean energy or technology, whatsoever. Podesta made the award regardless.
Lee Zeldin, Trumps’ EPA Administrator and DOGE need to track all of these IRA funds—all of them, and claw them back. The DOJ needs to subpoena said, John Podesta and others involved and make them testify under oath putting all of them on the hot seat. Shouldn’t Congress have hearings?
Now frankly, it has been a tough year for Mr. Podesta. The 76-year-old has taken the No.1 spot on People with Money’s Top 10 highest paid politicians in the world list with an estimated $96 million in earnings. His actual net worth is now estimated at $275 million. How did that happen, you must be asking.
How did that enormous wealth come to be? Smart insider trading? Property holdings? Sale of luxury homes and expensive belongings? Lucrative endorsement deals? Restaurant ownership? A football team? All of those and more. Even a top-selling perfume with the name—With Love from John, and his own private brand of vodka, all putting money in the political hack’s pockets. Any graft or kickbacks?
The textbook definition of cronyism is a specific form of in-group favoritism, the spoils system practice of partiality in awarding jobs, contracts, and other advantages to friends or colleagues, especially in politics and between politicians and supportive organizations.
It appears Podesta may be one of the biggest cronyists of all time.
He excels at payola.
(Views expressed by guest commentators may not reflect the views of OAN or its affiliates.)
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THEODORE ROOSEVELT MALLOCH, scholar-diplomat-strategist, was a professor at Yale and Oxford. He was to be Trump’s ambassador to the EU but was made Persona Non Grata by that body. The only American with that credit. His memoir, Davos Aspen & Yale is a best seller.
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