Zerohedge

Via Remix News,

Is Poland also looking to cancel elections and persecute the opposition if a candidate unfavorable to the left-liberal establishment wins? 

After authoritarian forces in Romania banned presidential frontrunner Călin Georgescu from the election and subsequently arrested him, such a move could be repeated elsewhere, including in Poland.

“Poland’s Internal Security Agency (ABA) has reportedly been told to contact its Romanian counterpart what materials they used for the constitutional court in Romania to invalidate the election there,” said Stanisław Żaryn, advisor to the President Andrzej Duda, talked about this development ahead of Poland’s May presidential election on the “Otwarta Konserwa” channel.

The ABW is tasked with securing Poland against potential foreign influences during its election period, but this request seems to be doing the exact opposite. 

According to Żaryn, the ABW asked specifically about what documents had been presented to the constitutional court in Romania, which allowed the court to invalidate the elections, reports wPolityce.

“And this is a certain light bulb that goes on for me in this situation, because it looks as if the team at the ABW was preparing how to prepare arguments, documentation, to possibly challenge the election result, because that is how it is interpreted,” he said. 

Żaryn further stated that he has received information that the ABW is specifically looking to block an election result that certain groups would find unfavorable. 

“This information is surprising, because today we should be preparing ourselves first and foremost to realistically assess Russian actions against Poland and counter them, and not to think about how to document or create documentation that will allow for the invalidation of the elections,” Duda’s advisor added.

Duda has already raised concerns in the past about what occurred in Romania. Last month, he questioned whether democratic elections can still be genuinely free if only candidates favored by the EU are able to win.

“Is it so that today elections in individual countries — democratic ones, it would seem — can only be won by those who are accepted in Brussels? I have such an impression, and I don’t like it very much,” he remarked, expressing skepticism over the European Commission’s involvement in both Polish and Romanian affairs.

He expressed unease over reports that prominent European Commission members admitted to influencing the Romanian elections, warning that “you will have to defend the results of elections in Poland if it turns out that someone intends to manipulate these results.”

Duda hinted at the possibility of public demonstrations to protect electoral integrity, suggesting that Poles may need to exercise their constitutional rights to free speech and assembly if they perceive any threats to democratic processes. “Maybe you’ll just have to demonstrate?” he said, warning that similar situations are unfolding across Europe and could destabilize democratic institutions.

Read more here…

Authored by Andrew Korybko via substack,

Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines Romeo Brawner invited India to join the Asian “Squad” while speaking at the latest annual Raisina Dialogue security forum in Delhi. This neologism was reportedly coined by Pentagon officials last spring to refer to the multilateral cooperation between the US, Australia, Japan, and the Philippines. Brawner suggested that India can participate through the sharing of intelligence on their “common enemy” China. Here are five background briefings:

* 16 June 2023: “The US’ Nascent Trilateral Alliance With Japan & The Philippines Will Integrate Into AUKUS+”

* 27 January 2024: “Why’s Russia Letting India Export Jointly Produced Supersonic Missiles To The Philippines?”

* 29 March 2024: “India’s Support Of The Philippines In Its Maritime Dispute With China Isn’t Related To The US”

* 6 May 2024: “The US’ Newly Formed Asian ‘Squad’ Has Strategic Implications For India”

* 18 February 2025: “The Latest Modi-Trump Summit Showcased India’s Multi-Alignment Strategy”

To summarize, the Philippines is becoming the centerpiece of the US’ planned “Pivot (back) to Asia” for more muscularly containing China, which will de facto expand the AUKUS alliance throughout the region. India is a founding member of the Quad alongside the US, Australia, and Japan, but it fiercely safeguards its hard-earned strategic autonomy and won’t subordinate itself to the US like the other two and the Philippines will in spite of its problems with China, which is why it wasn’t included in the “Squad”.

India and China also entered into a rapprochement after their leaders met on the sidelines of October’s BRICS Summit in Kazan, with the US being inadvertently responsible for this process as explained here at the time, yet tensions still remain. Trump’s return to the presidency changed India’s strategic calculations, however, since he’s tough on China and is prioritizing the “Pivot (back) to Asia”. The US’ grand strategic reorientation to that part of Eurasia will give India a larger role in American planning.

Indian policymakers might therefore see value in sharing intelligence on China with their Philippine partner, who’s one of the US’ mutual defense allies, through the “Squad” format. This could even lay the basis for a new “Five Eyes” intelligence-sharing alliance. Further ingratiating India with the Pentagon’s planning vis-à-vis China, so long as India retains its hard-earned strategic autonomy this entire time, might also result in less trade and tariff pressure from Trump or so Indian policymakers might think.

On the flipside, India could risk provoking China and thus further complicating their already difficult rapprochement if Beijing interprets this as signaling Delhi’s impending subordination to Washington, in which case their border tensions could once again worsen and last fall’s progress would be reversed. The bilateral sharing of intelligence with the Philippine would also likely be viewed as provocative by China but it would still be qualitatively different than India’s de facto or formal inclusion in the “Squad”.

Accordingly, one possibility is that India comprehensively ramps up its security cooperation with the Philippines without multilateralizing this through the “Squad”, all while communicating to the US how sensitive this issue is with regards to China. By taking the middle ground in such a way, India can remain in the US’ good graces despite keeping distance between itself and the “Squad”, which would avoid the perception that it’s joining an American-led anti-Chinese alliance at the expense of its sovereignty.

India must nowadays walk a fine line between China and the “Squad” in the context of Trump prioritizing the US’ “Pivot (back) to Asia” due to all that this grand strategic reorientation entails for India’s national security interests. Staying too far away from American-led initiatives could be seen as unfriendly by Washington while moving too close to them could be seen as unfriendly by Beijing. It’ll be tough to strike a balance, but if there’s any country that can successfully multi-align between both, it’s India.

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

President Donald Trump on Sunday said that he is “not joking” about recent talk of him potentially seeking a third term in office, although such a move would likely face significant legal hurdles.

“A lot of people want me to do it,” Trump told NBC News on Sunday morning. “But, I mean, I basically tell them we have a long way to go, you know, it’s very early in the administration.”

When asked about whether he is serious or joking about the third term comments, Trump said, “I’m not joking.”

“It is far too early to think about it,” he said, adding elsewhere in the interview that he is “focused on the current” term in office.

Since taking office, Trump has, on multiple occasions, suggested that he wants to run for a third term, which could pose a legal challenge, because the 22nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution states “no person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice.” That amendment was ratified in 1951 after President Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected four consecutive times. Roosevelt was the only president in U.S. history to be elected to either a third or fourth term.

Days after Trump took office in January, Rep. Andy Ogles (R-Tenn.) proposed an amendment to the Constitution that could allow presidents to be elected for three terms. However, amending the Constitution would require two-thirds of Congress members to vote for its approval, which would then have to be ratified by three-fourths of state Legislatures.

A reporter just asked President Trump about a third term.

Trump: We’ve got a long way to go—almost four years—but despite that, so many people are saying, ‘You’ve got to run again.’ Most importantly, they love the job we’re doing. pic.twitter.com/afAXJiDABD

— Grace Chong, MBI (@gc22gc) March 31, 2025

Explaining why he would want to seek a third term, Trump said that, “You have to start by saying, I have the highest poll numbers of any Republican for the last 100 years.”

“We’re in the high 70s in many polls, in the real polls, and you see that. And, and you know, we’re very popular,” Trump said.

When asked about how he could be elected to a third term, Trump told NBC News there might be ways to do so.

NBC’s Kristen Welker then provided him with a hypothetical situation: “Well, let me throw out one where President Vance would run for office and then would, basically … if he won, at the top of the ticket, would then pass the baton to you.”

In response, Trump said, “Well, that’s one. But there are others, too. There are others.”

“Can you tell me another?” Welker asked Trump. “No,” he said.

The 12th Amendment, which was ratified in 1804, says that “no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.”

Also in the interview, Trump was asked about why he wants to continue to be president, which Welker described is “the toughest job in the country.”

“Well, I like working,” replied Trump, who would be 82 at the end of his current term.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

If you’re looking for motivation to take the ole’ metal detector out on the beach and wander around aimlessly today, we might have it for you.

A coin collection buried for over 50 years is expected to bring in more than $100 million at auction, making it likely the most valuable ever sold. Known as the Traveller Collection, it includes coins from over 100 regions, spanning ancient to modern times, CNN reported last week.

The first sale, run by Numismatica Ars Classica, begins May 20, with auctions continuing over the next three years. Experts say the collection’s hidden past—buried underground for decades—makes it especially rare and remarkable.

According to a press release shared with CNN, the anonymous collector behind the Traveller Collection began buying gold coins after the 1929 Wall Street Crash and developed “a taste for coins with great historical interest, beauty and rarity.” Over time, he amassed around 15,000 coins.

The CNN report says in the 1930s, he and his wife traveled across the Americas and Europe, acquiring rare coins and documenting each purchase. As World War II loomed, they buried the collection in aluminum boxes underground, where it remained hidden for 50 years.

“The collection spans all geographical areas and contains exceptionally rare coins often in a state of preservation never seen in modern times,” the release states. Some coins have never appeared at public auction before.

Among the most notable pieces is a massive 100 ducat gold coin from 1629, minted under Ferdinand III of Habsburg. Weighing 348.5 grams, it’s one of the largest European gold coins ever produced.

The auction will also feature an “exceedingly rare” five-piece Toman set, minted in Tehran and Isfahan during the late 1700s and early 1800s by Agha Mohammad Khan Qajar. Only five complete sets are known to exist, including one housed at Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum.

Arturo Russo, director of Numismatica Ars Classica, called the sale “a landmark in the history of numismatics,” citing the range, rarity, and quality of the coins, along with the collection’s unique backstory.

David Guest, a consultant to the collection, added: “Not only was the quality exceptional but many of the coins before me were of types not known to have been offered for sale in over 80 years and, in some cases, completely unrecorded.”

A new WalletHub study ranks the 100 largest U.S. cities by debt delinquency, using two key metrics: the percentage of delinquent credit tradelines and the percentage of total loan balances delinquent as of Q4 2024. Cities were scored and ranked based on both the number of delinquent accounts and the dollar value of unpaid debt. The findings spotlight regions where consumers are struggling most to keep up with payments, often reflecting deeper economic stressors in those communities.

Laredo, Texas tops the list as the most debt-delinquent city in America, according to WalletHub.

In Q4 2024, 16.01% of all tradelines in Laredo were delinquent—the highest in the country. Even more striking, residents were delinquent on 22.36% of their total loan balances, also the highest nationally. This combination places Laredo at the top of the list with a perfect delinquency score of 100.

The WalletHub study noted that San Bernardino, California ranks second, with 15.98% of its tradelines delinquent and 18.18% of total loan balances unpaid. While its tradeline delinquency rate is nearly identical to Laredo’s, the total debt amount past due is slightly lower, putting it behind Laredo overall. Still, these numbers make San Bernardino one of the most financially distressed cities in the country.

Detroit, Michigan follows closely in third place. About 15.45% of loans and credit lines in Detroit were delinquent, and 18.92% of the city’s total debt was unpaid—the second-highest in terms of overall loan balance delinquency. Despite not being the worst on any single metric, Detroit’s consistently high scores across both measures placed it third overall.

Newark, New Jersey and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania round out the top five. Newark had the second-highest tradeline delinquency rate at 16.00% but slightly lower total loan delinquency at 17.40%. Philadelphia, meanwhile, had a similar tradeline delinquency rate (15.57%) but lower unpaid balances (13.95%), ranking it fifth.

Overall, the most delinquent cities are often older, economically challenged urban centers—many of them in the Rust Belt or South—where residents face a mix of high costs and limited income growth. This study provides a snapshot of where debt stress is most acute, offering insight for policymakers and financial institutions focused on economic stability.

Analyst Chip Lupo commented: “Being delinquent on debt can significantly damage a person’s credit score and make it more difficult to get a credit card, rent apartments, or buy cars and homes in the future. People who miss a loan payment should try to get current as quickly as possible. The good news is that for many types of debt, borrowers have at least 30 days before delinquency gets reported to the credit bureaus.”

“That allows people a little leeway to get the funds together and avoid credit score damage, though the issuer will still likely charge a late fee.”

Thanks for the tip…Chip. 

Authored by Andrew Thornebrooke via The Epoch Times,

The Kremlin is seeking to balance its relationship with the United States alongside its military and economic partnership with communist China, according to a senior Russian official.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexey Overchuk made the remarks during an address on March 27 at the Boao Forum in China’s Hainan Province.

“As to the relationship between Russia, China, and the United States, we should not develop a relationship with one other country at the expense of another and vice versa,” Overchuk said, according to a translation of the comments first reported by Bloomberg.

Overchuk added that Moscow was eager to continue working with Beijing to implement and expand a strategic agreement signed by the two powers back in 2023.

That agreement laid out a comprehensive strategic partnership between China and Russia, bringing the two nations into a de facto alliance. As part of that agreement, Moscow and Beijing have deepened their economic, diplomatic, and military ties, including by increasing their joint military exercises worldwide.

That agreement was also at least partially aimed at undermining U.S. hegemony in international affairs. Just one day before its signing, Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged that China and Russia would create a “multipolar world order” to replace the “rules” of the current U.S.-led international order.

Chinese state-run media said that Overchuk also expressed hope that the strategic partnership would reach new heights in the coming years as the two powers continued to entwine their futures.

Similarly, Overchuk said that Russia had, in large part, been able to resist the power of Western sanctions over its war on Ukraine because of the support of China, which has greatly expanded purchases of Russian energy and other goods to fill the void.

Chinese Vice Premier Ding Xuexiang, a high-ranking official on the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) Politburo Standing Committee, said he had met with Overchuk twice already this year and that the two would continue developing relations between their governments.

Overchuk agreed with that sentiment, saying he would continue to seek ways of expanding cooperation with China.

“There’s a desire on both sides to explore opportunities for expanding those ties because both nations are experiencing outside pressures,” Overchuk said. “And naturally we look for ways of how to cooperate and work together to improve the living standard of people in our countries.”

The comments come as Moscow seeks to reopen economic and diplomatic ties with the new administration in Washington and to discourage American and allied arms shipments to Ukraine.

President Donald Trump has thus far encouraged the rapprochement with Russia, saying that the United States would work towards fully reintegrating Russia into the global economic and diplomatic space.

Moscow’s recalcitrant approach to Trump’s efforts to end the war in Ukraine has dampened those efforts, however, with Trump on one occasion threatening sanctions and tariffs on Russia if the Eurasian power did not comply more fully with cease-fire efforts.

“Based on the fact that Russia is absolutely ‘pounding’ Ukraine on the battlefield right now, I am strongly considering large-scale Banking Sanctions, Sanctions, and Tariffs on Russia until a Cease Fire and final settlement agreement on peace is reached. To Russia and Ukraine, get to the table right now before it is too late. Thank you!!!” Trump wrote on Truth Social on March 7, partially in capital letters.

The Trump administration may nevertheless be open to the idea of a more integrated Russia and China as Washington seeks to bring both powers to the table on other issues, including military spending and nuclear proliferation.

“At some point, when things settle down, I’m going to meet with China, and I’m going to meet with Russia, in particular those two, and I’m going to say ’there’s no reason for us to be spending almost a trillion dollars on the military,’” Trump said last month.

How Washington will manage the increasing cooperation between Moscow and Beijing is an open question. The two powers have increasingly become antagonistic towards the United States in recent years, working directly with communist authorities in North Korea and the Islamist regime in Iran to undermine U.S. interests abroad.

With all of the leftwing vitriol against billionaire Elon Musk over his Department of Government Efficiency initiative, violence targeting his supporters was bound to happen. In a disturbing incident, 70-year-old Christopher Talbot of Meridian was arrested after allegedly striking a counter-demonstrator at a Tesla Takedown protest near a Tesla dealership. According to the Meridian Police Department (MPD), Talbot is said to have hit a 49-year-old man after making an “obscene gesture” toward the victim around 1:00 pm on Sunday.

KBTV: 70-year-old man charged with aggravated assault after allegedly striking a counter-protester with his vehicle outside Tesla dealership in Idaho pic.twitter.com/7Ek8iNIuja

— Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) March 30, 2025

The victim, who was reportedly driving a vehicle with a flag in support of President Donald Trump, had parked when Talbot allegedly assaulted him. KTVB reports that the victim received medical treatment at a nearby hospital and was later released with non-life-threatening injuries. Law enforcement subsequently tracked down Talbot at his home in Meridian, where they took him into custody peacefully. He was then transported to Ada County Jail, where he was charged with a single count of aggravated battery.

The Tesla Takedown protest, consisting of a meager 30 demonstrators, was overshadowed by a counter-protest organized by the Idaho Liberty Dogs, which drew nearly 200 participants, according to KTVB. In a hyperbolic social media post, organizers of the anti-Tesla protest declared, “Elon Musk is destroying our democracy, and he’s using the fortune he built from Tesla to do it. We are taking action at Tesla to stop Musk’s illegal coup,” highlighting the intensity of their opposition to Musk’s initiatives.

The Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) have launched a task force to investigate attacks on Tesla property. In a recent post on X Musk called the attack “domestic terrorism,” which was subsequently echoed by President Trump.

“We have taken additional steps to crack down and coordinate our response. This is domestic terrorism. Those responsible will be pursued, caught, and brought to justice,” Musk wrote.

The Justice Department revealed last week that three people are now confronting “severe accusations” after reportedly employing Molotov cocktails to ignite Tesla vehicles and their associated charging stations.

The charges from the DOJ are as follows:

• One defendant, also armed with a suppressed AR-15 rifle, was arrested after throwing approximately eight Molotov cocktails at a Tesla dealership located in Salem, Oregon.
• Another was arrested in Loveland, Colorado after attempting to light Teslas on fire with Molotov cocktails. The defendant was later found in possession of materials used to produce additional incendiary weapons.
• In Charleston, South Carolina, a third defendant wrote profane messages against President Trump around Tesla charging stations before lighting the charging stations on fire with Molotov cocktails.
• Each defendant faces serious charges carrying a minimum penalty of five years and up to 20 years in prison.

“The days of committing crimes without consequence have ended,” U.S. Attorney General Pamela Bondi said in a statement. “Let this be a warning: if you join this wave of domestic terrorism against Tesla properties, the Department of Justice will put you behind bars.”

Meanwhile – a 61-year-old woman driving a Tesla in Flagstaff, Arizona was boxed in by another driver and beaten while still inside her car – only to bite the assailant.

“I’m just appalled,” she told AZ Family, adding “I didn’t buy my car for a political statement. I bought my car because its really fun to drive. My politics have nothing to do with that. I’m ashamed of our society and what they are doing.”

It shows a green car pulling up next to her Tesla and then swerving in front of it to box it in.

The driver then walks over to the 61-year-old woman in the Tesla and, reportedly, starts hitting her while she’s behind the wheel.

“I started to say, you cut me off what’s your problem, but I didn’t know how much he heard me,” said Susan. “He got out and started to punch me with a closed fist.”

At one point, the victim said she bit the man’s hand. Moments later, the passenger of the green car appears to walk over and pull the attacker away. Finally, they get back in their car and drive off.

Watch:

🚨#BREAKING: Absolutely horrific footage shows 61-year old woman driving her Tesla, being boxed in by another driver, and then being beaten while still inside her car.

The woman was able to fend off the attacker by biting him.

She’s now signed up for a gun safety course. pic.twitter.com/m3G1c7KE84

— Matt Van Swol (@matt_vanswol) March 30, 2025

By Peter Tchir of Academy Securities

The Global Economy As An After School Special

This follows directly from Friday’s Warning, for lack of a better word, which leaned heavily on last weekend’s Be Afraid of Certainty, Not Uncertainty. Since anything can happen between the time this is distributed and “Liberation” Day, it seemed like a good time to take a view from 20,000 feet. Which leads me to discussing After School Specials.

For those who don’t know, the After School Special was a type of TV show. Longer (1 hour) with a bigger budget than a typical show aimed at children. But there was always a message or a moral to the show.

The typical show ran something along the lines of:

• A bad person, or group (bully, extortion, protection, etc.) does something to a good person, or group (generally weaker, awkward, or “loners”).
• Over time the “good” person or group trains, gets organized, or does something to fight back against the bad group or person.
• After an attempt or two, the good people win.
• More often than not, the “bad” people realize that they have been bad, and come to an agreement with the “good” people or even team up and let bygones be bygones. As “phony” as the rest of the plot, this ending always seemed the phoniest of all.

Right now, the trade war looks a lot like this, with a few plot “twists.”

• The U.S. administration believes it has been taken advantage of for years hence it is the good team in this global economic “movie.” The administration is just starting to fight back as the underdog to get even with the bullies/extortionists/protection racketeers.
• The rest of the world sees the U.S. as being the bully, the one upsetting the order, and flaunting traditional rules of engagement. Hence much of the rest of the world views themselves as the good people in the global economic “movie.”

Basically, the global economy (and some of this may apply to the ongoing wars and attempts at peace) is living in an After School Special – though everyone seems to believe they are on the “good” side.

The Problem with “An Eye for an Eye”

In theory an “eye for an eye” makes some sense. You poke out my eye, I poke out your eye. We are all even. We move on. Maybe this is where the concept of “reciprocity” fits in?

The problem is, in the real world, even at the After School Special level of preachiness, you can see how things can get out of control. No one can figure out who took the first eye, so it just keeps going on and on. Sound familiar to the tariff “negotiations” or rationalizations?

• Why did you slap me?
• Because you made fun of my girlfriend.
• Oh, but I said that because you mushed my brother’s ice cream into his face.
• And I’m sure there was a reason to mush the brother’s face in ice cream.
• And on and on and on.

Okay, this sounds juvenile (and it is) but isn’t what we are witnessing on the global economic landscape (and possibly the geopolitical landscape) playing out at least something like this? My guess is that a lot of people are nodding their heads, comfortable in the knowledge that the other side is the “bad” team and they, the “good” team, are merely responding.

While After School Specials typically lasted only an hour, many longer and even bigger budget films were made in the likeness of the After School Special. It just takes longer for the results to play out.

The Karate Kid might be my favorite example.

While it might be a stretch to list Animal House in this genre, I’m going to. First, how can you go wrong with referencing Animal House? Second, it does fit the concept at least a little. Third, and most importantly, how else could I manage to wedge in this quote:

• Bluto: Did you say “over”? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell, no!
• Otter [to Boon]: The Germans?
• Boon: Forget it, he’s rolling.

For some reason, this scene has been playing out a lot in my mind (almost every time I scroll through Twitter, I find myself wondering about when life imitates art). I won’t say any more as it will just get me in trouble, but the “forget it, he’s rolling” resonates as much as the line about the Germans bombing Pearl Harbor.

Time for Serious Business

Sadly, the above is what passes as serious business for me. 

Maybe we will get a reprieve on Liberation Day? Maybe the art of the deal will succeed, and I will be pleasantly surprised this week, and in the weeks ahead as well.

But I’m stuck with my existing mindset:

• The administration has underestimated the intangibles that the U.S. received from the rest of the world – capital flows and aspirational purchases.
• It will take years to build out the capacity to manufacture what the U.S. lost during decades of being de-manufactured. There will be some jobs created to get that build-out going, but with so much uncertainty, that build-out is likely going to take longer to start (and be smaller at the start) than what the U.S. needs.
• The global disruption to supply chains AND leaving much of the world re-thinking how they want to do business with each other is very negative for the global economy.

Finally, and most importantly, from my view, is that even if there is a deal, the actions and words of the past 2 months have set in motion changes that will reverberate for years to come!

This fits into the American Brand and When Jeans Symbolized Freedom risk we’ve been worrying about.

The HOW is affecting the WHAT and will continue to affect the WHAT going forward. This is the biggest change from Trump 1.0 (along with the tactics various countries have adopted this time around, versus Trump 1.0).

As recently as February, we were far more optimistic, and possibly naïve regarding tariffs and policy – The New Trump Tariffs.

We will continue to adapt to policies and our best estimate of their likely results.

Bears Caught Long and the Destruction of Buy the Dippers

On Friday in London, I was able to discuss some reasons why I think equities have another 10% or more downside in the near-term. Bloomberg TV (Academy starts at the 1:14:30 mark).

Bears positioned long risk. The sentiment might be incredibly bearish, but we continue to see dip buyers. Not just in “safe” assets or some of the most popular names, but also in the 3x leveraged Nasdaq 100 and 2x leveraged single stocks! I cannot think of a worse way to be positioned than to be long risk, for some bounce, while really quite pessimistic (sadly this was me as we headed into the weekend, as it seemed prudent to take off negative bets into Friday’s selling, especially after what happened last Monday).

Plus, it is quarter end, and month end, so we might see some rebalancing and even the infamous tape-painting.

But I think until “buy the dip” has been torched (and it is getting there) we will see new lows in risk assets. With major U.S. indices sitting at or near 5-month lows, anyone who didn’t take profits is treading water, at best.

We haven’t seen a true capitulation in a long time (see comments on fund flows earlier in this section and last weekend). Even last August, when VIX spiked over allegations of the yen carry trade unwind, there was no capitulation (buying the dip was the mantra) and even the “gap higher in VIX” was largely a bogus calculation since it didn’t show up in futures trading levels.

We’ve been arguing that you should, for now, begin trading this market like it was the GFC or European Debt Crisis, by selling rips and being net bearish. We think that continues to be the modus operandi until there are real signs of capitulation in equities. Friday had the first hints of capitulation, but that is just likely to bring out the bears (especially bears caught long risk) leading to further downside in the coming days (unless we are pleasantly surprised about deals around Liberation Day).

Crypto

Crypto drifts in and out of the T-Report, and has wormed its way into today’s report. Lately it has behaved more or less like a “risky” asset. It has its own ebbs and flows but seems increasingly tied to stocks. As we have highlighted in the past – crypto has infiltrated the stock market. MSTR is clearly tied to crypto and is in the Nasdaq 100. MSTX and MSTU (2x leveraged MSTR stocks), and some other strategies linked to MSTR, are in people’s equity accounts. The Bitcoin ETFs also reside in people’s equity accounts, which I think links them more than in the past to equities.

While the linkage might be small, I think it has the potential to be like the butterfly flapping its wings in Tokyo triggering rain in NYC. Small flows can impact the broader market and act as a catalyst to larger unwinds. With yet another company (or 2 if you look across the globe) joining the list of companies issuing bonds or equity to buy crypto for their Treasury portfolio, you’d think we’d be higher. Crypto was supported while those entities were engaged in buying crypto, but has sold off since. With Don Jr. touting crypto on social media and a barrage of “governments need to buy crypto” headlines (strategic reserves at the Federal and State level as far as you can see them), you’d think we’d be higher. Yet we aren’t.

Maybe some of the recent actions seem too “circular” to be believable. If you espouse the benefits of crypto, then buy more crypto. Rinse and repeat. Maybe that is wearing thin? Crypto is far from the highs.

Maybe as we face challenges with DOGE, Tariffs, and Peace/War, the ability to convince D.C. that we need to buy crypto is fading? At least until we see major wins across the board? There are wins, no doubt about it, but so far there is a decent amount of controversy, and let’s face it, stocks are down over 10% from their highs.

I’m the most bearish I’ve been on crypto in a long time and think it has the potential to have a GFC type of moment where the interlinked products, leveraged in many cases, create a vicious cycle, where each loss triggers concerns about another product, accelerating losses, rather than bringing in buyers.

Bottom Line

More risk-off. All risky assets will be repriced lower. The U.S. will lead the way lower. Sure, the old adage applies that if the U.S. sneezes, the world gets a cold, but I think the starting points on valuations, capital flows, and the perception of who is “good” versus who is “bad” will hit U.S. assets harder. If we use GDP as a metric for how people perceive the good vs bad then the U.S. has $30 trillion or so on its side, but it is far from clear how the other $80 trillion or so lines up.

Credit will not be spared. The longer the current methodology (and lack of any great deal) plays out, the more people will start discussing whether the recession will be a big “R” or little “r” recession, rather than doubting if we get one. I’m heading rapidly to the big R camp and might start breaking ground on the “D” word.

Rates could go lower in a global risk-off trade, as central banks will have to cut and there will be a flight to safety (in each region) but the inefficiencies of trying to redevelop global trade in months, instead of years, will keep rates (especially at the longer end) more elevated than they should be.

Last week, we highlighted the Nikkei and wondered what people were thinking in Japan as the late eighties ended. I presume they saw the world as their oyster, only to have it yanked away.

After spending the week in Ireland and London, I’ve been thinking about the saying “The Sun Never Sets on the British Empire.” The Empire under Queen Victoria was so vast that it is difficult to fathom.

Things change. And no, I’m not that dire and pessimistic, but I’ve also learned not to take things for granted.

Maybe by the time you read this, some grand bargains will have been struck, making the negative outlook irrelevant or completely wrong. But I’m no longer convinced that any bargains are at the end of this risk-off movement. It could just be the start of the second phase (and we may not even get those bargains).

In any case, this report went from the warm and fuzzy nature of an After School Special, to a dark place, rather quickly. If I’m wrong and markets rip higher (which would be really great) then I will be stuck rivaling Mr. Blutarsky’s GPA of “zero POINT zero.”

It is years too late and alternative and independent media had already done so much work on exposing the reality, including 600+ page books which have been published, but the New York Times on Sunday is out with a lengthy report on The Partnership: The Secret History of America’s Role in the Ukraine War.

Up until very recently, mainstream media gatekeepers wouldn’t so much as admit that a proxy war has been unfolding from the very start of the conflict in Ukraine. This even after the so-called paper of record had earlier in Feb. 2024 acknowledged that the CIA had built 12 “secret spy bases” in Ukraine to wage a shadow war against Russia going back to 2014. 

Again, it comes much too belatedly, but now with Ukrainian forces clearly losing the fight, the Times admits that the prior Biden administration was far more involved in being embedded on a military and intelligence level with Ukraine than was previously made public by official sources.

The report is a deep dive into the “extraordinary partnership of intelligence, strategy, planning and technology” that became Zelensky’s “secret weapon” in countering Russia. It begins by describing that within two months of Putin sending his army across the border, Ukrainian generals in civilians clothes were being secretly whisked away for high-level war planning sessions at US bases in Germany.

“The passengers were top Ukrainian generals,” NY Times describes of men taken by a convoy of unmarked cars from the Ukrainian capital to Western Europe. “Their destination was Clay Kaserne, the headquarters of U.S. Army Europe and Africa in Wiesbaden, Germany. Their mission was to help forge what would become one of the most closely guarded secrets of the war in Ukraine.”

The report makes clear that US commanders were much more inter-woven into Ukrainian operations than known, to the point of ‘shocking’ some NATO allies. In essence many counter-Russia operations happening on Ukraine’s battlefields were simply run from the base in Germany. 

“But a New York Times investigation reveals that America was woven into the war far more intimately and broadly than previously understood,” the report continues. “At critical moments, the partnership was the backbone of Ukrainian military operations that, by U.S. counts, have killed or wounded more than 700,000 Russian soldiers. (Ukraine has put its casualty toll at 435,000.) Side by side in Wiesbaden’s mission command center, American and Ukrainian officers planned Kyiv’s counteroffensives. A vast American intelligence-collection effort both guided big-picture battle strategy and funneled precise targeting information down to Ukrainian soldiers in the field.”

Notably, this is essentially US officials and the NY Times also admitting that the Kremlin has all along been right when it insisted this was never really simply about Moscow vs. Kiev – but that NATO countries have militarized Ukraine and weaponized it against Russia. President Putin and Kremlin officials have been fiercely complaining about US intervention all along, but this was dismissed in the West as merely ‘propaganda’.

Below are some key excerpts from the very lengthy NY Times report, with subheadings and emphasis by ZeroHedge…

* * *

Americans overseeing “kill chain”

One European intelligence chief recalled being taken aback to learn how deeply enmeshed his N.A.T.O. counterparts had become in Ukrainian operations. “They are part of the kill chain now,” he said.

The partnership’s guiding idea was that this close cooperation might allow the Ukrainians to accomplish the unlikeliest of feats — to deliver the invading Russians a crushing blow. 

Biggest battlefield feats were actually the CIA/Pentagon

An early proof of concept was a campaign against one of Russia’s most-feared battle groups, the 58th Combined Arms Army. In mid-2022, using American intelligence and targeting information, the Ukrainians unleashed a rocket barrage at the headquarters of the 58th in the Kherson region, killing generals and staff officers inside. Again and again, the group set up at another location; each time, the Americans found it and the Ukrainians destroyed it.

Farther south, the partners set their sights on the Crimean port of Sevastopol, where the Russian Black Sea Fleet loaded missiles destined for Ukrainian targets onto warships and submarines. At the height of Ukraine’s 2022 counteroffensive, a predawn swarm of maritime drones, with support from the Central Intelligence Agency, attacked the port, damaging several warships and prompting the Russians to begin pulling them back.

Overreach

The Ukrainians sometimes saw the Americans as overbearing and controlling — the prototypical patronizing Americans. The Americans sometimes couldn’t understand why the Ukrainians didn’t simply accept good advice.

Where the Americans focused on measured, achievable objectives, they saw the Ukrainians as constantly grasping for the big win, the bright, shining prize. 

Failed 2023 counteroffensive actually hatched at American HQ

Yet at arguably the pivotal moment of the war — in mid-2023, as the Ukrainians mounted a counteroffensive to build victorious momentum after the first year’s successes — the strategy devised in Wiesbaden fell victim to the fractious internal politics of Ukraine: The president, Volodymyr Zelensky, versus his military chief (and potential electoral rival), and the military chief versus his headstrong subordinate commander. When Mr. Zelensky sided with the subordinate, the Ukrainians poured vast complements of men and resources into a finally futile campaign to recapture the devastated city of Bakhmut. Within months, the entire counteroffensive ended in stillborn failure.

Biden banned clandestine operations in public, while crossing red lines in secret

Time and again, the Biden administration authorized clandestine operations it had previously prohibited. American military advisers were dispatched to Kyiv and later allowed to travel closer to the fighting. Military and C.I.A. officers in Wiesbaden helped plan and support a campaign of Ukrainian strikes in Russian-annexed Crimea. Finally, the military and then the C.I.A. received the green light to enable pinpoint strikes deep inside Russia itself.

In some ways, Ukraine was, on a wider canvas, a rematch in a long history of U.S.-Russia proxy wars — Vietnam in the 1960s, Afghanistan in the 1980s, Syria three decades later.

Task Force Dragon

The defense secretary, Lloyd J. Austin III, and General Milley had put the 18th Airborne in charge of delivering weapons and advising the Ukrainians on how to use them. When President Joseph R. Biden Jr. signed on to the M777s, the Tony Bass Auditorium became a full-fledged headquarters.

A Polish general became General Donahue’s deputy. A British general would manage the logistics hub on the former basketball court. A Canadian would oversee training.

The auditorium basement became what is known as a fusion center, producing intelligence about Russian battlefield positions, movements and intentions. There, according to intelligence officials, officers from the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency were joined by coalition intelligence officers.

The 18th Airborne is known as Dragon Corps; the new operation would be Task Force Dragon. All that was needed to bring the pieces together was the reluctant Ukrainian top command.

Debate over plausible deniability

Soon the Ukrainians, nearly 20 in all — intelligence officers, operational planners, communications and fire-control specialists — began arriving in Wiesbaden. Every morning, officers recalled, the Ukrainians and Americans gathered to survey Russian weapons systems and ground forces and determine the ripest, highest-value targets. The priority lists were then handed over to the intelligence fusion center, where officers analyzed streams of data to pinpoint the targets’ locations.

Inside the U.S. European Command, this process gave rise to a fine but fraught linguistic debate: Given the delicacy of the mission, was it unduly provocative to call targets “targets”?

Some officers thought “targets” was appropriate. Others called them “intel tippers,” because the Russians were often moving and the information would need verification on the ground.

The debate was settled by Maj. Gen. Timothy D. Brown, European Command’s intelligence chief: The locations of Russian forces would be “points of interest.” Intelligence on airborne threats would be “tracks of interest.”

“If you ever get asked the question, ‘Did you pass a target to the Ukrainians?’ you can legitimately not be lying when you say, ‘No, I did not,’” one U.S. official explained.

CIA and assassinations of Russian top officers

The White House also prohibited sharing intelligence on the locations of “strategic” Russian leaders, like the armed forces chief, Gen. Valery Gerasimov. “Imagine how that would be for us if we knew that the Russians helped some other country assassinate our chairman,” another senior U.S. official said. “Like, we’d go to war.” Similarly, Task Force Dragon couldn’t share intelligence that identified the locations of individual Russians.

The way the system worked, Task Force Dragon would tell the Ukrainians where Russians were positioned. But to protect intelligence sources and methods from Russian spies, it would not say how it knew what it knew. 

US operations room directly oversaw HIMARS strikes

Wiesbaden would oversee each HIMARS strike… HIMARS strikes that resulted in 100 or more Russian dead or wounded came almost weekly. Russian forces were left dazed and confused. Their morale plummeted, and with it their will to fight. And as the HIMARS arsenal grew from eight to 38 and the Ukrainian strikers became more proficient, an American official said, the toll rose as much as fivefold.

“We became a small part, maybe not the best part, but a small part, of your system,” General Zabrodskyi explained, adding: “Most states did this over a period of 10 years, 20 years, 30 years. But we were forced to do it in a matter of weeks.”

Together the partners were honing a killing machine.

Below: Editor-in-chief of Russia’s RT reacts to these latest detailed revelations…

New NYT “secret history” of American involvement in Ukraine makes the skin crawl. pic.twitter.com/SaPulmruO0

— Margarita Simonyan (@M_Simonyan) March 30, 2025

Tensions as Ukrainians push to blow past Putin’s red lines

The previous year, the Russians had unwisely placed command posts, ammunition depots and logistics centers within 50 miles of the front lines. But new intelligence showed that the Russians had now moved critical installations beyond HIMARS’ reach. So Generals Cavoli and Aguto recommended the next quantum leap, giving the Ukrainians Army Tactical Missile Systems — missiles, known as ATACMS, that can travel up to 190 miles — to make it harder for Russian forces in Crimea to help defend Melitopol.

ATACMS were a particularly sore subject for the Biden administration. Russia’s military chief, General Gerasimov, had indirectly referred to them the previous May when he warned General Milley that anything that flew 190 miles would be breaching a red line. There was also a question of supply: The Pentagon was already warning that it would not have enough ATACMS if America had to fight its own war.

The message was blunt: Stop asking for ATACMS.

Biden admin kept giving in to Zelensky

Until now, the Ukrainians, with help from the C.I.A. and the U.S. and British navies, had used maritime drones, together with long-range British Storm Shadow and French SCALP missiles, to strike the Black Sea Fleet. Wiesbaden’s contribution was intelligence.

But to prosecute the wider Crimea campaign, the Ukrainians would need far more missiles. They would need hundreds of ATACMS.

At the Pentagon, the old cautions hadn’t melted away. But after General Aguto briefed Mr. Austin on all that Lunar Hail could achieve, an aide recalled, he said: “OK, there’s a really compelling strategic objective here. It isn’t just about striking things.”

Mr. Zelensky would get his long-pined-for ATACMS. Even so, one U.S. official said, “We knew that, in his heart of hearts, he still wanted to do something else, something more.”

Allies clashed over Kursk incursion 

On Aug. 10, the C.I.A. station chief left, too, for a job at headquarters. In the churn of command, General Syrsky made his move — sending troops across the southwest Russian border, into the region of Kursk.

For the Americans, the incursion’s unfolding was a significant breach of trust. It wasn’t just that the Ukrainians had again kept them in the dark; they had secretly crossed a mutually agreed-upon line, taking coalition-supplied equipment into Russian territory encompassed by the ops box, in violation of rules laid down when it was created.

The box had been established to prevent a humanitarian disaster in Kharkiv, not so the Ukrainians could take advantage of it to seize Russian soil. “It wasn’t almost blackmail, it was blackmail,” a senior Pentagon official said.

The Americans could have pulled the plug on the ops box. Yet they knew that to do so, an administration official explained, “could lead to a catastrophe”: Ukrainian soldiers in Kursk would perish unprotected by HIMARS rockets and U.S. intelligence.

US Intel behind attacks on huge Kerch Strait Bridge

Of roughly 100 targets across Crimea, the most coveted was the Kerch Strait Bridge, linking the peninsula to the Russian mainland. Mr. Putin saw the bridge as powerful physical proof of Crimea’s connection to the motherland. Toppling the Russian president’s symbol had, in turn, become the Ukrainian president’s obsession.

It had also been an American red line. In 2022, the Biden administration prohibited helping the Ukrainians target it; even the approaches on the Crimean side were to be treated as sovereign Russian territory. (Ukrainian intelligence services tried attacking it themselves, causing some damage.)

But after the partners agreed on Lunar Hail, the White House authorized the military and C.I.A. to secretly work with the Ukrainians and the British on a blueprint of attack to bring the bridge down: ATACMS would weaken vulnerable points on the deck, while maritime drones would blow up next to its stanchions.

But while the drones were being readied, the Russians hardened their defenses around the stanchions.

Lloyd Austin seen as ‘godfather’ of the secret ops

In early January, Generals Donahue and Cavoli visited Kyiv to meet with General Syrsky and ensure that he agreed on plans to replenish Ukrainian brigades and shore up their lines, the Pentagon official said. From there, they traveled to Ramstein Air Base, where they met Mr. Austin for what would be the final gathering of coalition defense chiefs before everything changed.

With the doors closed to the press and public, Mr. Austin’s counterparts hailed him as the “godfather” and “architect” of the partnership that, for all its broken trust and betrayals, had sustained the Ukrainians’ defiance and hope, begun in earnest on that spring day in 2022 when Generals Donahue and Zabrodskyi first met in Wiesbaden.

Read the full Secret History of America’s Role in the Ukraine War here.

In an explosive interview with The Bureau’s Sam Cooper, David Asher – a former senior U.S. State Department official with close ties to the Trump administration’s financial and national security apparatus—issued a stark warning: Canadian banks could soon face a “new universe” of regulatory scrutiny from the U.S. Treasury. This follows the formal designation of Mexican cartels, including the Sinaloa group, as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs). According to Asher, the command-and-control structure for laundering proceeds from synthetic narcotics—produced using Chinese precursor chemicals—is largely orchestrated by Chinese triads operating out of Canada.

Asher warned that these transnational crime gang nexus seriously threatens both U.S. national security and the stability of the North American financial system. 

Exclusive: Canadian Banks Tied to Chinese Fentanyl Laundering Risk U.S. Treasury Sanctions After Cartel Terror Designation ⁦@StateDept⁩ ⁦@DHSgov⁩ ⁦@USTreasury⁩ ⁦@DEAHQ⁩ https://t.co/DA232SzHyr

— Sam Cooper (@scoopercooper) March 29, 2025

Here’s the interview between Cooper and Asher, which offers a possible road map for the looming legal consequences for Canadian banks as the Trump administration ramps up hemispheric defense and moves to dismantle, once and for all, the command-and-control structures of Mexican cartels and Chinese triads operating through Canadian financial institutions. 

In an explosive, sweeping interview, former senior State Department investigator David Asher—closely connected to the Trump administration’s financial and national security apparatus—warned that Canadian banks could soon face a “new universe” of regulatory scrutiny, including from the U.S. Treasury, due to the recent designation of Mexican cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.

Asher, who contends that the “command” for Western Hemisphere money laundering of synthetic narcotics—including fentanyl, methamphetamine, and ecstasy sourced from Chinese precursors—is “largely run by Chinese triads in Canada,” also argues that this interconnected transnational network presents profound risks to Canadian financial institutions.

Speaking bluntly about the nexus between Chinese Triads and Mexican cartels operating in Canada, Asher said: “Of course, they’re in bed with each other. This is why Tse Chi Lop lived in Toronto… These cartels are now designated as terrorist organizations. That changes everything—how we prosecute them, and what tools we can use.”

Asher, along with Canadian law enforcement experts such as former RCMP intelligence analyst Scott McGregor, believes a rarely discussed Canadian legal barrier—Stinchcombe—must be overcome. They argue Canada could unlock powerful new authorities if it begins treating cartel-connected Chinese money laundering networks as accessories to terrorism.

The rule, derived from the 1991 Supreme Court case R. v. Stinchcombe, requires Canadian law enforcement to disclose nearly all investigative material to the defense. While intended to ensure a fair trial, critics say it severely hampers complex RCMP investigations, especially those relying on wiretaps or sensitive intelligence, and risks blowing the cover of international partners and covert operations.

Asher didn’t mince words: “Every case I worked in Canada… the Stinchcombe thing ended up [inhibiting investigations]—we were targeting phone numbers tied to Canadian money launderers who were Chinese. And they got told after 90 days that we were going after them. Then they just changed numbers and changed their OPSEC. It’s a farce.”

He sees the recent terrorism designation of Mexican cartels as a legal pivot point: “That whole Stinchcombe thing should be thrown out the door because we can now use counter-terrorism authorities.”

Asher believes that if Canadian law enforcement engages more directly with U.S. authorities, the financiers and money launderers tied to Chinese triads in Canada can be directly linked to fentanyl-trafficking Mexican cartels. If Canadian banks are shown to be facilitating these funds, even passively, they may be subject to U.S. regulations—including terrorism finance sanctions.

The implications for Canadian institutions are profound. “If any of these financial institutions are picking up a dollar for the cartels at this stage and we can prove it, then they’re engaged in terrorism financing.”

Asher also pointed to marijuana trafficking from Canada into the United States—not as a separate criminal enterprise, but as part of the same transnational fentanyl networks. He said Chinese Triads, with ties to the Chinese Communist Party, sit atop this narcotics pyramid and are exploiting Canada’s legal marijuana system.

“The illegal pot—marijuana from Canada that comes into the New York State tri-state area and into the Pacific Northwest states of the United States is huge. And now we’re seeing the integration of fentanyl into marijuana in some cases.”

The flow of narcotics south and criminal proceeds north continues largely unabated, Asher warned, with superlabs in British Columbia and other areas of Canada producing meth, ecstasy, and fentanyl.

On Canada’s enforcement efforts and the outcomes of official inquiries into Chinese criminal and influence networks, Asher was scathing: “What have you done to follow up on [the Cullen Commission]? Nothing. And then you had this Hogue inquiry about Chinese influence in politics. What have you done about that? It looks to me like practically nothing.”

He called on Canada to show resolve on investigations that impact the United States: “Frankly, one of the first things you still need to do is: why is TD Bank Canada not being charged? And do we have charges against some of the executives, whether they’ve been publicly named or not?”

His core message is that Canada must shake off legal and political inertia: “Why wouldn’t Canada want to protect itself? You’re losing thousands of people every year, sometimes tens of thousands, due to overdoses and poisonings and basically murder in the form of these narcotics networks.”

The consequences of inaction, Asher warned, could be dire—not only for Canadian sovereignty and public health, but for its banking sector’s international standing. “Canadian money laundering command and control remains a huge issue for drug trafficking across the United States… That’s just the bottom line.”

The following transcript has been edited for clarity and brevity. Some passages have been removed to streamline the discussion while preserving its core insights.

Sam Cooper: What is the key change that designating the Sinaloa cartel and these other Mexican cartels as terrorist networks—because Canada followed President Trump on that. So now this anti-terrorism law should be applicable in Canada. One, does that change the calculus of the U.S. working with the Canadian government in going after cartels in Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal? And two, in your view, are these cartels operative with Chinese command-and-control financiers that underwrite their operations across North America?

David Asher: First of all, of course, they’re in bed with each other. I mean, this is the reason why Tse Chi Lop lived in Canada and in Toronto. I mean, the Sinaloa cartel has significant operations with partners and proxies in Canada, both for distribution and, increasingly, we believe with production—the rise of these super labs.

And so, the way I define it: we can do law enforcement top down. We use their intelligence, use their sources. We know who the leadership are, we know where the money is. Rather than build a case from the bottom up and start with dime bags on the streets of Chicago or Vancouver, we say we know these cartels are designated, and now these cartels are terrorist organizations. That changes everything in terms of how we could prosecute them and what type of tools we can use. Because that whole Stinchcombe thing should be thrown out the door because we can now use counter-terrorism authorities. Because Canada does have a reasonably strong counter-terrorism law.

So if we treat these cartels as terrorists—which they are—and you’ve designated them, we can use our signals intelligence and all sorts of other tools to much more robustly target them without them knowing it. Because every case I worked in Canada, the Stinchcombe thing ended up—we were targeting phone numbers tied to Canadian money launderers who were Chinese, and also actually some Italian mob guys too, and Iranian mob guys. And they got told after 90 days that we were going after them. And then they just changed numbers and they changed their OPSEC. It’s a farce, you know that. But I mean, just like with the terrorism designations, I think we’re in a new universe here.

So now that the Latin cartels have been designated as terrorists, your Anti-Terrorism Act of 2017 will—it has these four key provisions: prevent terrorists from getting into Canada and protect Canadians from terrorist acts; activate tools to identify, prosecute, and convict terrorists; keep the border secure and contribute to economic security; and work with the international community to bring terrorists to justice and address root causes of violence.

All these aspects are fundamentally game changers. I mean, if you apply that, I think that you treat these cartels as terrorists, you start to prosecute them. We could do it jointly. And their partners too—I mean, they’re accessories to terrorism. So if the Chinese are laundering the money, and if TD Bank, let’s say, is accepting the money? Then TD Bank is involved in terrorism finance. Suddenly, then, the whole tapestry of authorities has changed, and we should not have to follow the Stinchcombe thing anymore. It should be that we have a direct way to secretly target the communications and follow the money through the cartels, now that they’re basically the same as Hezbollah and the Quds Force and Al-Qaeda.

And then there’s Chinese partners. Frankly, if they’re working with them in a partnership, you should be able to approach them as accessories to terrorism from a legal standpoint. That would change your prosecution. It would change your intelligence collection capability, and it would actually conform with the facts, frankly.

And I think also anybody who’s getting the Chinese guys you’ve profiled, like Paul King Jin and all these Chinese United Front actors in Vancouver—I mean, they are now effectively accessories to a terrorist organization’s finances.

So I have to assume that your politicians are not going to meet with accessories to terrorist organizations anymore. I hope what this is doing in the U.S. is that all U.S. banks now are under warning that the Anti-Terrorism Act will be applied to them if they take one dollar of Sinaloa money.

I think that people are starting to realize that. And I think there’s much—I think it’s hardly that TD was the only Canadian bank that was involved in laundering money.

Sam Cooper: Can you expand on that?

David Asher: You’ve got other banks, like BMO. I’m not saying it’s laundering money, but I’m not saying it isn’t. I don’t know, but they have huge operations in Mexico, so obviously they should be looked at. But if any of these financial institutions are picking up a dollar for the cartels at this stage and we can prove it, then they’re engaged in terrorism financing. I mean, the U.S. government will go after banks anywhere in the world that are engaged in terrorism financing, Canadian or otherwise.

And I don’t think the U.S. government is satisfied at all with the Canadian response at this stage. But there is great hope because if you start to crack down using your Anti-Terrorism Act, I think that we have an opportunity to change the framework for collective action and have a much better relationship.

But it’s going to mean taking on the Chinese because the money laundering for terrorist dollars is material support for terrorism, and it’s going to require going after the distribution of not just fentanyl, but let’s not forget there’s massive amounts of methamphetamine produced in Canada. And by the way, no one’s talking about all the meth from Canada that’s entering the United States. President Trump isn’t just concerned about fentanyl. I mean, for years we’ve had methamphetamine coming out of Canada into the United States.

Sam Cooper: Well, I recently did a story on a major Sinaloa Cartel cell set up on the British Columbia border near the Peace Arch crossing. They were dealing with [Sinaloa Cartel boss] El Mayo directly, which says a lot, right?

And they were raided–mind you no one is even incarcerated—but they face civil forfeiture. And they found Mexican passports, fentanyl, MDMA, methamphetamine, ketamine, fake Xanax, incredible weapons caches. And you also just had another major smuggling operation of MDMA from B.C. just prosecuted in Washington state. So the U.S. government is concerned with all these precursors from China and that includes ecstasy as well, right?

David Asher: Yes. And of course, the illegal pot—marijuana from Canada that comes into the New York State tri-state area and into the Pacific Northwest states of the United States is huge. And now we’re seeing the integration of fentanyl into marijuana in some cases.

I think that the Canadian defense that statistics show Canada is innocent in fentanyl trafficking across North America is just bullshit. I mean, something like probably 80% of the money laundering networks in the U.S. that are Chinese are in direct contact with numbers in Canada every day. And we don’t know who those subscribers are. We’re not allowed to spy on Canada.

Sam Cooper: Alright. Can I ask you this? I heard from a senior U.S. narcotics expert with deep knowledge that the pot being run down from Ontario into New York and the tri-state area was coming in tons — and that they believed this was command-and-control Chinese organized crime in Toronto. They said the funds connected to all of that was collected in the U.S. and ultimately coming back up to Toronto banks.

Like you said, the money comes back to be laundered where command is. So that’s the legal—or really, illegal—pot trade from Canada, mixed with the fentanyl trafficking networks directed from Canada. The drugs go south, the cash is collected, and it’s laundered back up through Canadian banks.

That’s your TD Bank case, right?

David Asher: It’s all part of the same drug trafficking organizations.

But look, we don’t have super labs in the United States, and this idea that, well, we have super labs in Canada, but they’re not targeting the United States—how the hell do you know that? I mean, you just stumbled upon this super lab out in British Columbia. How many others? We’ve heard from dozens of sources that there are a number of labs like that in Canada. I mean, there’s no way they’re not going to be involved in exporting to the United States.

But even if they aren’t, it’s a huge threat to Canada. And we have to assume that it’s an incoming threat to the United States. But putting aside fentanyl super labs, you’ve got super methamphetamine labs too, and you’ve got the marijuana business, ecstasy business—it’s all drug business. They’re all interlinked. And let’s not forget that Tse Chi Lop served, I don’t know about nine years in prison in the United States. We arrested him well before he was identified publicly, and when he was based in Canada.

You showed in your book Wilful Blindness that Paul King Jin, all these guys come down to Las Vegas to launder money. Remember, you can take these chips from these casinos and you can exchange them internationally. They’re like bearer bonds practically. You can take them and settle them elsewhere. The chips are fungible. So the idea that these major Chinese networks in Canada are not cross-border into the U.S. is also bullshit.

Sam Cooper: Absolutely, yes.

David Asher: That’s not some secret. Everybody knows that who works organized crime cases. So what’s going on in British Columbia, which your Cullen Commission reporting detailed in mind-altering detail. What has Canada done to follow up on that? Nothing. And then you had this Hogue inquiry about Chinese influence in politics. What has Canada done about that? It looks to me like practically nothing. I think there’s a lot we can do though. And there are people in the Canadian government that want to work this positively, and I think there should be more receptivity to it in the United States.

But I think we’d like to see the Canadians put some meat on the plate. Can they help us target the Sinaloa cartel’s operations in partnership with Chinese triads, not just in Canada, but in the U.S. too, and maybe even in Mexico?

I mean, have they come forward with a plan of attack together? I don’t think so. And if they did, it would be helpful. But frankly, one of the first things you still need to do is: why is TD Bank Canada not being charged?

And do we have charges against some of the executives, whether they’ve been publicly named or not? It’s in the document that the Department of Justice released that there were a number of people they’ve identified for criminal prosecution. I mean, in the U.S. we’re fining TD $3.1 billion. What’s Canada done? Like a $9 million fine against TD Corporate in Toronto. Seriously? The people in Toronto were running the money laundering network in the United States of America.

Sam Cooper: What more can you say about that piece?

David Asher: There are other people you should talk to about that. But we know there was command and control for the money laundering in Toronto. That’s why the CEO of TD Canada resigned. He took the blame, but he hasn’t been charged. I expect that that case has not ended yet. I think there’s a high probability that it will be continuing. I don’t know this for certain—I’m not involved—but from what I can see, the facts are pretty clear in the document that was put out by the Department of Justice. I don’t think that there’s grounds for this investigation into TD’s money laundering activity at the headquarters level to stop.

But why isn’t the Canadian government looking into them? This is the largest money laundering bank in the history of the United States of America. It’s Canadian. Have you ever thought that you guys might be able to charge them for money laundering too? What about anything they’re doing today?

At this point, I know they’ve hired people as consultants to try to supposedly clean up the bank, but you know what? They’ve got a long way to go. They have to close accounts. They’ve got to screen every relationship they’ve got. And even then, if the Department of the Treasury is satisfied, the Department of Justice might have a different view of it.

But I think that we know this: at the end of the day, the Canadian money laundering command and control remains a huge issue for drug trafficking of all sorts across the United States of America. And so I think that’s just the bottom line.

Sam Cooper: Okay. Let’s talk more about Stinchcombe and Canada’s courts and cross-border crime, because this is a major cause of friction fundamentally for Canada and the U.S. as allies I believe.

Can you explain more about the extreme impediments that Canadian police work under, so that U.S. international enforcement is totally frustrated, loss of confidence, can’t work with Canada. Could you briefly describe to the readers what Stinchcombe means in terms of your and the U.S. government’s frustration in not being able to go up on [establish wiretaps] on Iranian, Chinese, and Mexican operatives in Canada?

David Asher: Well, we could go up on them, but then they had to be told we were going up on them. I mean, there’s this disclosure rule. I’m not an expert on Canadian law, but I can tell you that we had multiple cases—including [Asher names an alleged Iran-regime connected criminal in Toronto that allegedly laundered several billion dollars in major Canadian banks] against the Iran network.

We actually did have a case into Tse Chi Lop as well that was significant with the Australians, but it was DEA-led. And we’ve had so many others, including against the Hells Angels of Canada, who were a big problem. I mean, those guys, they’ve been trafficking into the United States. And as far as I can understand it, every time we want to target someone, they end up getting told that they’re being targeted. I mean, you can’t build an undercover criminal investigation if the cover gets blown after 90 days because of some Canadian law or rule.

And the fact is, but now with this terrorism designation, at least when it comes to the cartels and their facilitating parties—and that could be the Hells Angels, that could be the Wolf Pack, that could be the Chinese triads—it doesn’t really matter. They’re facilitating terrorism.

And Canada would need to start to make cases on your own to identify, prosecute, and disable and dismantle these networks. Your government knows where these networks exist. It just acts like it’s powerless to do anything. It’s just not true. I’ve always felt that there was a compromise—because we were dealing with, in some of these Iran cases, we were dealing with terrorism. We had direct Hezbollah and Iranian IRGC connections in Canada. So it baffled us why the criminals were being told that they were being targeted or how they found out.

Whether it was through Stinchcombe or leaks or whatever. But all I can say is: when’s the last time we did a major case together between U.S. and Canada to take down a network? Seriously? Can you name one?

Sam Cooper: I can’t. No.

David Asher: Exactly. So there’s none, basically, that’s of any note. And it’s not just to blame Canada. I’m saying let’s just turn this into an opportunity for justice, because at the end of the day, your people are getting murdered by these cartels. And the cartels are making money because they can launder through these Chinese networks. And if they can’t make money, they’ll go out of business. So our job is not to protect Canada, but we’re certainly happy to help.

But I think that this needs to be—and it’s unfortunate that things have started off in an adversarial way between Washington and Ottawa. But I think that there’s just a lot of frustration. And I know it exists at the Treasury Department, not just the Department of Justice.

You’ve got a ways to go, and I think that your new Prime Minister will hopefully be able to navigate this, and we’ll see a new way of working these things together.

And I think, again, this terrorism designation is huge, but someone has to start by saying, okay, now we’ve got a terrorism designation. What do we do with it? And right now, I don’t think you should wait for the U.S. to come and complain or appeal to you to do it. You should do this yourselves. Why wouldn’t Canada want to protect itself? You’re losing thousands of people every year, sometimes tens of thousands, due to overdoses and poisonings and basically murder in the form of these narcotics networks. And then, basically, you’ve created a countrywide environment that’s permissive to criminal organizations, and people are suffering. The fact is, this enormous amount of real estate that’s been bought across Canada, especially in British Columbia and the Toronto area, has been bought with money that’s been laundered. It makes Miami in the 1980s look minor league.

Sam Cooper: Yeah. The estimates I’m getting now are over a trillion dollars in Toronto and Vancouver, connected to mortgage fraud and underground banking since 2010.

David Asher: Yeah, it’s massive. And it has to be fixed. I mean, seriously, this is an opportunity.

Sam Cooper: It’s an opportunity to improve both our nations.

David Asher: Correct. And I think if Canada came forward and said, we just identified the following networks and individuals who are laundering money for Chinese money laundering organizations, and we’re going to take them down, the U.S. would probably be impressed. Right now, you’re showing videos of dogs on the border and helicopters—that doesn’t do anything. Make some arrests, take down some criminals.

Eliminating Mexican cartels and Chinese triads from financial institutions across the Americas is part of the Trump administration’s broader strategy to strengthen national and hemispheric defense. This explains the push for deeper economic integration between the United States and Canada, along with the establishment of a hardened defense perimeter stretching from the Arctic to the Panama Canal.

Let’s visualize that…

TD and other banks face continued scrutiny under U.S. anti-terrorism laws following the recent disclosure of Chinese-linked superlabs in Canada, as the drug overdose death crisis claims 100,000 Americans per year. This heightened scrutiny may help explain why TD Bank’s equity on the Canadian stock exchange has yet to recover above its October 2024 highs, when the U.S. Department of Justice announced AML penalties against the bank.

What’s clear is that U.S. officials are growing increasingly confident in their assessments of drug money laundering by international gangs through Canadian banks—and have already begun issuing AML violations, as seen in TD’s case. We suspect the spotlight could soon shift to Mexican banks as well. And in the U.S., the DoJ should take a deeper dive into banks.