Steve Bannon has been charged with fraud and money laundering for pocketing border wall funds

[View in browser]( [Mother Jones Daily Newsletter]( August 20, 2020 Ever since Donald Trump got elected, his allies have been dropping like flies. First, his personal lawyer Michael Cohen was [sentenced to three years]( in prison for campaign finance violations, tax evasion, and bank fraud. Then, longtime Trump adviser Roger Stone was [sentenced to 40 months]( in prison for lying to Congress, obstruction of justice, and witness tampering. Now, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon has been [charged with fraud and money laundering]( for allegedly defrauding hundreds of thousands of people who donated to help build a private wall along the US–Mexico border. Bannon was arrested while riding on a [very expensive yacht](. Who would have guessed that an apparently fraudulent fundraiser would be the thing to take the Breitbart co-founder, Cambridge Analytica board member, and patent racist down? —Abigail Weinberg [UC Press]( [Top Story] [Top Story]( [Steve Bannon Charged With Fraud and Money Laundering for Pocketing Border Wall Funds]( Other right-wing activists were also charged with defrauding hundreds of thousands of donors. BY NOAH LANARD [Trending] [This is the very expensive yacht Steve Bannon got arrested on]( BY NOAH LANARD AND DAN FRIEDMAN [A close Trump ally said the president supported the private border wall at the center of a massive fraud case]( BY NOAH LANARD [That time Steve Bannon accused the Clintons of corruption and money laundering]( BY MATT COHEN AND MARK HELENOWSKI [A Republican-backed Senate report shows Trump and his allies aided a disinformation plot. They've been pushing a conspiracy theory cooked up by the Kremlin.]( BY DAVID CORN [House Subscriptions Ad]( [The Big Feature] [Special Feature]( [How Native Tribes Started Winning at the Supreme Court]( In July, the court ruled that a large chunk of Oklahoma is an Indian reservation. The decision was two decades in the making. BY DELILAH FRIEDLER [Fiercely Independent] Support from readers allows Mother Jones to do journalism that doesn't just follow the pack. [Donate]( [Recharge] SOME GOOD NEWS, FOR ONCE [Gabby Giffords Spoke Last Night About Overcoming Despair. Here Are 3 More Ways to Tackle It.]( “Confronted by despair, I’ve summoned hope,” Gabby Giffords said last night, nine years after she was almost killed in a mass shooting as a Congress member from Arizona. “Confronted by paralysis and aphasia, I responded with grit and determination. I put one foot in front of the other. I found one word and then another.” Finding the words to describe despair, let alone overcome it, is a hugely personal project, and approaches differ, but here are three creative reads to get you going this weekend. [Watch]( Giffords first, then dive in: 1) [All About Love](, by Bell Hooks, or bell hooks, was written 20 years ago. Its insight into distancing is timeless: Although we live in close contact with neighbors, masses of people in our society feel alienated, cut off, alone. Isolation and loneliness are central causes of depression and despair. Yet they are the outcome of life in a culture where things matter more than people. Materialism creates a world of narcissism in which the focus of life is solely on acquisition and consumption. A culture of narcissism is not a place where love can flourish. The emergence of a “me” culture is a direct response to our nation’s failure to truly actualize the vision of democracy articulated in our Constitution and the Bill of Rights. All About Love is a poetic collection of critical essays on what resilience looks like, and it looks like bell hooks. 2) [The Invention of Solitude]( is Paul Auster’s moving memoir about his family’s skeletons—a philosophically penetrating book that draws a line between physical and social distance; enforced and chosen isolation; lockdown and evasion. Which of these we invent is an answerable question in Auster’s hands. Describing one family member, he writes: “[His] capacity for evasion was almost limitless…What people saw when he appeared before them was not really him, but a person he had invented…Solitary. But not in the sense of being alone. Solitary in the sense of retreat.” 3) Albert Murray’s [Stomping the Blues]( asks and empowers us all to keep the blues at bay. Murray is musical, lyrically questioning what he sees as orthodoxies in pursuit of creativity and freedom. He was a lifelong friend of Ralph Ellison, and a founder of Jazz at Lincoln Center. I interviewed Murray for the Village Voice in his New York home in 2003, before he passed away. Drop a line to recharge@motherjones.com if you’re down for a Murray marathon. Bonus! [A dance video](. Click the frame to unmute! Giffords [here](, hooks [here](, Auster [here](, Murray [here](. Dance [here](. —Daniel King Did you enjoy this newsletter? Help us out by [forwarding]( it to a friend or sharing it on [Facebook]( and [Twitter](. [Mother Jones]( [Donate]( [Subscribe]( This message was sent to {EMAIL}. To change the messages you receive from us, you can [edit your email preferences]( or [unsubscribe from all mailings.]( For advertising opportunities see our online [media kit.]( Were you forwarded this email? [Sign up for Mother Jones' newsletters today.]( [www.MotherJones.com]( PO Box 8539, Big Sandy, TX 75755