Trump White House rocked by 'no paper trail' scandal

President Donald Trump's corruption is reaching a state of critical mass, a political analyst warned on Wednesday — and the fact that this pattern exists is having profound consequences in terms of Americans' trust in their government.

"A now-former ambassador [Kimberly Guilfoyle] who asked for $100,000 to cover her credit card debt from a man she was helping lobby the administration — and repeatedly urged the man not to leave a paper trail, according to texts obtained by the Wall Street Journal," CNN's Aaron Blake wrote on Wednesday while listing the major corruption scandals that have rocked Trump's administration over the past few weeks. "Her lawyers have denied the allegations."

Blake added, "The Department of Homeland Security buying multiple airplanes from a donor to the outgoing secretary at apparently inflated prices. The former secretary and current secretary have pointed to one another for the purchases." He continued with "a Russian oligarch paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for parts of Donald Trump Jr.’s wedding celebration. Trump Jr.’s wife downplayed the idea that there was anything amiss with the arrangement, but the oligarch later said Trump Jr. had refunded the money."

Blake then mentioned "a mysterious alleged multimillion-dollar transfer from a wealthy Turkish investor that one Trump ally (who recently married the investor) claims another Trump ally misallocated, according to reports in Axios and the Times. More on that complicated mess below" as well as "that same first Trump ally, married to the Turkish investor, accepting a job that would pay her $50 million even as she served as a top adviser in Trump’s Justice Department — shortly before the billionaire Venezuelan banker who hired her got a pardon he had been seeking. She denied any role in the pardon."

He later brought up even more scandals, writing that "these aren’t the only remarkable and eye-catching developments for those looking out for corruption over the last two years, of course. Trump has made more than $1 billion off cryptocurrency. He’s repeatedly promoted companies shortly after buying their stock, according to a CNN investigation. His social media company is allowing Wall Street firms to pay for quicker access to market-moving posts. And he accepted a jet as a gift from Qatar to use as Air Force One; it is supposed to be transferred to his presidential library."

As a consequence, "a Gallup poll recently showed a record-high 89 percent of Americans said corruption was widespread in the US government." A similar 88 percent were found by Fox News to be either "extremely" or "very" concerned about government corruption. Going through other polls, Blake found an unbroken pattern of Americans believing the government is corrupt and Trump is a big part of the problem — although they're skeptical that Democrats would make things better.

Blake is not alone in noticing that Trump's corruption is having political consequences. Earlier in October, The Bulwark's economist Catherine Rampell wrote that "Donald Trump is robbing Americans blind, and even Republicans are starting to notice. You may recall that back in March, there were some suspiciously timed, uncannily lucrative oil and stock trades. About fifteen minutes before Trump abruptly announced he was retracting some threats against Iran, billions of dollars’ worth of contracts were placed on bets that oil prices would fall and the S&P 500 would jump. And those lucky bastards turned out to be right!"

Robert Reich, who served as Secretary of Labor under former President Bill Clinton, wrote earlier in October that "Trump’s war on Iran is causing Americans to spend almost 50 percent more on gas than before the war, on average. And the diesel fuel needed to transport almost everything else we buy now averages more than $6.00 a gallon, which is also being passed on to consumers. These price increases due to Trump’s war tell only half the story. The other half is the political corruption at the root of the war — enriching Trump’s friends and family."

Speaking to AlterNet in September, polling expert Kyle Kondik of Sabato's Crystal Ball provided more detail about the historical context in which Trump is grappling with these corruption scandals.

"It's primarily the president's weak approval rating combined with the usual difficulty that the presidential party has in a midterm," Kondik told AlterNet. "I also think there may be even more for voters to react to in 2026 compared to even 2018, because Trump has acted as more of an imperial president and there is more dissatisfaction both with the economy as well as the president's foreign policy choices."