Biden's USAID gave $800M contract to a fraudster despite knowing its manager had bribed USAID officers

It's almost impossible to believe the level of corruption that was (and likely still is) common in Dem-run shithole agencies in what's amusingly called "your" gruberment--as proven by guilty pleas in court!

USAID gave a known con-man an $800M contract to do...whut?  Ah yes!  To tell Cackles the ‘Root Causes Of Migration’!  (Spoiler: the fraudster blamed it on "climate change."  Shocker!)

This is long, with several players.  But you need to know how it worked--first to have even a hint of how utterly corrupt the Democrats are, and second, to be able to spot it in other cases.  Cuz if you think this is the only one, you're naive.

bribem’s USAID awarded an $800 million contract to a business operating out of a Virginia home even after knowing for a decade that the corruptocrat had secured USAID contracts through bribery.

The official purpose of the original contract was to "address issues affecting the root causes of irregular migration from Central America to the U.S.”

Last Friday the DOJ announced that Walter Barnes III (fraudster) and Roderick Watson--a totally corrupt USAID "contracting official"--had pleaded guilty to a bribery scheme in which Barnes and two others conspired to pay Watson $1 million to get $544 million in gruberment contracts.  (That's NOT the $800 million contract, which comes later.)

The bombshell here is that the corrupt bribem regime continued to steer massive contracts to the fraudster even after it knew of the bribes.

Some of these corrupt contracts are still "active"--meaning the fraudster's home-based "company" is still getting paid.

USAID (via bribe-taker Watson) awarded the staggering $800 million contract went to a joint venture between Barnes’ company and CollaborateUp, a one-man "consultancy" run out of the Virginia home of its founder, Richard Crespin.  The contract listed Crespin's Virginia home as the "company's" address--for an $800 million contract.  Perfectly legit.

When Crespin's one-man company  announced the award of the staggering $800 million contract, it said it was to "address irregular migration from Central America to the United States” by addressing “climate change.”

Crespin's website also touts its work “advancing DEIA” and combating “misinformation.”  All the right buzzwords to make the bribem regime slobber.

This year Crespin added Mark A. Green, a former Republican congressman who was appointed by Trump during his first term to head USAID during his first term, to its payroll as a “senior advisor,” according to its website.  (No word on whether Green knew what the company was doing.)

The scheme used "joint ventures" to exploit a DEI policy called "8(a) contracting," which allows the government to award contracts without competition to "companies" owned by a racial minority or a small business.  So such fronts would form "joint ventures" with a larger company to qualify for no-bid contracts, and the larger "partner" would  actually do the work—and kick back a million or so to the contracting officer (Watson).

Barnes--a black man--was the "front man" to allow Watson (white, bribed USAID "contracting officer") to steer the contracts to him without having to go through an open, competitive bid.  Perfect!

Barnes’ "front company" ultimately got hundreds of millions of dollars, which ended his “small, disadvantaged business” status, so a new front company--"small business"--called CollaborateUp was formed to keep the scam going.

CollaborateUp says it “co-developed” USAID’s “procurement reform” policies “alongside former Administrator Mark Green.” That means the company that USAID put in charge of alleged "contract reform" got a huge contract for itself after partnering with someone who criminally corrupted the USAID contracting process, then put a former USAID official on its payroll.

The bribes by Barnes and his co-conspirators to USAID "contracting official" Watson--laid out in charging papers—included cash, fake payroll payments, a country club wedding, a trip to Martha’s Vineyard, a down payment on a house, and basketball tickets, over a period of nine years, starting in 2013.

By 2023 the USAID inspector-general knew of the corruption. On November 9, 2023, the government barred Barnes from getting any more contracts due to “evidence of conduct indicating a lack of business honesty or integrity.”

But that same day, USAID notified the Vistant-CollaborateUp joint venture (now called PMCG CollaborateUp JV LLC) that it had been chosen for the $800 million contract to find “root causes of migration.”

A different USAID contracting official objected that the contract was “legally questionable” and told the contractors he was rescinding it.  But the fraudsters were so confident that they had the system rigged (and no doubt motivated by the thought of a nearly $1 billion contract for jack-shit) that they sued the government, demanding the contract be reinstated.  They asked the court for a permanent injunction “prohibiting USAID from rescinding its award.”

And astonishingly (or utterly predictably, depending on how aware you are), just two days later, on June 12, 2024, Judge Charles F. Lettow ORDERED the decision about the $800 million contract sent back to USAID to reevaluate.  And by then, thru some murky magic, Vistant had been removed from the list of banned contractors!

And again predictably, on August 22, 2024, some unidentified lackey at USAID again awarded a contract of up to $800 million to "PMCG CollaborateUp JV LLC"  for “USAID Central America Regional Support Services.”  So apparently the contract goal of "root causes of irregular migration/climate change" somehow morphed into "USAID Central America Regional Support Services.”  Same fraudsters, same amount, same contract, except for change in stated bullshit purpose.

Two weeks after Trump took office (February 2025) the "root causes/Support Services" contract was terminated—because the Trump administration ordered USAID to be closed due to massive evidence that graft and insider deals were common.  Democrats wailed dat dis wuz just a "right-wing conspiracy theory."  And a corrupt leftist judge has now ordered USAID to be re-started and all employees re-hired.

If you think the fraud described above was a "one-off," think again: bribem’s General Services Administration, which oversees government-wide contracting, gave this same corrupt "PMCG CollaborateUp JV LLC" two contracts lasting five years each, despite the fact that the government KNEW that Barnes had gotten prior contracts through bribery.

On November 6, 2024 — the day after the presidential election — GSA awarded the joint venture an "indefinite delivery contract" *through 2029,* capped at one dollar below a TRILLION (meaning no cap had been set).

Then on December 19, 2024--just a month before bribem and his handlers were kicked out of office--the GSA gave Barnes's joint venture another "indefinite delivery contract."  According to the venture's "GSA Price List," the company rents administrative assistants to the government for...$93.68 an hour.

The half-billion dollar bribery scheme is just one instance of fraud at USAID that was known about during the Biden administration, but not prosecuted until the Trump administration.  Think about what that implies.

Last November USAID’s inspector general told a federal court that another "USAID foreign aid contracting official," Matthieu Zahui of the "African Development Foundation," had steered contracts to a friend in exchange for bribes.  USAID had credible tips about Zahui for years, but *mysteriously* didn’t get a court order to seize his phone until February 2024. The phone contained evidence of the bribes.

Astonishingly (but utterly predictably), corrupt USAID did not ask a judge for a search warrant to conduct further investigation until November 4, 2024--the day before the election.  

Democrats: "Dat jus' total coincidence!  Dat don' prove nuttin'!"

Source:

https://www.dailywire.com/news/usaid-paid-corrupt-contractor-800m-to-do-kamalas-work-on-root-causes-of-migration