An Air Force veteran who raised more than $ 25 million through GoFundMe for a privately constructed wall along the U.S. border with Mexico was accused this week of filing a false tax return and fraud just seven months after being charged Fraud had been charged in connection with his attempted donation.
Brian Kolfage, a former security forces aviator who lost both his legs and a hand in a rocket attack in Iraq in 2004, was charged this week in Pensacola, Florida for allegedly filing a false tax return and fraud for 2019 , reported Bloomberg for the first time. He reported an income of $ 63,574 that year when he knew the real amount was far higher, prosecutors claim.
The indictment alleges that Kolfage failed to report hundreds of thousands of dollars received from his fundraiser, which he conducted in December 2018 to help then-President Donald Trump build a wall along the southwestern border between the United States and Mexico help. Kolfage originally planned to raise $ 1 billion and give it to the government to build the wall. However, in February 2019, he announced that the donations would instead go to a nonprofit that would build the wall and prompted GoFundMe to offer refunds to its contributors.
Kolfage then tried to urge contributors who had already sent money to transfer their donations to his new nonprofit, We Build The Wall Inc., which he teamed up with former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon and two others who were later charged with fraud were charged, headed. Although Kolfage and Bannon promised that every penny of the donation would go towards building the wall, prosecutors in New York last August accused the couple of doing just the opposite.
In fact, Kolfage allegedly took more than $ 350,000 in donations for his personal use, and Bannon allegedly received more than $ 1 million from We Build The Wall, which he is accused of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on personal expenses, said the Justice Department in August. Some of that money was reportedly used to buy a 40-foot fishing boat called the Warfighter, along with renovations, a luxury SUV, golf cart, jewelry, plastic surgery, and credit card debt, Business Insider reported.
Although Trump pardoned Bannon later on his last day in office, Kolfage and the other two defendants are still hooked in the ongoing New York case. In the Florida case, it is alleged that Kolfage failed to report the hundreds of thousands he allegedly received from the wall campaign when he filed his 2019 tax return. Kolfage then tried to cover his tracks when he took out the money, according to court documents shared by Business Insider.
“Often times, the deposits were hidden by multiple organizations, companies, organizations and individuals before they were deposited into the personal bank account held by Brian G. Kolfage,” the prosecutor wrote.
Of the $ 25 million originally raised by GoFundMe, $ 14 million has been transferred to We Build The Wall and $ 6 million refunded, a GoFundMe spokesperson told Task & Purpose in May 2019.
“As claimed, not only have they lied to donors, but they have also tried to hide their misuse of funds by creating bogus bills and accounts to launder donations and cover up their crimes, regardless of the law or the truth “Inspector-in Prosecution Philip R. Bartlett said in the August press release. “This case should serve as a warning to other scammers that no one is above the law, not even a disabled war veteran or a millionaire’s political strategist.”
Related: According to the Feds, the wounded Air Force vet used the funds from ‘We Build The Wall’ to purchase a luxury fishing boat called the ‘Warfighter’.