The Disappearing Bribe: How Tom Homan Slipped the Net

The Abscam-style sting that died in the shadows of DOJ politics

The Disappearing Bribe: How Tom Homan Slipped the Net

The Abscam-style sting that died in the shadows of DOJ politics

The Jack Hopkins Now Newsletter #565: Sunday, September 21st, 2025.

Two things before we start:

1. This is a long one. You’ll learn a lot that you didn’t already know.

2. No one will be any happier if…and when…the political and legal chaos finally slows down than my longtime friend…retired lawyer…judge…and walking history book…Mark.

He’s the one I lean on…hard…whenever I’m writing about anything that touches the legal world. His insight and perspective have been a steady anchor in a storm where the rules are twisted daily. He dedicates a lot of time answering my questions…even when I’m sure he’d rather what a football game.

What’s New Since Yesterday (and Why It Matters)

Our first pass told you the top line: MSNBC reported that Homan was recorded accepting $50,000 in cash from undercover agents posing as contractors in 2024…weeks before the election…while allegedly offering future help in landing border-security work if Trump won.

After Trump returned to office, the DOJ closed the probe…calling it insufficient and “politically motivated.”

Since then…major outlets have corroborated substantial pieces of that reporting; lawmakers are demanding the tapes. This isn’t rumor-mill blog spam…it’s being treated as a serious public-integrity story across the spectrum.

Here’s the brass tacks:

The alleged cash hand-off:

Hidden cameras; $50,000; a private-citizen Homan forecasting influence in a second Trump term.

The legal knot:

Was it a provable “bribe” if he wasn’t in office? Or a conspiracy to commit bribery (an agreement today for an official act tomorrow)? Prosecutors reportedly wrestled with this…and with modern case law that raises the bar on “official act” charges.

The shutdown:

After the administration changed, Trump-appointed DOJ leadership closed the matter…citing lack of “credible evidence.” Critics call that politicized triage; supporters say it shows restraint.

The oversight push:

Senior lawmakers have publicly urged: Release the tapes. Because if there’s nothing to hide…there’s nothing to hide…right?

I’m going to walk you through the timeline…the law…the institutional pressure points, and finally the stakes…not just for Homan…but for every future probe of political power in this country.

Part I: The Timeline the Public Deserves

Summer–Fall 2024:

According to internal DOJ summaries described to reporters…a separate West Texas case throws off a lead: Homan is allegedly soliciting payments tied to future contracting if Trump returns.

The FBI opens a covert operation; undercover agents…posing as would-be contractors…meet Homan…deliver $50,000 in cash, and capture it on hidden video.

Six weeks before the election is a lousy time to indict anyone in America…by longstanding DOJ practice. So agents hold…watching to see whether the contingency (Trump back in power; Homan wielding clout) materializes.

Late 2024–Early 2025:

Trump wins. Homan assumes the border-czar role; the theoretical “quid” now intersects with potential “quo.”

The case reportedly touches the Public Integrity Section (PIN) at DOJ…already a bruised…downsized part of the building. Internally…there’s both enthusiasm (“We have him on tape”) and trepidation (“Do we have an official act?”).

2025:

Under new leadership…DOJ closes the case. Official line: insufficient evidence… politically tainted origin…Homan wasn’t a public official at the moment he took the cash…no contract was ultimately steered.

Dissenters…inside and out…say that’s lawyerly gymnastics that fails a basic smell test: You don’t need the deed done to prove a conspiracy to do it.

And you don’t need a signed purchase order to prove corrupt intent when someone pockets a bag of cash and promises help with government work.

This week:

The story breaks across national outlets. A U.S. Senator publicly urges DOJ to release the video. Commentators left and right compare the case to Abscam…the 1978–80 FBI sting that bagged members of Congress on videotaped payoffs.

The question writes itself: If Abscam was chargeable…why isn’t this even reviewable?

Part II: The Law Isn’t a Technicality. It’s the Battlefield.

Let me translate the legal chessboard without the law-review fog.

1) “He wasn’t in office yet.”

True, per reporting. But bribery law doesn’t require the official to be wielding power at the moment of payment.

Prosecutors often charge conspiracy (agreement to exchange value for a future official act) or honest-services fraud(depriving the public of honest service via bribery/kickbacks).

The bar is proving an agreement focused on an official act…and the Supreme Court has tightened that definition (see McDonnell)…requiring something more concrete than access or vague promises.

That’s the hurdle DOJ is pointing to. Critics counter: “We have video of the money.” A jury should decide whether the promise was concrete enough.

2) “It’s entrapment.”

Unlikely on these facts. Entrapment requires the government to plant the criminal idea in an otherwise innocent mind and induce the crime.

If the subject is pre-disposed…already soliciting payments…already open for business…courts rarely buy entrapment. We don’t yet have all the pre-meet communications; the tapes would help the public evaluate that question.

Which is one reason “Release the tapes” isn’t political theater. It’s due diligence.

3) “No contract was awarded, so where’s the harm?”

That’s not the standard. Attempt and conspiracy exist precisely because the law punishes dangerous corruption before the government is actually bent.

If someone hands the guard $50,000 and the guard says “I’ll let you in after shift change,” you don’t shrug because the door hasn’t opened yet. You prosecute the corrupt bargain.

4) “Political case…drop it.”

Every public-corruption case is political by definition…because it involves politics.

The real question isn’t “Is it political?” but “Is it provable?” That’s a hard call…yes. It’s also precisely why independent career attorneys exist.

Did they get space to do their jobs? Or were they steered? We need the paperwork…and the video…to tell.

Part III: Institutional Pressure Points (Where Things Bend…or Break)

Public Integrity Section (PIN), DOJ

PIN is the nerve center for federal bribery cases. When it’s strong, you see cases like Abscam…Salinas…Ferriero.

When it’s weak or politicized…you see aborted cases…inexplicable declinations…and morale in freefall.

Reporting indicates PIN has been shrunk and pressured. If career attorneys recommended continued investigation and leadership overrode them…that’s a five-alarm fire. If they didn’t…show us the memo.

FBI Undercover Policy

Undercover stings are tightly regulated because they’re radioactive if abused. To green-light a cash payoff operation…there are layers of approvals. That signals the Bureau believed there was a predication…credible reason to test for bribery.

If that predicate existed in 2024…it didn’t evaporate in 2025. Evidence doesn’t age out because political winds change.

Leadership Statements

Current leadership has said there was “no credible evidence”…which…in plain English…implies the tapes don’t show what multiple reporters say they show.

That’s a bold assertion. There’s one way to settle it: Release the recording (with appropriate redactions). If the cash was a misunderstanding…let us see the context. If the promise was vague…let us hear the words. Sunshine is not the enemy.

Part IV: Comparing This to Abscam (and Why That Comparison Stings)

Abscam worked because the FBI put bags of money on camera with explicit quid-pro-quo talk; “I’ll do X official thing, you give me Y dollars.”

Juries understood it. So did the public. Here…the defense would say: Homan wasn’t yet in office…promises were fuzzy…McDonnell narrows “official act.”

The prosecution would say: Contingency doesn’t sanitize corruption…paying today for tomorrow’s power is the whole ballgame…and juries can recognize a corrupt bargain when they see one.

The message sent by dropping a case with cash-and-promises on tape is worse than losing a trial. Because everyone watching learns the lesson: If you time the deal right…you can walk. That’s a tutorial…not a deterrent.

Part V: What Homan’s Allies Will Say (and How to Hear It)

“This is a deep-state setup.”

If it were…the Bureau wouldn’t have filmed the hand-off; they’d have leaked innuendo. Undercover tapes are the opposite of vague. That’s why lawmakers want them released.

“MSNBC hyped a nothing-burger.”

Then Politico…WaPo…and others all got duped the same day. That’s not how major outlets operate when a claim can be falsified by a video.

They weigh sourcing because they know the tape either exists or it doesn’t.

“The FBI and DOJ reviewed it and said: no case.”

“No case” can mean “no case we choose to bring.” That’s a prosecutorial discretion statement…not a declaration that a tape shows a bake sale. When discretion tracks political interest, that’s the story.

Part VI The Stakes: Not One Man…the System

1) The Normalization of Contingent Corruption

“If he’s not in office yet, it’s fine.” That’s the loophole this teaches. It green-lights a market for future power. Do the deal today…cash out after inauguration. If you’re not chilled by that…read it again.

2) The Demolition of Deterrence

Ask any agent: the win isn’t the indictment…it’s the deterrent effect…the idea that the next guy won’t try it. When cases like this die in the crib…deterrence dies with them. The smart crooks learn. Fast.

3) The Signal to Career People

Career lawyers and agents take cues. Do we pursue public-integrity matters when the facts are ugly? Or do we look for the exit ramp?

If they think their work will be tossed for reasons other than law and evidence…the best ones leave. The rest go quiet. That’s how capture happens.

Part VII: What Accountability Looks Like (Concrete, Measurable, Now)

Spare me the “concerned statements.” This is what real oversight looks like:

Release the video (with necessary redactions).

Let the country see what the agents saw. Let us evaluate the “no credible evidence” claim ourselves.

Produce the declination memo.

Someone at DOJ wrote the legal rationale for shutting this down. What statutes were considered? What facts did they deem insufficient? Show us the work.

Preserve and produce approvals for the 2024 undercover operation:

Who signed off…and on what predicate? If the predicate was sound then…what changed…law or politics?

Reinforce Public Integrity.

If PIN has been hollowed out…rebuild it. If senior leadership overruled career prosecutors…we need names…dates…and reasons.

Independent review.

A special counsel or empowered IG with access to the case file can tell us…free of spin…whether this was a judgment call or a political burial.

Part VIII: Don’t Miss the Forest

This is not a discrete scandal to tab through and forget.

It’s part of a continuum: the steady repurposing of law enforcement…from neutral referee to partisan shield and sword.

You saw it with selective purges; you see it when loyalists are elevated over professionals…you see it when cases involving power get short-circuited while cases against critics get spotlit.

The point isn’t to win every case…the point is to own the process…to convince the public that corruption can’t be prosecuted when it’s the right people doing it.

That’s how fear and cynicism metastasize. People stop believing the system can self-correct. And once that happens…the field is clear for the worst actors.

Part IX: The Plain-English Answer to “But What If He’s Innocent?”

Release. The. Tape.

If the context exonerates him…if the bag was a test and Homan rejected the deal, show us.

If the words don’t rise to “official act,” let us hear the vagueness you’re touting. A hidden-camera payoff case is not a leak-war case.

There’s physical evidence. Either it supports the declination or it doesn’t. And if its public airing jeopardizes techniques…redact the tradecraft and keep the words. We’ve done this before. Abscam wasn’t tried in a secret basement.

Part X: What You Can Do (Reader Marching Orders)

• Call your reps and demand a hearing that compels DOJ to produce the declination memo and the recording.

• Support outlets doing the slog work: FOIAs, source-building, document review. Sunshine doesn’t happen by accident.

• Refuse cynicism. The people who want this buried feed on your despair. Cynicism is their shield. Noise is your sword.

The Lesson This Teaches…Unless We Interrupt It

Power always tests the fence. If it finds a weak post…it pushes again. A taped $50,000 hand-off followed by a shrug doesn’t just absolve a man…it advertises a method.

It tells every would-be influence peddler: “Do it before the inauguration. Keep your promises fuzzy. Ride the politics.”

That can’t be the lesson.

While it may feel like the walls are closing in…we’re nowhere near out of this fight. Why? Because every overreach like this cracks the façade of inevitability.

Authoritarians project invincibility until they trip over their own arrogance…and that’s when ordinary people…armed with persistence and sunlight…land the knockout blows.

The next move is ours. Release the tape. Release the memo. Let the facts speak.

BONUS: Who Else Might Be Involved…or Covering…(Without Getting Myself Sued)

Short version: I’m going to name roles…not people…and outline the plausible pathways corruption travels. If someone wants to prove us wrong…there’s an easy fix: release the tape…release the memos.

The Four Rings of a Pay-to-Play Scheme

Think of this like tree rings radiating from the trunk. The further you go out…the more “deniability” grows.

Ring 1: The Principal & The Go-Betweens

• The Principal: the person allegedly taking the money (here, Homan).

• Fixers & Intermediaries: friends…former staff…“consultants,” or lobbyist-adjacent figures who make introductions…courier messages…and keep fingerprints off the principal.

• Tell-tales: encrypted messaging, “coincidental” travel overlaps…burner emails… calendar entries that call a bag of cash “materials.”

• Legally safe takeaway: It’s common in bribery cases for the principal to keep one layer of human insulation between the cash and the promise. We’re describing a pattern…not accusing a specific individual.

Ring 2: The Suppliers of the Grift

• Contractor hopefuls: security vendors…detention operators…surveillance tech firms…logistics companies.

• Consulting shells: LLCs with no visible employees…sharing addresses with political consultancies…created right before “networking” ramps up.

• Tell-tales: sudden “advisory” agreements…success fees pegged to award dates… invoices with no deliverables apart from “strategic access.”

• Legally safe takeaway: these are risk markers auditors and oversight staff look for in any public-integrity probe.

Ring 3: The Policy & Process Gatekeepers

• Schedule keepers (special assistants)…intake desks (procurement pre-screens), legal reviewers, budget sign-offs…IG liaisons.

• If a case dies…it often dies by a thousand “routine” paper cuts: a misfiled conflict-of-interest form…a missing procurement note…a “lost” ethics recusal.

• Tell-tales: retroactive meeting logs…unusually redacted visitor records… procurement “market research” drafted by a vendor’s own language.

• Legally safe takeaway: this is process manipulation…not necessarily criminal…but it’s how questionable deals get normalized.

Ring 4: The Institutional Umbrella

• Political appointees who control priorities.

• Public affairs teams that call a tape “lacking context.”

• General Counsels who deem evidence “insufficient” or “tainted.”

• Tell-tales: shifting standards of evidence from one case to another; memos invoking “resource constraints” only when targets are politically inconvenient.

• Legally safe takeaway: we’re talking about structural capture…how systems are bent without a single illegal keystroke.

The Three Most Likely “Cover” Mechanisms (Seen in Past Scandals)

1. The “Context” Defense

   • Claim the conversation “lacked a clear official act.”

   • Rebrand the money as “consulting,” the promise as “policy insight,” and the meeting as “industry outreach.”

   • Safe framing: This is a legal strategy used historically to argue around bribery standards…whether it fits here requires the tape and the declination memo.

2. The “Process Was Flawed” Ejector Seat

   • Argue the undercover predication was thin; claim agents “nudged” the subject; label it “political.”

   • Safe framing: These are procedural arguments that can be valid or pretextual. Documents decide which. Produce them.

3. The “Nothing to See Here” Slow Walk

   • Starve the case: delay subpoenas…down-scope review…bury internal referrals… point oversight toward dead ends.

   • Safe framing: A pattern oversight committees have flagged in past integrity cases…naming the pattern is fair comment…not defamation.

Who Could Be in the Blast Radius (By Role…Not Name)

• Former colleagues who open doors and “sanity-check” which vendors are “friends.”

• Contract lobbyists who translate influence into “capability language” inside proposals.

• Political staffers who “deconflict” meetings so nobody has to file a recusal.

• Agency counsels who redefine “official act” down to a fig leaf.

• Public affairs handlers who preview press inquiries for principals, then sculpt the denial.

• Budget and procurement analysts who shape “requirements” to fit a single vendor’s footprint.

• Watchdog bottlenecks (IG or compliance inboxes) where tips curiously stall out.

None of the above implies criminal conduct by any specific person. It maps the typical lanes through which an influence scheme moves when it’s trying to look normal.

The Paper Trail You’d Pull If You Were Prosecuting (or Oversight)

1) Calendars & Visitor Logs

• Look for back-to-back private meetings…repeated “off-book” entries…or sudden switches to personal phones.

• Cross-reference with building badge swipes and camera access logs (if available).

2) Communications

• Email headers…Signal/WhatsApp/iMessage backups…and cloud retention policies.

• Search terms around “advisory,” “introduction,” “friend,” “helpful,” “circle back,” “after Jan 20,” “once we’re back,” “not over email.”

3) Procurement Files

• Market research memos…sole-source justifications…evaluation rubrics rewritten mid-stream…and “vendor questions” that only one bidder could answer.

4) Ethics & Recusal Filings

• Compare initial disclosures to later addenda; note late filings…look for blanket “screenings” that were never operationalized in practice.

5) Payments & LLCs

• Rapid-formation LLCs…wire transfers that coincide with “policy milestones”… consulting agreements with deliverables that read like vapor.

6) The Declination Memo & Undercover Approvals

• Who decided the case didn’t hit the bar? What statutes were considered? Was McDonnell (narrowing “official act”) the cited shield?

• Who approved the sting…on what predicate…and did that predicate mysteriously evaporate after the election?

Requesting these records is not an accusation. It’s basic due diligence any functioning oversight body should perform.

Red-Flag Patterns (If You See These…Ask More Questions)

• “Everyone does introductions” used as a shield for paid access.

• Sudden consultant retainers right before or after key policy announcements.

• “No minutes taken” meetings becoming the norm.

• Revolving-door hires: a gatekeeper leaves…pops up on a vendor’s payroll…then the vendor “finally” clears a hurdle.

• Declination language drift: standards of evidence get stricter only when cases implicate political allies.

All are context clues…not convictions. But they’re the smoke investigators chase when they smell fire.

What a Real Clean Bill of Health Would Look Like

If leadership wants to stop “speculation,” here’s a checklist they should be eager…eager…to meet:

1. Release the recording (with tradecraft redacted).

2. Release the declination memo (legal analysis…statutes…evidence weighed).

3. Release undercover approvals/predication summaries (who signed…when…why).

4. Commit to a neutral re-review by independent career prosecutors (not political appointees).

5. Certify procurement integrity with a third-party audit of any contracts adjacent to the players.

If the facts exonerate…the documents will, too. Sunlight clears the air or confirms the stench. Either way…the public wins.

Why Naming “Roles” Beats Naming “Villains” (For Now)

• Legally safer: We’re mapping systems…not alleging crimes by individuals without evidence.

• More useful: Power flows through positions and procedures. If you fix the lanes…bad drivers can’t speed.

• Harder to dodge: People can resign…structures persist. Repair the structure and you erase the next scheme’s oxygen.

What You Can Do

• Support FOIA work: fund the reporters who pry loose memos and emails.

• Call your reps: ask for the tape…the memo…and a public hearing with career attorneys…not just political spokespeople.

• Refuse the “everybody does it” shrug: That line is how corruption becomes culture.

Keep This In Mind

If a taped $50,000 hand-off can be waved away by calling it “context,” then the lesson to every future grifter is simple: Do it before inauguration…keep the promise fuzzy…and trust politics to carry you home.

We’re not accusing new villains by name. We’re identifying the lanes they’d use. Close the lanes…and the next scandal dies on the drawing board.

I’ll be back soon.

Best,

-Jack

Notes & Sources

Initial and follow-on reporting on the undercover cash payment and case closure: MSNBC (Leonnig/Dilanian), mirrored and summarized across outlets…The Guardian and Washington Post independently reported core facts and timing (cash…video… closure rationale). The Guardian+1

Administration/leadership statements framing the case as lacking “credible evidence” and “politically motivated”: Politico summary with official pushback. Politico

Oversight reaction: Sen. Adam Schiff’s public call to release the recording; allied calls to produce documentation. Senator Schiff

Contextual summaries relaying the West Texas origin and investigative predicate: coverage and advocacy press calling for transparency. Common Dreams

Disclaimer

This is analysis and opinion based on public reporting and statements from officials and lawmakers. Homan denies wrongdoing. No court has adjudicated these claims. If DOJ releases the underlying evidence and memos, we will update this analysis to reflect the full record. Politico+2The Guardian+2