According to an explosive report by Insider, billionaire Peter Thiel was recruited by an FBI informant in the summer of 2021. Now, there are still many questions surrounding this story, but there were three different sources that Insider spoke to, [00:00:16] one of whom decided to share his identity while speaking to the reporters. The other two are anonymous sources. But Insider explains that Thiel alleged served as what is known as a Confidential Human Source, or CHS. [00:00:31] Their report was corroborated by these three sources. One of them is a guy by the name of Charles Johnson, who also served as an informant for the FBI. Insider describes Johnson as a tech investor and far right agitator with long standing ties to both Peter Thiel and [00:00:50] to the network of MAGA political operators surrounding Donald Trump. Now, it's extremely important before we continue to note that Johnson specifically, I don't know about the other two sources, since they're anonymous, but Johnson specifically is a highly unreliable source, [00:01:06] having lied to the press on many occasions. So we are taking that into account, and we want you to take that into account as we continue with this story. But Insider says that they properly vetted the other two sources, who, again, remained anonymous. [00:01:22] So we'll start with what the Feds allegedly wanted Peter Thiel to tell them about and then get to why a little later. So, Charles Johnson remember, that's the right winger believes that Thiel's reporting to the FBI was largely limited to foreign contacts and [00:01:40] attempts by foreign governments to penetrate Silicon Valley. Thiel, Johnson said, was directed by the FBI not to report on his interactions with Donald Trump or other US political figures. >> Speaker 2: Interesting. [00:01:57] So I found that really interesting. It's not the main part of the story here. It's a little bit of an assigned, but that's the FBI saying, don't tell us about Trump. What happened? I thought they were deep state and they were maniacally trying to get Trump. This guy gave him one and a half million dollars to Trump and [00:02:13] was a close confidant. If they were out to get Trump, they would have milked this guy for every piece of information he had on Trump. It's almost like there isn't a deep state. >> Speaker 1: So, we can only speculate as to why the FBI wouldn't ask Thiel to snitch on his MAGA buddies. [00:02:34] But one potential reason is that the Feds already had Johnson on that beat. So Joshua Buma, a Los Angeles based FBI agent, said that FBI headquarters had closed his most valuable human sources, including one code-named Genius, who had reported on far-right [00:02:54] figures involved with planning the attack on the Capitol on January 6th. Now, Johnson told Insider that Genius was his CHS, or meaning informant's code name. So according to the report, Thiel became a CHS after being [00:03:12] introduced to this agent, this FBI agent in Los Angeles by Johnson. And allegedly, Thiel started snitching to the Feds because he was worried the government might go after him someday. So Johnson said that he told Thiel that by offering the FBI a window into his [00:03:30] contacts with foreign governments, he could demonstrate his loyalty to the United States. He described Thiel's motivation for working with Buma as a kind of hedge in an environment where, get a load of this, extravagant wealth no longer affords the safety it used to. [00:03:49] Really? Which country are you living in? He pointed to ProPublica's reporting on Thiel's income-tax avoidance and the death of Jeffrey Epstein, who had reportedly scheduled several meetings with Thiel. >> Speaker 2: That's super weird. >> Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't, so Charles Johnson told insider, quote, [00:04:08] I told him to join up or get crushed. Okay, so let's get into the details about Thiel and Epstein. So the New York Times had obtained emails sent to Epstein by his assistant, and in those emails, they found that Thiel had multiple meetings scheduled with Epstein in 2014. [00:04:27] Now, some of those meetings were scheduled as tentative or to be determined. It's unclear how many of them actually were carried out, how many times they actually met in 2014. But if Thiel is worried about the feds busting him, then at least some of them probably did, I don't know. [00:04:45] Some of those meetings probably did. Again, we're speculating because we don't know why the FBI wanted him as an informant. >> Yeah. >> Speaker 1: As for ProPublica's reporting, it had to do with how Peter Thiel took advantage of certain loopholes and certain methods to avoid paying taxes. [00:05:01] Over the last 20 years, Thiel has quietly turned his Roth IRA, a humdrum retirement vehicle intended to spur Americans to save for their golden years, into a gargantuan tax-exempt piggy bank, confidential Internal Revenue Service data shows. [00:05:16] Using stock deals unavailable to most people, Thiel has taken a retirement account worth less than $2,000 in 1999 and spun it into a $5 billion windfall. Thiel began the Roth IRA with his shares of his startup PayPal. [00:05:32] He allegedly paid $0.001 per share of PayPal and bought 1.7 million shares, or a large stake for just $1,700. Three years later, in 2002, when eBay acquired PayPal, [00:05:50] he sold his $1.7 million worth of shares, >> No, 1.7 million shares. >> Speaker 1: 1.7 million shares, my bad. But kept all of the proceeds inside his Roth IRA. In 2004, when he spent $500,000 and received in return a substantive [00:06:07] stake in a nascent Facebook, that too went into Thiel's Roth IRA account. So I'm guessing this has to do with him being able to use that account as collateral in order to obtain loans. And that's how you avoid paying taxes. If he were to take that money out of that account, [00:06:23] he would pay massive taxes for it. >> Speaker 2: But remember, at the end, he avoids all taxes on it eventually. >> Right, he's not breaking the law with that. Unfortunately, that's a legal vehicle, isn't it? >> Speaker 2: Relatively legal. He's stretching the intention of that IRA. [00:06:39] But look, so that gets to the nuance. First of all, let me tell you what, this isn't about. Peter Thiel worried that the government is going to end his tax loophole. >> Speaker 1: Seriously? >> Speaker 2: When's the government ever ended a tax loophole for the rich? No, they put away billions of dollars and [00:06:57] the government lets him get away with it all the time. So that can't be about this. If he was panicked about that, that's hilarious. Don't worry, Peter, your money was safe. >> Speaker 1: I don't think he's worried about that, there's something else going on. >> Yeah, I don't think so either. Yeah, I have a theory on that. So now let's go to Epstein. [00:07:15] So, Epstein mainly arranged young girls for people. Peter Thiel is gay, so I don't know if that affects anything. I don't know if Epstein got young boys. I have no idea, right? [00:07:30] And so but remember, Epstein's main shtick and how he got rich was not that he was like some sort of financial genius. He mainly blackmailed people. And so, did he have something on Thiel? Who knows? Wildly speculative. [00:07:46] We can't tell you that now, right? We just don't have that information at all. I'm not even sure it's fair to assume that at all, okay. But I'm just giving you the context here. Charles Johnson, an unhinged liar in an industry filled with scorpions and [00:08:05] lunatics, he's among the worst. I mean, I'd put him top three worst of all time. So, none of his stories that he ever printed ever came out to be true. Of all the false stories I've ever seen, probably ranks number one. [00:08:24] So, take everything he says with a giant grain of salt and it's a mark of shame for the FBI that they would work with that guy. >> Speaker 1: Yeah, I totally agree with you on that. And he seems to have a grudge against Peter Thiel, which should also make you question what he is sharing with the press. [00:08:42] Again, the only reason why I felt like this was worth doing is there are two other sources that Insider spoke to and they vetted those sources and corroborated their story. But Johnson also told Insider, he felt betrayed that Thiel did not invest in his own startups, which he had expected Thiel to do in exchange for [00:09:01] introducing him to the FBI agent in Los Angeles, Buma. >> Speaker 2: Of course, bunch of scammers and grifters. What did you think was going to happen, Thiel? You get in bed with scorpions like Charles Johnson, you're going to get stung. That's their nature. [00:09:16] I got no love for Peter Thiel. He has done massive damage to this country. He backed Donald Trump 100%. He backed the lunatics JD Vance and Blake Masters. Just disgusting people who spread hatred and fear and lies in this country. [00:09:34] So don't mistake what I'm saying for as any defense of Peter Thiel, but we're being honest with you guys, be careful what Charles Johnson says. And so, last thing on this that I think is relevant, which is why, why would Thiel even make any of these? [00:09:50] Only to me, there's many different potential reasons, but the two main reasons is, one, once you get into that right wing world, it's swirling with conspiracy theories, and you start to get detached from reality, and you don't know what's real and what's not real. [00:10:06] So it's possible, if you're listening to Charles Johnson, you've lost the thread on reality. So maybe he really thought, my God, the government's going to come to get me. The deep state is real. I've got to switch teams and work with the deep state. [00:10:21] Who knows, maybe? Look, second possibility is and this is a giant one, he's invested in companies like Palantir that already work with the government, and he has the 10% stake in it. And he thought, I'm making billions of dollars working with the CIA, the FBI, [00:10:39] the state department. What am I going to endanger that for a bunch of this right wing clowns that I'm hanging around with? No, no, I'll go give the FBI whatever the hell they want. That's the most logical theory. Last one. Look, foreign governments are looking to infiltrate Silicon Valley because it is [00:10:55] now the most powerful force on earth. So you've got, of course, the issue of TikTok. And how much does the Chinese government control TikTok? You've got a lot of other forces trying to enter that arena. So maybe some of them approached Thiel, and then Thiel was like, well, [00:11:11] now I got a hot potato. Like, either I tell the government and then I'm an informant, or I don't tell the government, and then I'm in trouble, and the only thing that can endanger me sitting on this pile of money that I couldn't possibly spend in my lifetime is if the government comes to get me. [00:11:26] So I'll just go work with them instead. So that's, to me, is the most likely reason why he worked for them. But now right wingers, now, you know your beloved Peter Thiel and guy who financed a lot of what the was doing. He's a snitch. [00:11:43] >> Speaker 1: All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, the speakership debacle, complete with a voicemail message of a threat coming from a Jim Jordan ally to a wife of the sitting United States Congressperson.