Armed man arrested near Trump golf course days before president's visit

Armed Man Arrested at Trump Golf Course Ahead of Presidential Visit

Authorities in California arrested a man who was walking around the Trump National Golf Club in the Los Angeles area on Sunday afternoon.

Jeanine John Taele, 38, first arrived at the golf course on Friday, July 31—three days before Trump was scheduled to be there. He was seen wearing an earpiece and taking pictures and video of the course while the Secret Service conducted a security assessment.

Two days later, on August 2, Taele returned to the course, approached federal agents, and told them he was working for State Department security. After Taele was detained by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, deputies found a 16-round magazine with hollow-point bullets in his pants pockets and a loaded 9mm pistol in his pickup truck. A home search also revealed a modified AR-platform rifle, body armor, and notebooks full of "concerning statements."

"Mr. Taele's troubling behavior at the President's public golf course merely days before the President was expected to arrive raised serious red flags for law enforcement and led to the discovery of an unregistered firearm, a loaded weapon, as well as additional items of concern," said FBI Los Angeles Field Office assistant director Patrick Grandy. "There is no room for error, particularly in light of previous attempts on President Trump's life, and the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force, working with our partners at the U.S. Secret Service, the ATF, and the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, will investigate this case thoroughly."

Taele now faces federal charges of "possession of an unregistered short-barreled rifle," a felony with a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.

President Trump has yet to comment.

Freedom 250 Corporate Sponsors May Have Violated Lobbying Disclosure Act

Some of America's biggest corporations shelled out millions of dollars to support Freedom 250, the Trump administration's public-private partnership that oversaw spending for the country's semiquincentennial celebration.

It was no secret who was involved: The Freedom 250 website proudly displayed nearly two dozen of its sponsors, including Palantir, Boeing, ExxonMobil, United Health Group, and more.

But most of those corporations—including defense contractors Lockheed Martin, GE Aerospace, and Northrop Grumman—did not disclose the payments on lobbyist contribution reports that were due to Congress by last Friday, according to a NOTUS investigation.

Just three Freedom 250 backers made note of their event contributions in their recent filings, as required by the federal Lobbying Disclosure Act: Chevron, United Airlines, and RTX, according to NOTUS.

The law "is certainly not airtight, and certain entities have found ways to try to exploit this law," Aaron Scherb, a longtime ethics and democracy advocate, told NOTUS.

"Nonetheless, it requires full disclosure of political spending when companies are trying to curry favor with an administration and elected officials," Scherb said. "So, companies contributing to Freedom 250 should absolutely be required to disclose their political spending."

Background on Freedom 250

Freedom 250 is a subsidiary of Task Force 250, an entity that Donald Trump signed into existence by executive order days into his second term. It largely replaced the "America250" nonprofit that was created by Congress a decade ago to oversee the semiquincentennial's funding and development strategies.

Unlike America250, Freedom 250 is technically a limited liability company housed within the National Park Service's charity arm, the National Park Foundation.

Trump himself is the chair of Freedom 250, while the rest of his Cabinet are listed as members.

"When it comes to other nonprofits, the question is always whether it was created and controlled by Trump," Craig Holman, a government affairs lobbyist at the left-leaning nonprofit watchdog Public Citizen, told NOTUS. "But there is little question about Freedom 250."

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