A German politician has been filmed taking large sums of cash from a Kremlin-supporting broadcaster, Czech intelligence has claimed.
Petr Bystron, who is standing for Alternative for Germany (AfD) at European parliamentary elections in June, allegedly received €20,000 (£17,000) in cash from the manager of a Russian propaganda network while sitting in a parked car, recordings indicate.
Mr Bystron, who also sits on the Bundestag’s foreign affairs committee, has previously denied allegations of taking Russian money as a “defamation campaign”.
The Security Information Service (BIS), the Czech Republic’s domestic intelligence agency, now says Mr Bystron met with Artem Marchevsky, who allegedly managed a Kremlin-backed propaganda front called Voice of Europe, at least three times in the past six months.
European thinking politicians consider €20.000 a “large sums of cash”?
That’s cute.
A common theme in politics around the world is that you can buy politicians for a shockingly low amount of money. In the UK we’ve had politicians paid off for similar amounts, or politicians bought for £100k for basically their entire career.
https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1992/04/08/
100,000 usd, pound, or euro would be enough to buy my loyalty for a long while. So I guess I get it.
My number is probably higher tbh. I mean I suppose it depends on the source of money, if it was russia they would have to add half a dozen more zeros.
It’s not a large sum at all. That’s one of the most shameful facts of all these corrupt shitheads. They sell their countries out for such a pittance.
You should see how many American politicians are just as corrupt for less money, I was surprised when I saw Devin Nunes was only making $15K from one of the bribery schemes that was supporting him while he was in Congress. I guess it all comes down to knowing your worth to the scumbags you work for. 🤷♂️
This is actually a sign of rampant corruption. Bribery is a tight market, and with a lot of politicians willing to accept bribes the cost drops significantly. It’s one of the few areas where capitalism behaves as believed.
“One of the bribery schemes”…
If they’re selling out to one faction, there’s nothing stopping them from taking bribes from a bunch of other sources as well.
I doubt there are exclusivity contracts in place.
That’s honestly the most disgusting part of it to me. The amount of money they make doing it is barely enough to insulate them from the effects of living in a worse country
If they got $250k to redirect $1m in funding to a company, I wouldn’t like it but I would understand why someone without morals would sell out like that
But it’s more like $100k over a decade at the cost of billions to the country. Half the time, they’re basically just funding their next campaign… they’re burning our society, and they don’t even come out ahead
Just greedy short sighted fools who are willing to abase themselves to scum, or they are sociopathic monsters who don’t care about anything but whatever they want.
You’d be surprised how little money it takes to influence a US politician
I’ve had the “pleasure” of rubbing elbows with a few of the people currently engaged in
briberypolitical donations. I hear the going rate is about $10k and a nice meal.Aren’t their salary is roughly 6 figure? Why bother risking your career for the amount you make in 2 week?
For 100k, that’s understandable. But 10k and a nice meal? I mean , I’m low class but you can’t even buy me for a day with that amount.
I think that’s psychological. Irrational.
It’s some kind of not absent, but inverted moral principle. Where if someone buys you, you get bought. Even if it’s a small sum. Like as if between being for sale and not being for sale the former were morally preferable.
Maybe also some perverted understanding of valuing every dime.
Depends on the job, but I think more like 5 figures. Still enough to live comfortably, but of course not enough for these greedy fucks. The reason so many are millionaires is not their salaries.
That’s the thing. Campaigns are super expensive AND the politician doesn’t get to keep the money, so if you can find a politician who takes cash payment it’s way cheaper than “legitimate” political spending.
It’s in a twisted way a major reason mega corps like the massive expense of lobbying and PACs. Bribes are cheap and anybody can do it, but pulling together millions for PACs and campaigns is something smaller companies and individuals can’t do.
Its rarely just €20.000
You’re often seeing the tip of the iceberg, with significantly more money changing hands under the table or being paid out with in-kind services like friendly media coverage or consulting services or loans.