Donald Trump and his Truth Social app broke federal securities laws, alleges whistleblower

A recently fired aide higher-up in Donald Trump's Truth Social app's corporate ladder has levelled serious allegations against the former US president.

Co-founder turned whistleblower Will Wilkerson, former senior vice-president for operations of Trump Media and Technology group, has told the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that the firm violated federal securities laws in how investments were raised.

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He also alleged undue pressure from Trump himself to hand over lucrative shares of the firm to his wife, the former first lady Melania Trump, reports Guardian.

According to Wilkerson, "fraudulent misrepresentations... in violation of federal securities laws" were used by the company in its attempts to raise more than $1 billion through a special purpose acquisition company (Spac).

Wilkerson, who was sacked from his role last week, has filed a whistleblower complaint and presented "a cache of emails, documents, messages and audio recordings which detail a pattern of rancorous infighting, technical incompetence and power struggles inside Trump Media since its launch last year," reports Guardian. He was reportedly fired for “unauthorised disclosures” to the Washington Post.

An email exchange between Wilkerson and fellow co-founder Andy Litinsky, who was reportedly sacked as retaliation for refusing to provide some of his shares—worth millions of dollars—to Melania Trump, is also among the evidence, according to Washington Post.

Litinsky claims that Trump threatened to "blow up the company" if his demands were not met in the email exchange.

SEC is already investigating Trump Media's merger with Digital World Acquisition Corp. The merger has been put on hold for a year, since last October due to civil and criminal investigations. A lack of investor interest owing to the lacklustre number of users is another factor.

(With inputs from agencies)

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