Three years after the We Build the Wall fraud convictions, TIJ News traces the full financial trail of $25 million in donor funds through a network of shell companies, personal accounts, and luxury purchases that had nothing to do with border security.
The Promise
In December 2018, a GoFundMe campaign titled “We The People Will Fund The Wall” launched with the ambitious goal of raising $1 billion to privately fund construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Within weeks, it had raised over $25 million from more than 400,000 individual donors, making it one of the largest crowdfunding campaigns in history. The donors — predominantly conservative Americans frustrated with congressional inaction — believed every dollar would go toward physical border barrier construction.
What followed instead was one of the most brazen fraud schemes in American political history, documented in exhaustive detail across Department of Justice criminal filings, federal court records, and financial audits that reveal how political passion was systematically converted into personal enrichment.
Where the Money Went
Court documents filed in the Southern District of New York reveal that campaign organizers created a 501(c)(4) nonprofit called “We Build the Wall, Inc.” to receive the funds. The nonprofit’s IRS Form 990 filings, accessible through ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer, show that the organization spent approximately $1.7 million on an incomplete and structurally unsound section of fence on private land in New Mexico — roughly 7% of total funds raised.
The remaining 93% disappeared into a network of shell companies and personal accounts. According to federal court filings available through CourtListener, organizers used a series of intermediary entities — including a company called “Privateer Jet” — to funnel donor money toward a $1.2 million yacht, luxury vehicles, cosmetic surgery, jewelry, personal credit card payments, and cash withdrawals totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The Conviction Trail
The fraud eventually caught up with its perpetrators. Federal prosecutors secured convictions against multiple campaign organizers, with sentences ranging from probation to years in federal prison. The DOJ’s fraud section case records document how investigators traced financial flows through at least eight shell companies created specifically to obscure the movement of donor funds.
Perhaps most damning was the discovery that organizers had explicitly discussed the deception in private communications. Encrypted messages obtained by investigators and filed as exhibits in court proceedings show campaign leaders joking about donor gullibility and debating how much they could personally extract before attracting scrutiny.
The Structural Lesson
The We Build the Wall case exposed fundamental weaknesses in crowdfunding oversight and nonprofit accountability. GoFundMe’s platform allowed the campaign to raise $25 million with essentially no verification that funds would be used as promised. The 501(c)(4) nonprofit structure provided a veneer of legitimacy while offering minimal public accountability — these organizations are not required to disclose their donors and face limited IRS scrutiny.
Data from the Government Accountability Office shows that crowdfunding platforms processed over $17 billion in donations between 2020 and 2024, yet fewer than 0.3% of campaigns receiving over $100,000 underwent any form of independent financial auditing. The gap between donor expectation and actual fund usage remains largely unpoliced.
For the 400,000 Americans who contributed to We Build the Wall, the experience offered a painful education in the gap between political enthusiasm and financial accountability. Their money didn’t build a wall — it built a case study in how easily political conviction can be exploited by those willing to profit from it.
Sources: DOJ SDNY Press Release, ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer, CourtListener Federal Filings, GAO Crowdfunding Report, DOJ Fraud Section