Trump-Vance inaugural donor loses $250,000 to crypto scam via spoofed email from fake Steve Witkoff address, leading to partial recovery of $40,300 with FBI and Tether assistance

Summary

A Trump-Vance Inaugural Committee donor was scammed out of $250,000 in cryptocurrency after receiving a fraudulent email that appeared to be from Steve Witkoff. The email, sent on Christmas Eve 2024, contained a subtle domain spoof—replacing an “i” with an “l” in the email address. The victim transferred 250,300 USDT.ETH to a scammer-controlled wallet, which was then traced to Nigeria. The FBI recovered $40,300 of the stolen funds through blockchain analysis. A civil forfeiture complaint has been filed to return the recovered amount to the victim. The U.S. Attorney’s office and Tether assisted in the recovery effort.