David Marchese

The park that you're going to visit doesn't open. I don't think that the public and Trump's voters were prepared for this kind of change and to make it risks huge political pullback for Trump and pretty big disruptions for regular people.

Look, to me, this is a question about trust. An enormous amount, historic amount of trust has been placed in Doge.

Look, to me, this is a question about trust. An enormous amount, historic amount of trust has been placed in Doge.

This tiny little group of people, many of them with no government experience, has been given an unprecedented amount of data about government, an unprecedented amount of data about us, about Americans, and an unprecedented amount of power to change the way the government's going to look for years, for decades. And the question is, do they deserve that trust?

This tiny little group of people, many of them with no government experience, has been given an unprecedented amount of data about government, an unprecedented amount of data about us, about Americans, and an unprecedented amount of power to change the way the government's going to look for years, for decades. And the question is, do they deserve that trust?

And the one way we have to start to answer that question is to look at this little slice of data that they've made available about how they see the world, about the work that they're doing. And so sloppy mistakes, obvious mistakes in the first thing they show to the public raises questions about whether they deserve the huge amount of trust they've been given.

And the one way we have to start to answer that question is to look at this little slice of data that they've made available about how they see the world, about the work that they're doing. And so sloppy mistakes, obvious mistakes in the first thing they show to the public raises questions about whether they deserve the huge amount of trust they've been given.

Thank you so much for having me on.

Thank you so much for having me on.

Hi, I'm David Yaffe-Bellini, and I cover the cryptocurrency world for The New York Times. Last year, I came across a strange and really interesting story. It was about a bank in Kansas that collapsed. The bank was called Heartland Tri-State Bank, and it was located in this tiny rural community in the southwestern corner of Kansas called Elkhart.

Hi, I'm David Yaffe-Bellini, and I cover the cryptocurrency world for The New York Times. Last year, I came across a strange and really interesting story. It was about a bank in Kansas that collapsed. The bank was called Heartland Tri-State Bank, and it was located in this tiny rural community in the southwestern corner of Kansas called Elkhart.

The town of Elkhart is one of those really tight-knit, isolated communities whose charm and whole sense of itself kind of derives from the way that it's cut off from the outside world. Everyone in town knows each other. Everyone in town trusts each other. But a bank collapse is really serious business. The federal government has to step in.

The town of Elkhart is one of those really tight-knit, isolated communities whose charm and whole sense of itself kind of derives from the way that it's cut off from the outside world. Everyone in town knows each other. Everyone in town trusts each other. But a bank collapse is really serious business. The federal government has to step in.

They have to orchestrate a takeover really quickly, almost under the cover of night, to stop panic from spreading in the markets. On the day that Heartland collapsed and that it was taken over in July 2023, a really dramatic scene played out on the streets of Elkhart. There were blacked-out SUVs surrounding the bank, cargo vans with license plates that nobody in town recognized.

They have to orchestrate a takeover really quickly, almost under the cover of night, to stop panic from spreading in the markets. On the day that Heartland collapsed and that it was taken over in July 2023, a really dramatic scene played out on the streets of Elkhart. There were blacked-out SUVs surrounding the bank, cargo vans with license plates that nobody in town recognized.

You had government officials walking into the bank building with power tools and ladders, pushing all the furniture to the perimeter of the room, taking down the security system, removing laptops and computers and piling all that hardware into the vans parked outside. And then a state banking official got up in front of the staff and made an announcement.

You had government officials walking into the bank building with power tools and ladders, pushing all the furniture to the perimeter of the room, taking down the security system, removing laptops and computers and piling all that hardware into the vans parked outside. And then a state banking official got up in front of the staff and made an announcement.

The bank had fallen victim to a scam, and now it was insolvent. What was especially remarkable about this scam was how big it was. And that's because the primary victim wasn't some random employee. It was the bank's president, a guy named Shane Haynes. And he had access to tens of millions of dollars, the bank's money. And when Haynes fell victim to this scam, he ended up stealing that money.

The bank had fallen victim to a scam, and now it was insolvent. What was especially remarkable about this scam was how big it was. And that's because the primary victim wasn't some random employee. It was the bank's president, a guy named Shane Haynes. And he had access to tens of millions of dollars, the bank's money. And when Haynes fell victim to this scam, he ended up stealing that money.

The total amount that he stole from the bank came out to $47.1 million. Shane Haynes was just about the last person anyone in Elkhart thought would fall for a scam like this. He had been part of the community for decades. He'd worked his way up from a loan officer to become president of the bank.