Sunday Morning Coffee — May 4, 2025 — A License to Steal
By Roy Berger, Las Vegas, NV not Parumph.
Unless you live in Clark County, Nevada, home to Las Vegas or heaven forbid neighboring Nye County, where activities both legal and illegal make Clark County look like a kindergarten, you probably never heard of Michele Fiore. In fact, there is a real good chance that even if you are a resident, but living in a local news vacuum like so many these days, you may not have heard of Fiore either. For that be thankful.
Fiore, 54, isn’t hard to miss. Her clothes look like they are two sizes too small, she is all boobs and thighs and a walking billboard for plastic surgery. In 2006 she co-wrote, produced, and starred in Siren, a movie which she cast herself perfectly as an ordinary overweight middle-aged wife and mom.
Six years later, with her film career history, Fiore entered Nevada politics and served two terms, 2012-16, in the Nevada State Assembly. She did not seek reelection, instead vying for a seat in Congress. That didn’t work, finishing third in a 2016 Republican primary. In the interim she ran a home healthcare business that the IRS filed tax liens against in 2014 totaling $1 million. It couldn’t be her fault and instead pointed the finger at an ex-husband and a former employee. The business was shut down. Fiore changed her focus and ran for a seat on the Las Vegas City Council, won and occupied it for five years until 2022. In the meantime, while serving on the council she was appointed a Republican National Committeewoman representing the party from 2021-23. From there it was an eye on the 2022 governor’s race. She dropped out early, the polling numbers were bleak and then won the Republican nomination for State Treasurer, losing the general election by a point. Undeterred, Fiore left Las Vegas and moved over the hump to the Nye County metropolis of Parumph, a town of 45,000 about 50 miles from Vegas on the Nevada-California border. I’ve never been there but those who have tell me it’s even a worse place than it sounds. She was appointed by that Nye County Board of Commissioners as a justice of the peace and then elected to the same position a year later. Fiore does not have a legal degree, seemingly unimportant to the electorate of Nye County. She also serves as the Nevada Republican Party national committeewoman responsible for fund raising in the state. It appears she is pretty good at fundraising.
In 2014 when Fiore was a state assemblywoman, Las Vegas Metropolitan police officer Alyn Beck and his partner Igor Soldo were murdered while responding to an armed robbery. Soon after Fiore received headlines for her benevolence— through a political action committee and charity she raised money for a statue remembering the late Officer Beck. Very honorable.
However that benevolence took a crooked turn. It seems none of the money, $70K, went to a memorial as promised. Instead, Fiore used it for what she considered a much better cause than honoring a fallen public service officer: her daughter’s upcoming wedding; her own rent and perhaps most importantly, more plastic surgery. The federal government didn’t take very kindly to those expenditures charging the fine lady with wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. During the trial Fiore’s daughter took the Fifth. Nevada’s sitting governor, Joe Lombardo, a party-line Republican, was among the donors Fiore bilked. Lombardo testified against her.
Last October a federal jury, in about the time it takes to eat lunch, found Fiore guilty of six counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy.
A few months ago, on February 2, 2025 in our Sunday Morning Scramble I wrote this in response to former President Joe Biden’s advance pardon of his son Hunter:
By no means am I a fan of presidential pardons, but the pre-emptive pardon makes me laugh. It is the ultimate get-out-of-jail free card. It’s probably not something Parker Brothers had in mind with the first spin of Monopoly in 1935.
Politics aside, the power of the pardon both presidential for federal crimes and gubernatorial for state offenses goes above, beyond and contrary to our judicial system and its many layers. No one person should have the power to negate our judiciary. In my opinion it’s just wrong and a travesty of justice more times than not. A pardon completely erases a conviction and restores the person’s civil rights; not to be confused with a commutation that reduces the sentence of a convicted individual.
Presidential pardons aren’t new to the market. In fact since George Washington got the ball rolling in 1795 dismissing charges of treason against two men for their involvement in the Whiskey Rebellion there have been over 15,000 of them, including 3,000 by FDR, the presidential clubhouse pardon leader. Andrew Johnson granted “a full pardon and amnesty” against all former Confederates as their Christmas present on December 25, 1868. More recently in 1971 Richard Nixon for some unexplainable reason, pardoned Teamsters head Jimmy Hoffa less than five years into a 13-year prison sentence for jury tampering and pension fund fraud. It was a combined pardon/commutation. Soon after the pardon, Hoffa went missing never to be heard from again. In what might be the first pre-emptive pardon, shortly after Richard Nixon resigned the presidency in 1973, his successor Gerald Ford pardoned him from any imminent charges in the Watergate scandal. There is little doubt that act cost Ford the 1976 election giving us Jimmy Carter. On Carter’s first day in office he pardoned some 200,000 draft resisters to the Vietnam War. On Bill Clinton’s last day in office in January 2001 he made America great again by pardoning his half-brother Roger for cocaine and drug-trafficking and Democratic billionaire Marc Rich found guilty of only $48 million of income tax evasion and making illegal deals with Iran. In 2017 President Obama got into the Monopoly game with his pardon of WikiLeaks source Chelsea Manning for sending thousands of sensitive documents on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to the WikiLeaks site.
And that string continued. More recently in 2020 President Trump pardoned who we Jews call machatunim, Charles Kushner, the father of Trump’s son-in-law Jared for the seemingly forgivable offenses of tax fraud, witness tampering and making false statements to the Federal Election Commission. No big deal. In his first term, Trump granted 144 pardons. Then this January came Biden’s pre-emptive pardon of son Hunter, despite telling us that would never happen, on federal charges for illegal gun possession and tax evasion. It was one of 80 Biden pardons during his term. A few weeks after Biden’s pardon of his son came Trump’s looking the other way to 1,600 people convicted of offenses in the January 6, 2021, march on the Capitol. Two of the 1,600 refused to accept the amnesty.
By now you know where this is going. Later this month, May 14, was the date the charming Ms. Fiore was scheduled to be sentenced for her heinous fiscal crimes against friends, colleagues and the public. And the unconscionable use of a public servant, Officer Beck’s memory, purely for self-serving purposes. Each of the seven counts against Fiore was punishable by 20 years. That’s a long time without caking on make-up. ‘Was’ becomes the operative word. That’s all gone now. Two weeks ago, April 25, six days after a federal judge rejected Fiore’s request for a new trial President Trump, according to Fiore, received a message and came to the rescue granting her a “full and unconditional” presidential pardon. Federal case closed.
Incredulously Fiore, despite her deep national Republican ties, didn’t see this as Trump’s doing. Instead, according to her, it belonged to a higher authority. “Not because man permitted it, but because God ordained it,” she wants us to believe. Mr. Trump was simply a messenger. This comes from a woman who has publicly expressed the belief that cancer is a fungus curable with baking soda and salt water. I was actually surprised that God had some free time to help Fiore because Shedeur Sanders wanted us to believe God was tied up protecting him from falling further into the NFL draft abyss.
Fiore has denied requests from local and national media to speak. However, the White House wrote to the Washington Post that: “Due to her (Fiore’s) conservative views, she became a target and incurred government investigation and prosecutions.” No mention at all of her con-game. Wow. Just wow.
Speaking of cancer, there’s still hope for Nevadans to rid themselves of this cancer. There is the little known ‘no-shield protection’ that says a federal pardon does not provide immunity from state prosecutions. The pardon only addresses the federal charges and has no bearing on state-level cases wiping out double jeopardy protections. It’s not often tested. This is the time.
Fingers crossed that Governor Lombardo, and the Nevada judicial system will resurrect the no-shield protection provision and file state charges against Fiore and her get-rich-quick scheme regardless of how she thinks the Lord feels about her. The bad guys need to be punished, not walk away laughing at the rest of us.
If that happens, as one, this state too will thank God.
I’m proud that Medjet is sponsoring Sunday Morning Coffee. I spent 20 wonderful years with Medjet in Birmingham, Alabama, and can tell you unequivocally they are the standard-bearer for medical assistance membership programs. A talented staff, who cares about its members, is at the forefront of the company’s success. Whether you are traveling for business or pleasure, domestic or international, a Medjet membership should be an important part of your travel portfolio before you leave home. Check out the Medjet website at medjet.com or just tap on the Medjet logo and you’ll be able to get a look at Medjet’s services, rules and regulations, pricing, and an overview of the organization. And remember, any opinions expressed in Sunday Morning Coffee content or comments belong to the author and not the sponsor. Safe travels with your Medjet membership! — Roy Berger
Spot on !
That’s the best pic I’ve ever seen of Fiore. Where did you find it. Hopefully, someday, her prison pic will be just as nice.