The Left’s poster child for “green” finance and anti-poverty activism is headed for a federal courtroom — and likely a prison cell. Joe Sanberg, a major Democrat donor, co-founder of the ESG-driven financial firm Aspiration Partners, and self-described anti-poverty crusader, has agreed to plead guilty to two counts of wire fraud in a scheme that defrauded investors and lenders out of nearly $250 million.
“For years, Joseph Sanberg used his position at Aspiration to deceive investors and lenders for his own benefit, causing his victims over $248 million in losses,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Galeotti. The Justice Department made it clear that Sanberg’s fraud wasn’t just financial mismanagement, but a deliberate, calculated con that stretched across fake customers, falsified revenue, and flat-out lies.
Joe Sanberg, the California Dem behind the state's expansion of welfare to illegal immigrants & ballot initiative to raise the minimum wage to $18, was arrested today on suspicion of fraud related to his "green" finance company, marketed as a more moral alternative to Wall Street pic.twitter.com/ddiGRtyU5V
— Luke Rosiak (@lukerosiak) March 4, 2025
How it started / how it's going
A billionaire "anti-poverty activist" fraudulently enriched himself with a "carbon credit" scheme where companies would pay for ESG indulgences and he'd plant trees in Africa, the DOJ said. The company's financials were fake, Joe Sanberg admitted pic.twitter.com/4TRS1LPltM
— Luke Rosiak (@lukerosiak) August 22, 2025
Aspiration Partners branded itself as a financial company for the morally superior, blending corporate finance with left-wing activism. Its motto — “clean rich is the new filthy rich” — now reads like a bad joke. The company promised investors it would plant trees across Africa and avoid funding “polluting industries.” It became a darling of the ESG movement, with celebrity backers like Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Downey Jr. giving it star power. But behind the slick marketing and social justice buzzwords, it was rotten to the core.
According to federal prosecutors, Sanberg and fellow co-conspirator Ibrahim AlHusseini, a former Aspiration board member, lied to banks, falsified documents, and created fake revenue streams. They even went so far as to use Sanberg-controlled shell companies to pose as paying clients, generating artificial revenue to boost the company’s value and secure massive loans.
AlHusseini has already pleaded guilty. Sanberg will do the same in federal court in Los Angeles in the coming weeks. Each count carries up to 20 years in prison. In total, Sanberg faces a potential 40-year sentence.
Sanberg’s downfall is especially bitter given his political ties. He is a longtime donor to California Governor Gavin Newsom and once spent $11 million trying to push a minimum wage hike to $18 per hour. He even expanded California’s welfare benefits to illegal immigrants. Now, he’ll be remembered not as a savior of the poor, but as a fraud who used progressive activism as a cover to line his own pockets.
So much for morally superior finance.
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