The New York Times story draws a line between the new gig and clemency granted by Trump to Venezuelan billionaire banker Julio Herrera Velutini. Given the cottage industry that’s grown up among Trump’s circle of friends and those seeking his mercy, it would hardly come as a surprise. Yet, there is no evidence that the former caused the latter. Correlation does not imply causation.

That doesn’t make the odor emitting from the gig any less unpleasant.

Then the Herrera family hired Alina Habba, who had been one of Mr. Trump’s personal lawyers and at the time was an adviser at the Justice Department. They offered her $10 million a year for four years along with a range of bonuses. In total, including bonuses, she was guaranteed more than $50 million over four years, according to interviews and documents obtained by The New York Times.

This may come as a shock to some non-lawyers, but this NBA-size deal isn’t normal for a lawyer, particularly a lawyer so undistinguished as Alina Habba, whose resume spans parking lot lawyer to failed United States Attorney.

Under the agreement, Ms. Habba would become general counsel at Concord Partners, a company that Ms. Herrera set up in late October 2025 in Florida. The company has no public profile and its business remains unclear even to some people associated with the Herrera business empire. Ms. Habba finalized her deal days after the company was registered, while she was still serving as U.S. attorney in New Jersey.

The article neglects to spend much time addressing the last sentence of that paragraph. At the time the deal was “finalized,” she still wore the hat of New Jersey United States Attorney. Sure, she was ill-suited for the job, and had not been confirmed by the Senate such that her possession of the much-too-large hat was tenuous at best.

But she put the title under her name and cashed the government paycheck that came every two weeks. While she was on the government payroll, she struck a deal with a just-formed company owned by a fellow awaiting sentence that was not engaged in any cognizable business to be paid $50 million.

She formally began her work for Concord Partners on Jan. 1. Weeks later, Mr. Trump granted Mr. Herrera a full and unconditional pardon.

There’s the correlation piece. Much as it may smell of a connection, the evidence is speculative and circumstantial. There are other explanations for the pardon.

So Mr. Herrera deployed his lawyer, Christopher M. Kise, the former Florida solicitor general who was on Mr. Trump’s personal legal team, to help with a plea for clemency. His 27-year-old daughter, Isabela Herrera, who is an American citizen, donated $3.5 million to a super PAC tied to Mr. Trump. But as of last fall, the pardon remained elusive.

While Trump has never been accused of being dilatory about pardoning his financially-contributing supporters, it’s not impossible that it took a few months for the payoff to filter through the Trump pardon machine. The period between “last fall” and last January isn’t so long as to prove that the earlier efforts to buy a pardon didn’t prove successful, and paying Habba was at worst belt and suspenders.

But for Habba, her new gig wasn’t enough to hold her attention as she continued to serve.

By then, Ms. Habba was a senior adviser to Attorney General Pam Bondi, overseeing U.S. attorneys. She had an office at the Justice Department and a protective detail from the U.S. Marshals, a holdover from her time serving as the U.S. attorney in New Jersey.

When you’re well-paid by a brand new corporation that doesn’t actually engage in any enterprise, you have a lot of time on your very wealthy hands, so why not sit in your office at Main Justice with your Marshal detail guarding the door?

Ms. Habba was a special government employee at the time, which allows individuals to work for the federal government for up to 130 days and maintain outside employment with conflict-of-interest restrictions.

Was there a conflict of interest? It’s hard to say. Sure, Herrera had already been pardoned, so she was no longer working for a guy who was awaiting or serving a sentence. But still there was the business in which Concord, a very American-sounding name, was engaged.

She declined to discuss her work for Concord.

Both Habba and the Justice Department say she played no role in Herrera’s pardon. While that offers no solace, given that neither enjoys much credibility anymore, it similarly doesn’t prove she did. And yet, there is nothing about Habba’s $50,000,000 side hustle for the Herrera family that doesn’t stink.