He is aware of when to carry ’em — and when to fold ’em.
The chief of a nonprofit that cashed in on $3 billion in grants from the Biden administration and have become the biggest harborer of migrant children — earlier than President Trump yanked funding final week — is a nationally ranked poker participant with upwards of $800,000 in winnings.
Southwest Key Packages CEO Anselmo Villarreal, whose wage grew by 139% in the course of the first three years of Biden’s time period, boasts $801,484 in whole desk earnings — good for a rating of two,000th within the US, based on the poker database web site Hendon Mob.
Practically half of Villarreal’s pot — $398,541 — was received between 2021 and 2024 after he was appointed president of the Austin, Texas-based nonprofit.
Villarreal, who favors no-limit Texas Maintain ‘Em, received his first World Collection of Poker Circuit sport in Might 2006 at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas, taking dwelling $14,667.
The cardboard shark went on to nab the highest three slots in additional than a dozen match championships as of 2024.
Villarreal’s single-biggest victory got here on the DeepStack Extravaganza in February 2021, when he completed second total with winnings of $253,441, per knowledge on Hendon Mob and the International Poker Index — the latter of which places his nationwide rank at 13,557th.
On the identical time, the US Division of Well being and Human Providers (HHS) was beginning to dole out billions to Southwest Key to shelter the record-breaking quantity of unaccompanied migrant kids coming into the nation.
A number of of the nonprofit’s executives noticed their six-figure salaries double — with Villarreal’s pay surging from $491,642 in fiscal 12 months 2021 to $1,174,551 by the top of fiscal 12 months 2023.
Different data obtained solely by The Put up revealed that not less than a dozen different high staff had pay will increase of between 10% and as excessive as 112% from 2021 to 2022 beneath former President Joe Biden.
The nonprofit had already been dinged in September 2020 by HHS’ Workplace of Inspector Common for improperly utilizing taxpayers’ cash to spice up pay and bonuses.
Biden’s Justice Division sued Southwest Key final July, alleging its staff had been sexually abusing migrant children since 2015, however the Trump administration dropped that civil grievance final Wednesday and pulled the kids out of the group’s 27 shelters in Texas, Arizona and California.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) had beforehand heard testimony from whistleblowers in regards to the group shifting the migrant kids off to dwell with unvetted sponsors within the nation after leaving their shelters.
Some had been thrust into “doable child-trafficking rings” and not less than one resided at a home with “doubtless MS-13” gang-affiliated members, Grassley wrote in a February 2024 letter to Villarreal.
In an announcement final Wednesday, HHS mentioned: “Out of continuous issues relating to those placements, HHS has determined to cease placement of unaccompanied alien kids in Southwest Key amenities, and to evaluation its grants with the group.”
A rep for the group, who didn’t reply to The Put up’s follow-up requests for remark, introduced the identical day that it was “happy” in regards to the DOJ dismissing its intercourse abuse case and “strongly denied the claims referring to baby sexual abuse in our shelters.”
“There isn’t a settlement or fee required,” the Southwest Key spokesperson mentioned, earlier than pointing to a Trump-imposed federal funding freeze for five,000 layoffs on the group.
Earlier than working for Southwest Key Packages, Villarreal served as president of La Casa De Esperanza, a Waukesha, Wisconsin-based nonprofit serving to Spanish audio system with English language tutoring.
His wage in his last 12 months at La Casa, one other HHS grantee, was $253,282, fiscal 12 months 2020 tax filings present.
Earlier than that, Villarreal served six years as a Wisconsin-based consultant on an financial fee of his native Mexico, centered on “points associated to commerce, group reinvestment, shopper safety laws, shopper credit score, monetary privateness and safety, digital banking and basic monetary companies,” based on Southwest Key Program’s web site.
