Campaign '24: Bogdan Peșchir accused of bribing voters
Romania's chief prosecutor's office has indicted businessman Bogdan Peșchir, who is accused of bribing voters in connection with the financing of Călin Georgescu's 2024 presidential election TikTok campaign. Prosecutors listed 874 individual acts as part of the continuing offense, claiming that between October 13 and November 27, 2024, Peșchir distributed benefits worth more than 290,000 dollars to influence voters' decisions. The case is being heard by the Brașov Court, and the businessman is defending himself while at liberty.
Most of the amount cited in the indictment reached beneficiaries in the form of TikTok gifts: Peșchir sent 868 such gifts to 105 users, worth a total of about 251,065 dollars. In addition, he transferred cryptocurrency to two people on six occasions, worth a total of about 39,160 dollars; the two amounts together make up the more than 290,000 dollars recorded in the indictment. According to the prosecution, voter influence took place on three levels, the first of which involved recruiting influencers with large reach who addressed audiences interested in online election debates. According to the prosecution's description, Peșchir decisively shaped the topics discussed in livestreams and, indirectly but unambiguously, steered viewers toward supporting Georgescu, while moving significant financial resources among content creators. On the second level, he gave virtual gifts during livestreams to voters who openly supported Georgescu or who were drawn into the campaign as potential voters. The third method consisted of direct bank transfers to people who agreed to vote for the candidate and to encourage others in their circle of acquaintances to do the same. According to HotNews's account, influencers taking part in the campaign received a fee of 390 lei for every twenty thousand followers in exchange for promoting Georgescu's program or the principles associated with him.
Peșchir's name came to public attention after the first round of the 2024 presidential election, when Romania's Intelligence Service (SRI), in a briefing prepared for the Supreme Council of National Defense, linked the TikTok account "bogpr" to the financing of Georgescu's online promotion. According to HotNews, the SRI reported at the time campaign spending of more than 960,000 dollars, while the declassified document mentioned TikTok donations by Peșchir exceeding one million euros. The same intelligence material stated that TikTok representatives, during a meeting with Romanian authorities on November 28, 2024, confirmed the identity of the user of the "bogpr" account and provided information about payments worth 381,000 dollars. These were received by TikTok users who took part in promoting Georgescu between October 24 and November 24, some of them after the campaign had ended; the earlier intelligence data and the current indictment thus record different amounts and time periods.
According to the SRI briefing, Peșchir previously worked as a programmer, then in 2021 founded the company Digital On-Ramp Solutions SRL in Brașov, although the service found his lifestyle inconsistent with the company's activity. His previous workplaces included the cryptocurrency-related companies Globaya Fintech SRL and Bitxatm Technology SRL, whose owners include Gabriel Prodănescu, who emigrated to South Africa in 1995 and also holds South African citizenship.
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