Aspiration co-founder Joseph Sanberg pleaded guilty to two counts of federal fraud charges Monday in Los Angeles. Sanberg is at the heart of the NBA’s investigation of the Los Angeles Clippers, owner Steve Ballmer and star Kawhi Leonard, and whether they used an endorsement deal with Aspiration to circumvent the league’s salary cap rules.
Sanberg co-founded Aspiration, the California-based fintech and carbon offsetting company that filed for bankruptcy last spring. Sanberg, according to the Department of Justice, defrauded company investors by falsifying Aspiration’s financial statements and, along with another Aspiration board member, Ibrahim AlHusseini, also fraudulently obtained $145 million in loans from two banks. AlHusseini pleaded guilty to wire fraud in March.
“There is a lot of misinformation out there about Joe Sanberg,” Marc Mukasey, an attorney for Sanberg, said. “At the appropriate time, in a proper legal filing, we will provide a full picture of who he is.”
Sanberg, as an Aspiration board member, pushed for the company to give Leonard a four-year, $28 million endorsement deal for which Leonard never did anything. He also gave Leonard $20 million in company equity.
The NBA has hired white-shoe law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen and Katz to investigate the claims.
The Clippers and Ballmer had an extensive relationship with Aspiration: Ballmer invested twice into the company, first with $50 million in December 2021 and then with another $10 million in March 2023 as the company was laying off employees and in a tailspin.
Dennis Wong, the Clippers vice chairman, also invested $2 million in that fundraising round — the only new investor into the company at that time. Aspiration also signed a $300 million sponsorship deal with the Clippers to be their jersey patch partner and then signed a carbon offsetting contract with the Clippers where the team paid Aspiration more than $50 million, according to multiple sources briefed on the deal.
Sanberg will be sentenced at a later date. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California did not immediately respond to a request for comment.