There is evidence consistent with parts of Chamath’s claim, but it is not strong or clean enough to say the prediction is clearly right or clearly wrong.

Evidence that large grifts have continued and some elite coverage remained sympathetic

• In 2023 the Associated Press and others documented what they called “the greatest grift in U.S. history”: an estimated ~$280B in stolen and another ~$120B in wasted or misspent U.S. COVID‑19 relief funds, roughly 10% of all aid disbursed. That’s a huge, system‑scale grift persisting into and being fully recognized after 2022, matching the prediction’s claim that large frauds would continue in the U.S. landscape. (wusf.org)
• In 2023 Michael Lewis published Going Infinite about Sam Bankman‑Fried. Major reviews in outlets like the Washington Post and New York Times described the book as “stubbornly credulous” and overly sympathetic to SBF, saying Lewis seemed “snowed” and spent more time second‑guessing FTX’s bankruptcy leadership than drilling into the fraud. Critics saw this as a prominent media/elite figure effectively giving SBF a partial “hall pass” even after the collapse. (en.wikipedia.org) This lines up, at least rhetorically, with Chamath’s complaint that some in‑group figures get unusually forgiving narratives.

Evidence cutting against the strong form of the media‑protection claim

• Mainstream U.S. outlets also did extensive critical coverage of SBF and FTX once cracks appeared, and prominently reported his 2023 federal trial, conviction on seven fraud and conspiracy counts, and 25‑year sentence. (en.wikipedia.org) That undercuts a simple story where “mainstream media” reliably shield in‑group fraudsters from accountability.
• For large post‑2022 fraud stories like COVID‑relief fraud, mainstream coverage has mostly focused on exposing and quantifying the abuse (e.g., AP’s “Great Grift” investigation and follow‑on coverage in outlets such as the Philadelphia Inquirer and Fortune), not on protecting the perpetrators. (inquirer.com) The drivers were weak government controls and speed of disbursement, not clearly the kind of media in‑group deference Chamath describes.

Why the prediction can’t be cleanly scored

• The prediction bundles two elements: (1) a mechanism (“mainstream media protect ideological/class in‑group figures and don’t admit errors”) and (2) an outcome (“similar grifts will continue”).
• The outcome is so broad and open‑ended that it is almost guaranteed to be true in some sense; large frauds and grifts do keep happening. But connecting specific post‑2022 frauds causally to media protection of in‑group elites is highly subjective and not something the available evidence can decisively prove or falsify.
• For every example someone could cite as confirmation (e.g., credulous SBF narratives in parts of elite media), another person can point to strong investigative and prosecutorial work as counter‑evidence that the system, including much of the press, ultimately punished rather than protected the grifters.

Because of this mix of partially supportive anecdotes, substantial counter‑evidence, and the broad, value‑laden nature of the claim, the prediction’s truth value is fundamentally interpretive rather than empirically crisp, so it is best classified as ambiguous.