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Timmy Teepell rides to rescue in growing flap over Jindal’s ‘no-go’ zone Muslim-baiting speech in London on Monday

Posted in Governor's Office, Media, PACs on January 21, 2015| 19 Comments »

Gov. Bobby Jindal and his advisers are clamoring for damage control in the wake of his idiotic speech in London on Monday but this one could be a tough hill to climb.

In case you’ve been in a cave the past few days, Jindal spoke to a conservative group, the Henry Jackson Society, claiming the existence of “no-go zones” throughout England and France into which non-Muslims are afraid to venture because of what are apparent roving gangs of Islamic thugs just itching to assault any non-believer.

The only problem with his histrionics is that they weren’t true and his source for the information, Faux News, had even retracted its original claim to that effect on four separate occasions prior to Jindal’s speech during what was billed as an industrial recruiting tour.

Never one to admit his error in the face of overwhelming evidence, Jindal repeated his claim to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer while standing outside Parliament.

A wave of public criticism quickly mounted here in Louisiana with much of the criticism pointing out that as governor of Louisiana, Jindal should be home tending the store instead of trying to interject himself into an international debate in which he is pitifully unqualified to participate. http://theadvocate.com/news/opinion/11384992-123/our-views-bobby-jindal-shows

But now Jindal’s supporters, which are considerably thinner in ranks than a mere three years ago, have come to his rescue.

Timmy Teepell, Jindal’s personal political guru, came charging in on his white horse this morning in an email blast on which we somehow managed to get included. (We don’t dare give our email address lest they delete us from their mailing list. Besides, we’d rather imagine them going through that email list in a frantic attempt to determine which address is ours.)

“No matter how desperate the liberal press appears, their assaults on Conservative leaders rarely shock me,” he said in the opening paragraph of his little missive. (Yep, he lower-cased liberal and capitalized conservative. That GED of his is really kicking ass.)

“But even I was taken aback when CNN disregarded its own reporting in an attempt to smear Bobby Jindal.” (Apparently Teepell thinks so highly of himself, he considers Bobby as some sort of subordinate and refuses to use the title of Governor when speaking or writing about him; it’s just “Bobby.”)

“We both know many members of the press have their own agenda—but this is beyond the pale,” he said.

“This came about after Bobby Jindal (there he goes again with the “Bobby”) spoke out about so-called “no-go” zones throughout Europe. The locals use this designation because non-Muslims know not to go there, or else they will be subject to harassment by groups of hardline Muslim thugs.”

Teepell said a CNN reporter (that would be Wolf Blitzer, Timmy) “blasted” Jindal and claimed the zones didn’t exist.

Well, we watched that interview and at no time did Blitzer claim the non-existence of the “no-go” zones; he merely noted that the claim (by Faux News) had been retracted and even discredited by the British prime minister. But then Teepell said this: He should have taken the time to watch this CNN report that Red State was able to find – the reporters own network reported on this problem more than a year ago.

Well, Timmy, we did. And while the report did indeed allude to roving groups of Muslim “morality police” who would set upon drunks or women who were wearing dresses deemed by the groups as inappropriate, it could hardly be said anyone could have felt physically threatened.

What we saw were what the CNN report specifically referred to on more than one occasion as “small groups” of Muslims doing little more than preaching their beliefs in much the same manner in which we have witnessed street preachers in downtown Baton Rouge or even on a busy street corner (actually the intersection of the two business thoroughfares, LA. 16 and U.S. 190) berating sinners and fornicators and warning them to repent or face eternal damnation. Between the street preachers right here at home and what we saw on that CNN report, we could discern very little difference in tactics.

In fact, what we saw the Muslim “thugs” doing was far less offensive than what we’ve heard and seen of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas, or that Baptist preacher up in Alabama a few years ago who actually compiled a list (really, we’re not making this up) of the individuals in his county who were going to hell.

But what really puzzles us is that Teepell, in addition to being Jindal’s one-time campaign manager and later his chief of staff, eventually became head of the Southern office of OnMessage, the outfit from the Washington, D.C., area to which Jindal has paid some $5 million in campaign expenses.

In paying all that money to Teepell and his organization, one would think that Jindal would expect a little more than just pulling up some obscure report by Red State http://www.redstate.com/ to support his claim.

But Timmy wasn’t through. Oh, no.

After he posted the link to the CNN story which did more for Blitzer’s credibility than Jindal’s, he had this to say:

“Do me a favor—show your support for the Conservative (there’s that capital “C” again) movement by standing with the Stand up to Washington PAC. Your donation of $5 will go a long way in the fight to reclaim America.”

“P.S. After you donate, forward this message to your conservative friends—they need to know what is really going on.

“Timmy Teepell

Senior Advisor, Stand up to Washington PAC

About that last comment, Timmy: We couldn’t agree more. They do need to know what is “really going on” about the denial of equal pay for women, about generous tax breaks for the wealthy while the rest of us are required to pay our taxes, about the lucrative defense contracts for campaign contributors, privatizing governmental agencies and services to the enrichment of contributors, about removing the restrictions on Wall Street banks, thus paving the way for another economic collapse possibly worse than 2008, about an out of control Supreme Court, about Republican’s blocking an increase in the minimum wage while corporate CEOs reap tens of millions in salary and perks.

We could go on, but you get the idea, Timmy. Or maybe you don’t. But yes, your “Conservative friends” really do need to know what is going on.

And, Timmy, since you are a “senior advisor” to the Stand up for America PAC, perhaps you could explain this for us:

How is it that the Stand up for America PAC web page has the disclaimer at the bottom that says, “Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee” when there is a photo (a very dominant one at that) of only one candidate—Gov. Bobby Jindal—smack dab in the middle of that page?

http://www.standuptowashington.com/

Could you explain that to us? Huh? Could you, please?

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And what a year it was! LouisianaVoice offers our version of year in review: first six months of 2014 political lowlights

Posted in Budget, Campaign Contributions, Coastal Erosion, Commissions, Contract, Contracts, Corruption, Courts, DHH, DOA, Education, Ethics, Finances, Governor's Office, Health Care, Higher Education, House, Senate, IT, Lawsuits, Legislature, Legislators, Lobbyist, LSU, OGB, Office of Group Benefits, PACs, Politicians, Privatization, Revenue, State Agencies, Teague, Transparency on December 30, 2014| 5 Comments »

           As 2014 winds down, we decided that everyone else does a year-end wrap-up of the year’s significant events, so why not us?

            Accordingly, here is our review of the first six months of LouisianaVoice installments. The last six months will appear on Wednesday (Dec. 31).

JANUARY

IT Contractor linked to Obamacare, other problems:

A company holding two contracts with the State of Louisiana worth $32.8 million was the lead IT contractor of the ill-fated Affordable Health Care enrollment web page rolled out late last year.

CGI Technologies and Solutions, headquartered in Quebec, has experienced problems with other contracts in Canada and the U.S. even before the Obamacare debacle.

CGI Technologies and Solutions was awarded a $32.5 million contract with the Office of Community Development’s (OCD) Disaster Recovery Unit (DRU) on March 2, 2012 to provide computer software hosting, support and training for OCD’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP), small rental programs.

That contract is scheduled to run out on March 1, 2015.

CGI executives have been involved with at least 20 other troubled government IT projects, including one contract to automate retirements for millions of federal employees that went $60 million over budget and despite $2.3 billion in contracts with two dozen federal agencies, the company was rejected by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) because of “performance issues” in carrying out an earlier contract.

HGI ties to Jindal, Christie:

MSNBC and the Wall Street Journal have begun focusing attention on a Louisiana firm with more than $200 million in contracts with both the Chris Christie and Jindal administrations for federally-funded relief to hurricane victims.

Hammerman & Gainer, Inc., or HGI, of Lutcher, was awarded a $68 million contract in May of 2013 to oversee two programs distributing $780 million in federal money to Sandy victims. That contract was cancelled only six months later, on Dec. 6, 2013, because of mounting complaints about delays in processing claims.

New Jersey homeowners say they have been unable to get answers, paperwork has been misplaced and HGI employees, most of whom are temporary employees, could not be reached by phone and that the company’s recovery centers change rules midstream and that no reconstruction program grants to thousands of applicants already approved have yet been awarded.

HGI also just happens to hold a $60 million contract with the Louisiana Office of Community Development’s Disaster Recovery Unit to administer the state’s Road Home Program. That contract began on March 20, 2012, and ends on March 19, 2015. Prior to that contract, HGI had a similar contract for $83.3 million which ran from March 20, 2009 to March 19, 2012. The $83.3 million contract replaced a $912 million contract with ICF Emergency Management Services of Baton Rouge.

In New Jersey, HGI hired Glenn Paulsen, former chief of the Burlington County Republicans, as its legal counsel when it submitted its bid to run the two Sandy relief programs. Paulsen’s law firm Capehart Scatchard, made a $25,000 contribution to the Republican Governors Association which Christie now heads.

HGI contributed $15,000 to Jindal in three equal contributions in 2007, 2008 and 2009. The company also gave $7,500 to Robert Wooley ($2,500 in 2003 and $5,000 in 2002), $5,000 to the Republican Party of Louisiana, $5,000 in 2011, to New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin in March of 2006, only months after Hurricane Katrina, and $7,500 to his successor Mitch Landrieu in equal contributions of $2,500 in 2010, 2011 and 2012. In addition, HGI President Larry Oney gave $5,000 to Jindal’s campaign in 2008.

Alvarez & Marsal gets fat at state trough:

Jindal also awarded a four-month contract to Alvarez & Marsal for a tad more than $5 million that called for the firm to deliver $500 million in savings to the state.

A & M’s cozy if disastrous relationship with state government goes back further than Jindal. In December of 2005, the Orleans Parish School Board adopted Resolution 59-05 on the advice of the consulting firm.

The resolution, passed in the aftermath of disastrous Hurricane Katrina was specifically cited in the ruling earlier this week by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeal that upheld a lower court decision the school board was wrong to fire 7,500 teachers, effective Jan. 31, 2006.

Then-State Superintendent of Education Cecil Picard chose Alvarez & Marsal to prevail upon the school board to replace acting parish Superintendent Ora Watson with an Alvarez & Marsal consultant.

So, Watson was replaced, 7,500 teachers were fired, the teachers sued and won, leaving the Orleans School Board and the state liable for a billion-five and the firm that started it all is hired by Jindal to find a $500,000 savings.

Alvarez & Marsal is specifically cited—by name—no fewer than six times in the first 51 pages of a 2009 report calling for the privatizing the state’s charity hospital system. Alvarez & Marsal performed that bit of work under a $1.7 million contract that ran for nine months in 2009, from Jan. 5 to Sept. 30.

The firm also received a $250,000, contract of a much shorter duration (10 days) from Jindal on April 9, 2013, to develop Jindal’s proposal to eliminate the state income taxes in favor of other tax increases. That plan was dead on arrival during the legislative session and Jindal quickly punted before a single legislative vote could be taken.

The obvious next step for Jindal was to

Problems continue at OGB:

Charles Calvi and Patrick Powers are out at the Office of Group Benefits (OGB) and Susan West, late of the Office of Risk Management has been named Interim CEO—the fourth person to head OGB in less than three years.

Meanwhile, that $540 million reserve fund balance OGB had on hand to pay benefits at the time of Gov. Bobby Jindal’s infamous raping of the agency now sit at $240 million and is dwindling at a rate of $20 million per month, no doubt the result of Jindal’s 7 percent premium reduction six months before the January 2013 takeover of OGB by Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS) of Louisiana.

FEBRUARY

Adley’s not-so-hidden agenda:

State Sen. Robert Adley (R-Benton) filed Senate Bill 79 which was designed to give Jindal even more power by giving him greater freedom in appointing members of a levee board, specifically the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authorities of both the east and west banks.

The bill was a counteroffensive to attempts by the east bank authority to push for a historic lawsuit that would hold oil and gas companies responsible for damages to coastal wetlands.

The Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority East (SLFPAE) was attempting to force the oil and gas companies to pay for the state’s coastal restoration efforts.

The lawsuit claimed that the companies destroyed the state’s coastal wetlands by dredging canals that contributed to erosion. The marshes had served as a natural buffer that mitigated storm surge. The suit, if successful, could cost the companies billions of dollars.

Adley’s bill should come as no surprise, given his opposition to the lawsuit but some might question why Adley would oppose the legal action against the companies in the first place.

One consideration could be that he has owned pelican Gas Management Co. since 1993, was president of ABCO Petroleum from 1972 to 1993, is affiliated with the Louisiana Oil and Gas Association, and has been the recipient of more than $150,000 in campaign contributions over the years from companies, political action committees, and individuals affiliated with or controlled by oil and gas interests.

Adley’s bill was assigned to the Senate Transportation, Highways & Public Works Committee. The chairman of Transportation, Highways & Public Works?

Robert Adley.

Jindal tantrum goes national:

Jindal’s outburst upon exiting a meeting between the nation’s governors and President Barack Obama Monday was a petulant display of immaturity that only served to underscore his disgraceful scorn for Louisiana’s working poor in favor of pandering to the mega-rich Koch brothers in the apparent hope that some of their Americans for Prosperity (AFP) money might find its way into his campaign coffers.

His shameless promotion of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline project coupled with his criticism of Obama’s push for a minimum wage increase comes on the heels of word that Jindal is literally stealing from the blind in drawing down more than half of a trust fund established to assist blind vendors in state buildings to purchase equipment, to pay for repairs and to pay medical bills.

That trust fund shrank from $1.6 million to about $700,000, apparently because of yet another lawsuit the administration found itself embroiled in over the delivery of food services at Fort Polk in Leesville that sucked up $365,000 just for the state’s 21 percent share of attorney fees.

Jindal said of Obama’s push for an increase in the minimum wage that the president “seems to be waving the white flag of surrender” and that Obama’s economy “is now the minimum wage economy.”

CIA kidnap accomplice locates in Bossier City

A photo in the Shreveport Times shows a grinning Gov. Bobby Jindal shaking hands with David Zolet, executive vice president and general manager of the North American Sector of Computer Sciences Corp. (CSC) as the two jointly announced that the company plans to open a technology center at CSC’s national Cyber Research Park in Bossier City.

CSC will be the anchor tenant of the research park and will partner with Louisiana Tech University to account for 1,600 new jobs over the next four years, thanks in part to $14 million in state funding over the next decade to expand higher education programs to increase the number of computer science graduates per year.

CSC customers, meanwhile, were being urged to boycott the company over allegations that it took part in illegal CIA rendition flights in the U.S. “war on terror.”

Court documents have linked CSC to the rendition of German citizen Khaled El-Masri who was abducted on Dec. 31, 2003, after being mistaken for a known terrorist by the CIA.

El-Masri was blindfolded, beaten, imprisoned for 23 days, stripped, sodomized, chained, drugged, flown to Afghanistan where he was again beaten and imprisoned for another four months, interrogated, threatened, denied legal representation, force fed and finally flown in a CSC-chartered plane to Albania, where he was left on a remote road in the middle of the night some 1500 kilometers from his home.

CSC was contracted for the flight as well as for other illegal CIA renditions, according to human rights charity Reprieve. CSC has so far refused a request by Reprieve to sign a pledge of “zero tolerance to torture,” and has also declined to respond to questions from Computer Weekly about the allegations.

Germany has paid the company some $405 million since 1990 and over the past five years, the country has awarded more than 100 contracts to CSC and its subsidiaries.

The story said it is “no coincidence” that the company’s various German offices are often located near U.S. military bases.

Barksdale AFB, home of the U.S. Air Force’s 2nd Bomb Wing and Global Strike Command, and Cyber Research Park are nearly adjacent in their proximity to each other, with the proposed CSC facility and Barksdale separated only by I-20.

MARCH

Jindal contributor benefits from state road work

The controversy over that 55,000 hunting lodge that straddles three central Louisiana parishes has taken a new and curious twist as the result of a $1.7 million highway resurfacing project that conveniently runs right past the entrance to the lodge that is owned by a major contributor to Gov. Bobby Jindal and to unsuccessful congressional candidate State Sen. Neil Riser.

The overlay of LA. 127, also known locally as the Olla-Sikes Highway, started on Feb. 20 at the Caldwell Parish line and run 5.5 miles east in Winn Parish to LA. 1238, according to an announcement by the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD).

The LA. 127 project ends at the camp entrance and at the property of TV reality show Swamp People star Troy “Choot ‘em” Landry, whose campsite is located within the hunting camp.

A search of political campaign contributions show that camp owner Bill Busbice and his wife, Beth each contributed the maximum allowable $2,600 ($5,200 total) to State Sen. Neil Riser’s campaign for the 5th Congressional District seat won by Vance McAllister.

Jindal also picked up $20,000 from Busbice and Alfred Lippman of Morgan City, the registered agent for Olla Productions, LLC., one of Busbice’s may business entities.

Busbice contributed $5,000 to Jindal in April of 2009 and Beth Busbice gave another $5,000 in December of that same year, while Lippman contributed $5,000 in October of 2003, $3,500 in April of 2009 and his firm, Lippman, Malfouz, Tranchina & Thorguson of Morgan City gave another $1,500 in September of 2010.

Additionally, one of Lippman’s law partners, David Thorguson and his wife contributed $1,300 to Jindal, Jindal campaign records show.

Appel’s shrewd investments:

State Sen. Conrad Appel (R-Metairie) purchased Discovery Communications stock in 2010 a week before a major announcement of a partnership between Discovery Education and the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, Capitol News Service has learned.

On Dec. 7, 2010, Discovery Education, a division of Discovery Communications, announced that Louisiana and Indiana had joined Oregon in adopting the Discovery Education Science Techbook as a digital core instructional resource for elementary and middle school science instruction.

Appel is Chairman of the Senate Education Committee and was in a unique position to know not only of the pending deal between Discovery Education and the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) but also of the company’s recent agreement with Indiana and Oregon, as well as Texas and Florida.

Appel’s financial disclosure form obtained from the State Board of Ethics indicates his Discovery Communications stock purchase was for “between $5,000 and $24,999.”

Discovery Communications is traded on NASDAQ and on the date of Appel’s purchase, the company’s shares opened at $40.96 and closed at $40.78.

And while there was no significant movement in the stock’s prices on the date of and on the day’s following Discovery’s announcement of the agreement with BESE, the stock hit a high of $90.21 per share on Jan. 2 of this year, meaning Appel’s on-paper profit after a little more than three years was in excess of 100 percent. The stock closed on March 27 at $75.72, still an 85 percent gain for Appel.

Appel’s 2012 financial report reveals that he also purchased between $5,000 and $24,999 of Microsoft stock on June 4, 2012, the same date that the Louisiana Legislature adjourned its 85-day session.

Ten days earlier, on May 25, the Louisiana Legislature approved the implementation of Common Core in Louisiana after a major push by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation which poured more than $200 million to develop, review, evaluate, promote and implement Common Core.

APRIL

Deputy Sheriff dabbles in private background checks:

A former DeSoto Parish sheriff’s deputy may have violated state law by using his office to run background checks for a company in which he owned a major interest, according to a report by the Legislative Auditor’s office in Baton Rouge.

Lagniappe and Castillo Research and Investigations ran 41,574 background checks through the sheriff’s office during an 11-month period between April 1, 2012, and February 28, 2013, the report says. Robert Davidson, retired chief investigator for the DeSoto Parish Sheriff’s Office, is 50 percent owner of Lagniappe and Castillo. He was employed by DPSO from 1980 until his retirement in May of 2013.

The report, released on Monday, also noted that three DeSoto Parish Sheriff’s Office (DPSO) employees were paid nearly $2,000 by Lagniappe and Castillo Research and Investigations for running the background checks between January 2011 and May 2013, duties they would normally perform as part of their jobs with the sheriff’s office.

The company charged its customers $12 for each background report and paid the sheriff’s office $3 for each report. That represents an income of more than $374,000 and a profit of more than $372,000 for owners Robert Davidson and Allan Neal Castillo.

Extortion claimed on state highway project:

A six and one-half-year-old lawsuit took a dramatic turn following a Mangham contractor’s claim that the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) denied payments for work performed by his company because he resisted shake-down efforts by a DOTD inspector.

Jeff Mercer owner of the now-defunct construction company that bears his name, worked as a subcontractor to several prime contractors on six different projects for which he has not been paid. He first filed his lawsuit against DOTD on Sept. 7, 2007, in state district court in Monroe, claiming that the state owes him nearly $9 million for actual work done for which he was never paid, plus interest and delay costs which bring the total to more than $11.6 million.

The $500 million savings report by Alvarez & Marsal (A&M) was finally released on Monday only minutes before adjournment of the 2014 legislative session.

The 425-page report, produced under a $5 million contract, while projecting a savings of $2.7 billion over five years (an average of $540 million a year).

Most of the projected cost savings were based on assumptions for which A&M offered little or no supporting data other than arbitrary estimates and suppositions that could have been produced at a fraction of the report’s $11,760 per-page cost.

MAY

It pays to play I:

If there are any lingering doubts that politicians are beholden to the special interest who bankroll their campaigns, consider the money that has been spread among our state lawmakers—just from the oil and gas interests:

  • The 144 incumbent legislators have received more than $5.8 million in campaign contributions by a single special interest group—oil and gas. That comes to an average of $40,357 per legislator.
  • For the 39 current members of the Louisiana Senate, the aggregate is a little north of $2.8 million, or $51,100 each.
  • A total of $2.99 million was distributed among the 105 House members—an average of $40350 each, the figures show.

So, by obtaining a dismissal of litigation that could conceivably cost oil companies several hundred million dollars—before it ever goes to trial or even to the discovery stage—by spreading $5.8 million around represents a nice return on investment.

And make no mistake about it: campaign contributions are just that—investments.

It pays to play II:

The Senate Finance Committee on Sunday (Sen. Dan Claitor discarded their oaths of office—their sworn duty to protect the interests of the people of Louisiana—in favor of political expedience of the very lowest sort by ripping $4.5 million from the budget for Louisiana’s developmentally disabled and allocating the money for a Verizon IndyCar Series race at the NOLA Motorsports Park in Jefferson Parish.

LouisianaVoice conducted a search of the Secretary of State’s web page to learn the identities of the NOLA Motor Club corporate officers and whose name should pop up as one of the principals? Laney Chouest, that’s who.

So, who is Laney Chouest, you ask?

Well, he also showed up as an officer in a few other corporations run by the politically active Chouest family of Galliano. Their main business is in shipbuilding and Laney Chouest was listed as an officer in Edison Chouest Offshore, Inc., Alpha Marine Service Holdings, LLC. and Beta Marine Services, LLC., to name only three.

So, armed with that information we did a campaign contribution search of only the last name of Chouest and we hit the mother lode.

Between 2007 and 2010, members of the Chouest family and their various businesses contributed $106,500 to Jindal.

JUNE

Legislator’s firm cited for environmental infractions:

A citation and a cease order issued to Dual Trucking Co. by the Montana Department of Environmental Equality for dumping oilfield radioactive waste from the nearby Bakken Oilfield, it turns out, is not the only problem State Rep. Gordon Dove (R-Houma) has experienced with environmental authorities, Capitol News Service has learned.

Vacco Marine, Inc., a company owned by Dove, who chairs the House Committee on Natural Resources and Environment, has been the subject of several investigations, negative reports, citations, and compliance orders by and from the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) over a period of several years, records show.

Last week, while presiding over a meeting of the Natural Resources Committee, he joined 12 other members in passing an amendment to SB 469 that made the prohibition against suing oil companies for damages to the state’s wetlands and marshes retroactive.

Dove also serves as a member of the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority.

Lobbyists swarm to protect BP:

By now, most people who have followed the bill authored by Sen. Bret Allain (R-Franklin) but inspired by Sen. Robert Adley (R-Benton) know that big oil poured money and thousands of lobbying man hours into efforts to pass the bill with it accompanying amendment that makes the prohibition against such lawsuits retroactive to ensure that the SLPFA-E effort was thwarted.

Most followers of the legislature and of the lawsuit also know that up to 70 legal scholars, along with Attorney General Buddy Caldwell, strongly advised Jindal to veto the law because of the threat to the pending BP litigation.

Altogether, the 144 current legislators received more than $5 million and Jindal himself received more than $1 million from oil and gas interests. Allain received $30,000 from the oil lobby and Adley an eye-popping $600,000.

So, when BP lobbyists began swarming around the Capitol like so many blow flies around a bloated carcass, the assumption was that BP somehow had a stake in the passage of SB 469 and that infamous amendment making the bill retroactive.

John Barry, a former SLFPA-E who was given the Jindal Teague Treatment but who stuck around to pursue the lawsuit, said, “During the last few days of the session, we were very well aware that the BP lobbyists were extraordinarily active. They were all over the place. We all assumed there was definitely something it in for them.”

Something in it for them indeed.

Blogger Lamar White, Jr. observed that former Gov. Edwin Edwards spent eight years in a federal prison for accepting payments from hopeful casino operators for his assistance in obtaining licenses—all after he left office. New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was similarly convicted of using his position to steer business to a family-owned company and taking free vacations meals and cell phones from people attempting to score contracts or incentives from the city.

So what is the difference between what they did and the ton of contributions received by Adley and Jindal? To paraphrase my favorite playwright Billy Wayne Shakespeare, a payoff by any other name smells just as rank.

And while big oil money flowed like liquor at the State Capitol (figuratively of course; it’s illegal to make or accept campaign contributions during the legislative session), what many may not know is that Jindal may have had an ulterior motive in going against sound legal advice to sign the bill into law, thus protecting the interests of big oil over the welfare of Louisiana citizens who have seen frightening erosion of the state’s shoreline and freshwater marshes.

The Washington, D.C., law firm Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher is one of the firms that represented BP in negotiating a $4.5 billion settlement that ended criminal charges against the company. Included in that settlement amount was a $1.26 billion criminal fine to be paid over five years.

An associate of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher who has defended clients in government audit cases and in several whistleblower cases is one Nikesh Jindal.

He also is assigned to the division handling the BP case.

Nikesh Jindal is the younger brother of Gov. Piyush, aka Bobby Jindal.

Suddenly, John Barry’s words take on a little more significance: “We all assumed there was definitely something it in for them.”

Something in it for them indeed.

By now, most people who have followed the bill authored by Sen. Bret Allain (R-Franklin) but inspired by Sen. Robert Adley (R-Benton) know that big oil poured money and thousands of lobbying man hours into efforts to pass the bill with it accompanying amendment that makes the prohibition against such lawsuits retroactive to ensure that the SLPFA-E effort was thwarted.

Most followers of the legislature and of the lawsuit also know that up to 70 legal scholars, along with Attorney General Buddy Caldwell, strongly advised Jindal to veto the law because of the threat to the pending BP litigation.

Altogether, the 144 current legislators received more than $5 million and Jindal himself received more than $1 million from oil and gas interests. Allain received $30,000 from the oil lobby and Adley an eye-popping $600,000.

So, when BP lobbyists began swarming around the Capitol like so many blow flies around a bloated carcass, the assumption was that BP somehow had a stake in the passage of SB 469 and that infamous amendment making the bill retroactive.

John Barry, a former SLFPA-E who was given the Jindal Teague Treatment but who stuck around to pursue the lawsuit, said, “During the last few days of the session, we were very well aware that the BP lobbyists were extraordinarily active. They were all over the place. We all assumed there was definitely something it in for them.”

Something in it for them indeed.

 

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PAC money outstrips individual contributions by 2.5 to 1 for Congressman Cedric Richmond, fed. campaign records show

Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, Campaign Contributions, Congress, Elections, House, Senate, PACs, Politicians on October 3, 2014| 6 Comments »

Between U.S. Mary Landrieu and U.S. Rep. Bill Cassidy, the man who wants to replace her, incumbents in five of the state’s six November congressional races have received more than $21.5 million in campaign contributions, of which more than $6.5 million has come from political action committees, or PACs, according to figures provided by the Federal Elections Commission.

The number of corporate dollars that have flowed into the races is somewhat deceptive, however, because money given by corporate officers and board members are listed as individual contributions and is not counted with the PAC money.

LouisianaVoice has always maintained that political clout no longer belongs to the citizenry, but to special interest groups like corporations and corporate officers who pour money into political campaigns, in the process drowning out the voice of individual voters.

In two of the congressional races, PAC contributions to incumbents actually outpace those of individuals—Reps. Charles Boustany of the 3rd District ($984,000 to $769,000) and Cedric Richmond of the 2nd District ($723,000 to $278,000).

Even more alarming, each candidate we’ve reported on thus far has accepted money from PACs connected to corporations that have serious legal and ethical issues. Those issues include, among others, insider trading, influence peddling, environmental pollution, and fraud.

It might be of no real consequence if these were isolated occurrences, but they’re not. The same companies keep turning up in report after report is what has become a dangerous trend of corporate control of the entire Congress as the welfare of the American people has been all but crowded out of the picture and excluded from the national dialog.

Following is a partial list of some of Richmond’s PAC contributions:

ALTRIA GROUP PAC: $1,500

  • Altria Group, Inc. (previously named Philip Morris Companies Inc.) The name change alternative offers the possibility of masking the negatives associated with the tobacco business,” thus enabling the company to improve its image and raise its profile without sacrificing tobacco profits,
  • According to the Center for Public Integrity, Altria spent around $101 million on lobbying the U.S. government between 1998 and 2004, making it the second most active organization in the nation.
  • Altria also funded The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition which lobbied against the scientific consensus on climate change.
  • Daniel Smith, representing Altria, sits on the Private Enterprise Board of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

ARCHER DANIELS MIDLAND CO.: $1,000

  • On December 20, 2013 the SEC announced that it had charged ADM for failing to prevent illicit payments (bribes) made by its foreign subsidiaries to Ukrainian government officials in violation of federal statutes. ADM agreed to pay more than $36 million to settle the SEC’s charges.
  • In 1993, the company was the subject of a lysine price-fixing investigation. Senior ADM executives were indicted on criminal charges. Three of ADM’s top officials, including vice chairman Michael Andreas were eventually sentenced to federal prison in 1999. Moreover, in 1997, the company was fined $100 million, the largest antitrust fine in U.S. history at the time.
  • One hundred percent or more of overcharges resulting from price fixing are passed through to consumers.
  • The company has been the subject of several major federal lawsuits related to air pollution. In 2001, it agreed to pay a $1.46 million fine for violating federal and Illinois clean-air regulations at its Decatur feed plant and to spend $1.6 million to reduce air pollution there.
  • The company paid $4.5 million in penalties and more than $6 million to support environmental projects. In addition, ADM agreed to eliminate more than 60,000 tons of emissions of carbon monoxide, particulate matter, organic volatile chemicals and other pollutants from 42 plants in 17 states at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars.

AT&T PAC: $6,000

  • AT&T is the second-largest donor to United States political campaigns, and the top American corporate donor, having contributed more than US$47.7 million since 1990, 56% and 44% of which went to Republican and Democratic recipients, respectively. Also, during the period of 1998 to 2010, the company expended US$130 million on lobbying in the United States. A key political issue for AT&T has been the question of which businesses win the right to profit by providing broadband internet access in the United States.
  • Bobby Jindal rejected an $80 million federal grant for the expansion of broadband internet service in rural Louisiana even as AT&T was contributing $250,000 to the Foundation run by Jindal’s wife Supriya after Gov. Jindal signed SB- 807 into law (Act 433) in 2008 over the objections of the Louisiana Municipal and the State Police Jury associations. The bill, the Consumer Choice for Television Act removed from local and parish governments their authority and responsibility to negotiate cable franchise agreements with companies that relied largely on locally-owned public infrastructure such as utility poles. The bill also allows AT&T to sell cable television service without the necessity of obtaining local franchises.
  • Bill Leahy, representing AT&T, sits on the Private Enterprise Board of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

CHESAPEAKE ENERGY CORP. PAC: $2,000

  • Former Chief Executive Aubrey McClendon borrowed $1.1 billion against his stake in thousands of company wells. The loans, undisclosed to shareholders, were used to fund McClendon’s operating costs for the Founders Well Participation Program, which offered him a chance to invest in a 2.5 percent interest in every well the company drills. McClendon in turn used the 2.5 percent stakes as collateral on those same loans. Analysts, academics and attorneys who reviewed the loan documents said the structure raised the potential for conflicts of interest and raised questions on the corporate governance and business ethics of Chesapeake Energy’s senior management. The company disagreed that this is a conflict of interest or a violation of business ethics.
  • Current CEO Doug Lawler was responsible for laying off over 800 employees—roughly 16 percent of the workforce—within a few months of taking the position. Lawler released waves of employees over the course of a few months. All of the layoffs culminated in October of 2013 when Lawler released a staggering 800 employees nationwide, 640 of whom were from the corporate office in Oklahoma City.
  • In June of 2014, the state of Michigan filed felony fraud and racketeering charges against Chesapeake Energy, alleging that the company canceled hundreds of land leases on false pretenses after it sought to obtain oil and gas rights. Chesapeake Energy disputed all charges.

CHEVRON EMPLOYEES PAC: $4,500

  • In 2003 a class action lawsuit against Chevron was sued in Ecuadorian court for $28 billion for making residents ill and damaging forests and rivers by discharging 18 billion US gallons of formation water into the Amazon. Chevron claimed that agreements with the Ecuadorian Government exempted the company from any liabilities.
  • In 2011, Ecuadorian residents were awarded $8.6 billion, based on claims of loss of crops and farm animals as well as increased local cancer rates. The award was later revised to $19 billion on appeals, which was then appealed to the Ecuadorean National Court of Justice. Chevron described the lawsuit as an “extortion scheme” and refused to pay the fine.
  • Chevron’s activities at its century-old Richmond refinery have been the subject of ongoing controversy. The project generated over 11 million pounds of toxic materials and caused more than 304 accidents. The Richmond refinery paid $540,000 in 1998 for illegally bypassing waste water treatments and failing to notify the public about toxic releases. Overall, Chevron is listed as potentially liable for 95 Superfund sites, with funds set aside by the EPA for clean-up.
  • Chevron’s operations in Africa have also been criticized as environmentally unsound. In 2002, Angola became the first country in Africa to levy a fine on a major multinational corporation operating within its borders when it demanded $2 million in compensation for oil spills allegedly caused by Chevron.
  • On October 16, 2003, Chevron U.S.A. settled a charge under the Clean Air Act, which reduced harmful air emissions by about 10,000 tons a year. In San Francisco, Chevron was ordered to spend almost $275 million to install and utilize innovative technology to reduce nitrogen and sulfur dioxide emissions at its refineries. In 2000, after violating the Clean Air Act at an offline loading terminal in El Segundo, California, Chevron paid a $6 million penalty as well as $1 million for environmental improvement projects.

CH2M HILL COMPANIES: $1,000

  • CH2M HILL used nearly $10 million in stimulus funding to design the elaborate Solyndra solar panel facility in Fremont, California. While CH2M HILL is in no danger of suffering the same bankruptcy plight, they also languish in a pool of mismanaged taxpayer funds. The firm has a history of fraud, kickbacks, violations, and cover-ups, not to mention one particular parallel with the Solyndra scandal—layoffs. This, despite receiving almost $2 billion in stimulus funding.
  • CH2M Hill has agreed to pay a total of $18.5 million in 2013 after admitting to defrauding the public by engaging in years of widespread time card fraud in its contract with the Department of Energy.

COMCAST: $5,000

  • Comcast’s customer satisfaction often ranks among the lowest in the cable industry.
  • With $18.8 million spent in 2013, Comcast has the seventh largest lobbying budget of any individual company or organization in the United States. Comcast employs multiple former U.S. congressmen as lobbyists.
  • Comcast also supports lobbying and PACs on a regional level, backing organizations such as the Tennessee Cable Telecommunications Association and the Broadband Communications Association of Washington PAC. Comcast and other cable companies have lobbied state governments to pass legislation restricting or banning individual cities from offering public broadband service. Municipal broadband restrictions of varying scope have been passed in a total of 20 US States, including Louisiana.

DELOITTE & TOUCHE PAC: $5,000

  • Deloitte has delayed payments to hundreds of thousands of unemployed in the State of California.
  • The firm has been working on a statewide case management system for California courts which originally had a budget of around $260 million. Almost $500 million has already been spent and costs are expected to run as high as $2 billion. No single court is yet fully operational. California’s Judicial Council terminated the project in 2012 citing actual deployment costs associated with the project and California’s budget concerns

DUKE ENERGY: $5,000

  • In 1999 the EPA initiated an enforcement action against Duke Energy for making modifications to old and deteriorating coal-burning power plants without getting permits under the Clean Air Act.
  • In 2002, researchers identified Duke Energy as the 46th-largest corporate producer of air pollution in the United States, with roughly 36 million pounds of toxic chemicals released into the air annually. Major pollutants included sulfuric and hydrochloric acid, chromium compounds, and hydrogen fluoride. The Political Economy Research Institute ranks Duke Energy 13th among corporations emitting airborne pollutants in the United States.

EMPLOYEES OF NORTHROP GRUMMAN PAC: $5,000

  • From 1990-2002, Northrop Grumman contributed $8.5 million to federal campaigns. The company gave more than $1 million to federal candidates in 2005-2006 election cycle, compared to $10.6 million given by all defense contractors in the same cycle. This was behind only General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin in the defense industry. Former Northrop Grumman Electronics Systems chief James Roche served as Secretary of the Air Force for two years under George W. Bush. Roche was eventually nominated to head the Army, but was forced to withdraw his nomination among accusations of mismanaging a contract with Boeing and of failing to properly handle the Air Force sexual assault scandals of 2003. At least seven former officials, consultants, or shareholders of Northrop Grumman held posts in the Bush administration.
  • Northrop Grumman has dealt with multiple scandals during its history. In 1995, Robert Ferro, an employee for TRW, a company acquired by Northrop Grumman, discovered that satellite components manufactured for the U.S. Air Force were faulty and likely to fail in operation. TRW allegedly suppressed Ferro’s report and hid the information from the Air Force, even after a satellite in space equipped with the faulty components experienced serious anomalies. Ferro later sued Northrop Grumman in federal court under the federal whistle-blower law. In April 2009 Northrop Grumman agreed to pay $325 million to settle the suit. Ferro was awarded $48.8 million of the settlement.
  • The company was sued in 1999 for allegedly knowingly giving the Navy defective aircraft. This suit sought $210 million in damages. Then in 2003, the company was sued for allegedly overcharging the U.S. government for space projects in the 1990s. Northrop Grumman paid $111.2 million to settle out of court.
  • In 2010, Virginia’s computer operations experienced a week-long computer outage. Northrop Grumman operated these systems under a $2.4 billion contract. As a result, as many as 45,000 citizens could not renew their driver’s licenses prior to their expiration. Computer systems for 26 of the state’s 89 agencies were affected and some data may have been permanently lost.

EXXON MOBIL CORP. PAC: $2,500

  • ExxonMobil has drawn criticism from scientists, science organizations and the environmental lobby for funding organizations critical of the Kyoto Protocol and seeking to undermine public opinion about the scientific conclusion that global warming is caused by the burning of fossil fuels. Mother Jones Magazine said the company channeled more than $8 million to 40 different organizations that have employed disinformation campaigns including “skeptical propaganda masquerading as journalism” to influence opinion of the public and of political leaders about global warming and that the company was a member of one of the first such groups, the Global Climate Coalition, founded in 1989. ExxonMobil’s support for these organizations has drawn criticism from the Royal Society, the academy of sciences of the United Kingdom. The Union of Concerned Scientists released a report in 2007 accusing ExxonMobil of spending $16 million, between 1998 and 2005, towards 43 advocacy organizations which dispute the impact of global warming. The report argued that ExxonMobil used disinformation tactics similar to those used by the tobacco industry in its denials of the link between lung cancer and smoking, saying that the company used “many of the same organizations and personnel to cloud the scientific understanding of climate change and delay action on the issue.” These charges are consistent with a purported 1998 internal ExxonMobil strategy memo, posted by the environmental group Environmental Defense, which said:

“Victory will be achieved when

  • Average citizens [and the media] ‘understand’ (recognize) uncertainties in climate science; recognition of uncertainties becomes part of the conventional wisdom;
  • Industry senior leadership understands uncertainties in climate science, making them stronger ambassadors to those who shape climate policy;
  • Those promoting the Kyoto treaty on the basis of extant science appear out of touch with reality.”

 

  • In 2003, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York announced that J. Bryan Williams, a former senior executive of Mobil Oil Corp., had been sentenced to three years and ten months in prison on charges of evading income taxes on more than $7 million in unreported income, including a $2 million kickback he received in connection with Mobil’s oil business in Kazakhstan. Documents filed with the court said Williams’ unreported income included millions of dollars in kickbacks from governments, persons, and other entities with whom Williams conducted business while employed by Mobil. In addition to his sentence, Williams must pay a fine of $25,000 and more than $3.5 million in restitution to the IRS, in addition to penalties and interest.

GLAXOSMITHKLINE PAC:  $1,000

  • In July 2012 GSK pleaded guilty to criminal charges and agreed to a pay $3 billion to settle the criminal charges as well as civil lawsuits in the largest settlement paid by a drug company at the time. The criminal charges were for promoting Paxil and Wellbutrin and for unapproved uses and failing to report safety data about Avandia:; GSK paid $1 billion to settle the criminal charges. The remaining $2 billion were part of the civil settlement over unapproved promotion and paying kickbacks, making false statements concerning the safety of Avandia; and reporting false prices to Medicaid. GSK also signed an agreement which obligated it to make major changes to the way it did business.

HONEYWELL PAC: $5,000

  • The EPA says that no corporation has been linked to a greater number of Superfund toxic waste sites than has Honeywell. Honeywell ranks 44th among U.S. corporations causing air pollution. The firm released more than 9.4 million pounds of toxins per year into the air. In 2001, Honeywell agreed to pay $150,000 in civil penalties and to perform $772,000 worth of reparations for environmental violations.
  • In 2003, a federal judge in New Jersey ordered the company to perform an estimated $400 million environmental remediation of chromium waste, citing “a substantial risk of imminent damage to public health and safety and imminent and severe damage to the environment.” In the same year, Honeywell paid $3.6 million to avoid a federal trial regarding its responsibility for trichloroethylene contamination in Illinois. In 2004, the State of New York announced that it would require Honeywell to complete an estimated $448 million cleanup of more than 165,000 pounds of mercury and other toxic waste dumped into Onondaga Lake in Syracuse, N.Y.

LOCKHEED MARTIN EMPLOYEES’ PAC: $5,000

  • Lockheed Martin received $36 billion in government contracts in 2008, more than any company in history. It does work for more than two dozen government agencies from the Department of Defense and the Department of Energy to the Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency. It’s involved in surveillance and information processing for the CIA, the FBI, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the National Security Agency (NSA), The Pentagon, the Census Bureau and the Postal Service.
  • Lockheed is listed as the largest U.S. government contractor and ranks third for number of incidents, and 21st for size of settlements. Since 1995 the company has agreed to pay $606 million to settle 59 instances of misconduct.
  • Through its political action committee (PAC), the company provides low levels of financial support to candidates who advocate national defense and relevant business issues. It was the top contributor to House Armed Services Committee chairman Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R-California), giving more than $50,000 in the most recent election cycle. It also topped the list of donors to Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI), chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee before his death in 2012.
  • Lockheed Martin Employees Political Action Committee is one of the 50 largest in the country. With contributions from 3,000 employees, it donates $500,000 a year to about 260 House and Senate candidates.
  • In March 2013, Maryland State Senate Majority Leader Rob Garagiola, while he was said to be dating a Lockheed Martin lobbyist, cosponsored a resolution which would give Lockheed Martin tax rebate worth millions of dollars related to hotel taxes paid at its CLE facility in Bethesda, MD. This was after Montgomery County Council refused to pass a similar resolution.

MARATHON OIL EMPLOYEES PAC: $10,000

  • Marathon gave $250,000 to the Supriya Jindal Foundation and Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration promptly awarded Marathon subsidiaries $5.2 million in state funds.

MICROSOFT CORP. PAC: $4,500

  • One of Microsoft’s business tactics, described by an executive as “embrace, extend and extinguish,” initially embraces a competing standard or product, then extends it to produce their own version which is then incompatible with the standard, which in time extinguishes competition that does not or cannot use Microsoft’s new version. Various companies and governments have sued Microsoft over this set of tactics, resulting in billions of dollars in rulings against the company.
  • Microsoft has been criticized for its involvement in censorship in the People’s Republic of China. Microsoft has also come under criticism for outsourcing jobs to China and India. There were reports of poor working conditions at a factory in southern China that makes some of Microsoft’s products.
  • To avoid providing stock options and medical and retirement benefits to employees, Microsoft hires thousands of temporary workers (temps) for the designing, editing and testing of its software. When a federal judge (upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court) outlawed the hiring of temps for longer than six months, Microsoft got around the ruling by laying off its temps for 100 days and then rehiring them.

MONSANTO CO.: $4,000

 

  • In 2003, Monsanto reached a $300 million settlement for manufacturing and dumping of the toxic chemical polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in Alabama.
  • In 2004, Monsanto, along with Dow and other chemical companies, were sued by a group of Vietnamese for the effects of its Agent Orange defoliant, used by the U.S. military in the Vietnam War. The case was dismissed.
  • In 2005, the US DOJ filed a Deferred Prosecution Agreement in which Monsanto admitted to violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and making false entries into its books and records. Monsanto also agreed to pay a $1.5 million fine. The case involved bribes paid to an Indonesian official.
  • The Monsanto Company Citizenship Fund has donated more than $10 million to various candidates since 2003. In 2011, Monsanto spent about $6.3 million lobbying Congress and the U.S. Department of Agriculture about regulations that would affect the production and distribution of genetically engineered produce.
  • US diplomats in Europe have worked directly for Monsanto.
  • Monsanto gave $186,250 to federal candidates in the 2008 election.
  • Monsanto spent $8.1 million opposing the passage of Proposition 37 in California, making it the largest donor against the initiative. Proposition 37, which was rejected in November 2012, would have mandated the disclosure of genetically modified crops used in the production of California food products.
  • More recently, as of October 2013, Monsanto and DuPont Co. are backing an anti- labeling campaign with roughly $18 million so far dedicated to the campaign.

 

PFIZER, INC. PAC: $2,500

 

  • In September 2009, Pfizer pleaded guilty to the illegal marketing of the arthritis drug Bextra for uses unapproved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and agreed to a $2.3 billion settlement, the largest health care fraud settlement at that time. Pfizer also paid the U.S. government $1.3 billion in criminal fines related to the “off-label” marketing of Bextra, the largest monetary penalty ever rendered for any crime. Called a repeat offender by prosecutors, this was Pfizer’s fourth such settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice in the previous ten years.

 

RAYTHEON CO. PAC: $7,500

  • In March 1990, Raytheon pleaded guilty to one felony count of illegally obtaining classified Air Force budget and planning documents. U.S. District Judge Albert V. Bryan, Jr. imposed a $10,000 criminal fine for one felony count of “conveyance without authority” and $900,000 in civil penalties and damages. The documents allegedly gave Raytheon an unfair advantage against its competitors in bidding for weapons contracts. Although the plea only involved 1983 Air Force documents, U.S. Attorney Henry Hudson said Raytheon also illegally obtained a wide range of secret Pentagon documents.
  • In October 1994, Raytheon paid $4 million to settle a U.S. government claim that it inflated a defense contract for antimissile radar. The PAVE PAWS (Precision Acquisition Vehicle Entry Phased Array Warning System) system was designed to detect incoming submarine-launched ballistic missiles. The government claimed in a federal lawsuit that Raytheon inflated a contract to upgrade two of four PAVE PAWS sites by proposing to hire higher-skilled employees than were necessary for the job.
  • Just one year earlier, on October 14, 1993, Raytheon paid $3.7 million to settle allegations that it misled the U.S. Department of Defense by overstating the labor costs involved in manufacturing Patriot missiles. “The recovery of this money is yet another warning to contractors that the Truth in Negotiations Act’s information disclosure requirements will be strictly and sternly enforced,” Assistant Attorney General Frank Hunger said.
  • The Patriot missile system was not the spectacular success in the Persian Gulf War that the American public was led to believe. There is little evidence to prove that the Patriot hit more than a few Scud missiles launched by Iraq during the Gulf War, and there are some doubts about even these engagements. The public and the U.S. Congress were misled by definitive statements of success issued by administration and Raytheon representatives during and after the war.

BOEING CO. PAC.: $2,000

  • In 2003, Lockheed Martin sued Boeing for industrial espionage to win the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) competition. Lockheed Martin claimed that the former employee Kenneth Branch, who went to work for McDonnell Douglas and Boeing, passed nearly 30,000 pages of proprietary documents to his new employers. Lockheed Martin argued that these documents allowed Boeing to win 19 of the 28 tendered military satellite launches.
  • In July 2003, Boeing was penalized, with the Pentagon stripping seven launches away from the company and awarding them to Lockheed Martin. Furthermore, the company was forbidden to bid for rocket contracts for a twenty-month period, which expired in March 2005. Boeing settled with the U.S. Department of Justice for $615 million.
  • On September 15, 2010, the World Trade Organization ruled that Boeing had received billions of dollars in illegal government subsidies.

DOW CHEMICAL EMPLOYEES PAC: $10,000

  • Dow was one of several manufacturers who began producing the napalm B compound under government contract from 1965. After experiencing protests and negative publicity, the other suppliers discontinued manufacturing the product, leaving Dow as the sole provider. The company said that it carefully considered its position, and decided, as a matter of principle, “its first obligation was to the government.” Despite a boycott of its products by anti-war groups and harassment of recruiters on some college campuses, Dow continued to manufacture napalm B until 1969. The USA continued to drop napalm bombs on North Vietnam until 1973.
  • Until the late 1970s, Dow produced DBCP (1,2-dibromo-3-chloropropane), a soil fumigant, and nematicide, sold under the names the Nemagon and Fumazone. Workers at Dow’s DBCP production plants were made sterile by exposure to the compound. These effects were consistent with animal experiments showing that DBCP sterilized rabbits. The workers successfully sued the company, and most domestic uses of DBCP were banned in 1977.
  • Areas along Michigan’s Tittabawassee River, which runs within yards of Dow’s main plant in Midland, were found to contain elevated levels of the cancer-causing chemical dioxin in November 2006. In July 2007, Dow reached an agreement with the EPA to remove 50,000 cubic yards of sediment from three areas of the riverbed and levees of the river that had been found to be contaminated. In November 2008, Dow Chemical along with the EPA and Michigan Department of Environmental Quality agreed to establish a Superfund to address dioxin cleanup of the Tittabawassee River, Saginaw River and Saginaw Bay.[48]
  • According to the EPA, Dow has some responsibility for 96 of the United States’ Superfund toxic waste sites, placing it in 10th place by number of sites.

GOLDMAN SACHS PAC: $5,000

  • A federal appeals court upheld the conviction of former Goldman Sachs Group Inc director Rajat Gupta, one of the biggest successes in federal prosecutors’ long-running probe to stop insider trading on Wall Street.
  • Federal prosecutors and Securities and Exchange Commission officials also investigated whether a senior Goldman investment banker, Matthew Korenberg, fed inside information to a Galleon Group portfolio manager named Paul Yook, according to separate reports in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

 

HOME DEPOT PAC: $2,500

  • In July 2005, former employee Michael Davis filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the Home Depot, alleging that his discharge was in retaliation for refusing to make unwarranted backcharges against vendors. Davis alleges that the Home Depot forced its employees to meet a set quota of backcharges to cover damaged or defective merchandise, forcing employees to make chargebacks to vendors for merchandise that was undamaged and not defective.
  • In the settlement of the litigation, Home Depot changed some of its corporate governance provisions. Home Depot also agreed to pay the plaintiff’s counsel $6 million in cash and $8.5 million in common stock.

WALMART STORES PAC: $6,000

  • Wal-Mart is the beneficiary of $96.5 million in economic development subsidies in Louisiana and $1.2 billion in tax breaks nationwide. Yet, in 2011, Walmart, four of whose owners are among the 11 richest Americans, decided to roll back health care coverage and to increase premiums for its employees. Wal-Mart still boasted that 90 percent of its employees had health coverage, neglecting to mention that more than half of those got their coverage through their spouses’ group coverage. The company provides no health coverage at all for new part time employees despite the company’s 24.7 percent gross profit martin that same year.
  • An April 2012 New York Times investigative report revealed that a former Walmart executive alleged that, in September 2005, Walmart de Mexico paid bribes throughout Mexico in order to obtain construction permits, information, and other favors. Concerns were raised that Walmart executives in the United States concealed the allegations. Reportedly, bribes were given to speed up construction permits, which gave Walmart a substantial advantage over its business competitors. A follow-up investigation by The New York Times published December 17, 2012, revealed evidence that regulatory permission for siting, construction, and operation of 19 stores were obtained through bribery.
  • A paper published in Farm Foundation in 1997 found that some small towns can lose almost half of their retail trade within ten years of a Walmart store opening.
  • A 2004 paper by two professors at Penn State University found that counties with Walmart stores suffered increased poverty compared with counties without Walmarts due to displacement of workers from higher-paid jobs in retail stores which customers no longer choose to patronize. A study in Nebraska looked at two different Walmarts, the first of which had just arrived and was in the process of driving everyone else out of business by cutting their prices to the bone. In the other Walmart, “they had successfully destroyed the local economy, there was a sort of economic crater with Wal-Mart in the middle; and, in that community, the prices were 17 percent higher.”
  • The Economic Policy Institute estimates that between 2001 and 2006, Walmart’s trade deficit with China alone eliminated nearly 200,000 U.S. jobs. Another study found that a new store increases net retail employment in the county by 100 jobs in the short term, half of which disappear over five years as other retail establishments close.
  • Walmart has been criticized by labor unions, community groups, grassroots organizations, religious organizations, environmental groups, and even Walmart’s own customers and employees. They have protested against the company’s policies and business practices, including charges of racial and gender discrimination. Other areas of criticism include the corporation’s foreign product sourcing, treatment of product suppliers, employee compensation and working conditions, environmental practices, the use of public subsidies, the company’s security policies and slavery. Wal-Mart denies doing anything wrong and maintains that low prices are the result of efficiency.

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Majority Whip Rep. Steve Scalise PAC contributions second to Landrieu as LouisianVoice tracks PAC money in Congress

Posted in ALEC, American Legislative Exchange Council, Campaign Contributions, Congress, House, Lobbyist, PACs, Senate on September 7, 2014| 7 Comments »

With $1.1 million reported U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, the House Majority Whip, is slightly ahead of Rep. Charles Boustany’s $984,000 but less than half of U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu’s $2.6 million to rank as the second leading recipient of contributions from political action committees (PACs) among Louisiana’s congressional delegation, according to information provided by the Federal Elections Commission.

While opponents in congressional races are quick to point out opponents’ vulnerability to political influence from special interest groups, each of the state’s eight-member (two senators and six representatives) accept contributions from PACs.

And it’s very important to them that they accept this money in private and out of the public eye. The last thing they want is for us to be watching to see where they get their funding.

It is this practice that is becoming more and more grating to the individual voters who do not have the means to match PACs on a dollar-for-dollar basis. And that imbalance long ago tipped the scales in favor of pharmaceutical companies, Wall Street banks, oil companies, tobacco (disguised under innocent-sounding corporate names) and defense contractors, to name only a few, at the expense of the interests of John Q. Citizen.

The various business and industry lobbyists, once a rare animal in Washington, had by the late 1970s become such a force that they outnumbered the 535 members of Congress 130 to one. The number of companies with offices in the nation’s capital grew from 175 in 1971 to 2,445 a decade later.

By 1978, nearly 2,000 different trade associations employed 50,000 staff members in Washington and in 1980 the U.S. Chamber of Commerce employed 45 full-time lobbyists.

They are all there for one reason and one reason only: to feed the beast and with each election (every two years for House members and every six year for the Senate) the beast grows ever-hungrier and it is the American voter who is being devoured.

Each incumbent has accepted PAC contributions but not all challengers have. For this reason, LouisianaVoice has taken on the project of providing a sampling of PAC contributions to each candidate for the House and Senate where applicable. Contributions to each candidate will be duly reported over the coming weeks.

Our fourth installment, presented here, is on the PAC contributions to U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise.

ALTRIA GROUP PAC: $6,500

  • Altria Group, Inc. (previously named Philip Morris Companies Inc.) The name change alternative offers the possibility of masking the negatives associated with the tobacco business,” thus enabling the company to improve its image and raise its profile without sacrificing tobacco profits,
  • According to the Center for Public Integrity, Altria spent around $101 million on lobbying the U.S. government between 1998 and 2004, making it the second most active organization in the nation.
  • Altria also funded The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition which lobbied against the scientific consensus on climate change.
  • Daniel Smith, representing Altria, sits on the Private Enterprise Board of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

AMERICAN AIRLINES: $2,000

  • American was accused of hiding repeated maintenance lapses from the FAA. Repair issues included such items as faulty emergency slides, improper engine coatings, incorrectly drilled holes, and other examples of shoddy workmanship. The most serious alleged lapse was a failure to repair cracks to pressure bulkheads; the rupture of a bulkhead could lead to cabin depressurization. It is also alleged that the airline retired one airplane in order to hide it from FAA inspectors.
  • AMR Corporation filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2011, and American announced capacity cuts in July 2012 due to the grounding of several aircraft associated with its bankruptcy and lack of pilots due to retirements. American notified more than 11,000 workers of possible job loss as part of its bankruptcy reorganization, and cut flights in September and October 2012.
  • As of November 2013 American Airlines and American Eagle received $10 million in annual federal subsidies.

AMERICAN BANKING ASSOCIATION PAC: $9,500

  • The financial crisis of 2007-2010 led to a sweeping overhaul of the United States financial regulatory system. The ABA spent $4.38 million on lobbying Congress in the first two quarters of 2011 alone. The ABA lobbied the White House, the departments of Agriculture, Treasury and Labor, and regulators such as the Federal Reserve, Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Securities and Exchange Commission.
  • As soon as the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act was signed into law on July 21, 2011, the American Bankers Association announced it would continue to lobby for fewer regulations on the Volcker Rule, derivatives regulations, and other pieces of the bill.

AMERICAN PETROLEUM INSTITUTE: $2,000

  • To help fight climate control legislation, API supports the Energy Citizens group. A leaked summer 2009 memo from API President Jack Gerard asked its member companies to urge their employees to participate in planned protests (designed to appear independently organized) against cap-and-trade legislation. “The objective of these rallies is to put a human face on the impacts of unsound energy policy and to aim a loud message at [20 different] states.” Gerard said that API would cover all organizational costs and handling of logistics. In response to the memo, an API spokesman told media that participants will be there (at protests) because of their own concerns, and that API is just helping them assemble. Texas residents who were not employed by the energy industry were turned away from the event.

BANK OF AMERICA CORP. PAC: $2,000

  • Bank of America (BOA) received $20 billion in the federal bailout from the U.S. government through the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) in 2009, as well as a guarantee of $118 billion to cover potential losses by the company—in addition to the $25 billion given to them in the fall 2008 through TARP. The additional payment was part of a deal with the U.S. government to preserve BOA’s merger with the troubled investment firm Merrill Lynch. Since then, members of Congress expressed concern that some of the recipients had been accused of misusing the bailout money and that loan applicants (particularly small business owners) were denied loans and credit card holders faced stiffer terms on the debt in their card accounts.
  • BOA received an additional $5.2 billion in government bailout money, channeled through American International Group (AIG).
  • On August 3, 2009, BOA agreed to pay a $33 million fine, without admission or denial of charges, to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over the non-disclosure of an agreement to pay up to $5.8 billion of bonuses at Merrill Lynch. The bank approved the bonuses before the merger but did not disclose them to its shareholders when the shareholders were considering approving the Merrill acquisition in December 2008. New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo commented after the suit and announced settlement that “the timing of the bonuses, as well as the disclosures relating to them, constituted a ‘surprising fit of corporate irresponsibility.”
  • In 2010, the bank was accused by the U.S. government of defrauding schools, hospitals, and dozens of state and local government organizations via misconduct and illegal activities involving the investment of proceeds from municipal bond sales. As a result, the bank agreed to pay $137.7 million, including $25 million to the Internal Revenue service and $4.5 million to state attorney general, to the affected organizations to settle the allegations.
  • On October 24, 2012, the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan filed a lawsuit alleging that BOA fraudulently cost American taxpayers more than $1 billion when it sold toxic mortgages to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The scheme was called ‘Hustle’, or High Speed Swim Lane.
  • In August 2014, BOA agreed to a near-$17 billion deal to settle claims against it relating to the sale of toxic mortgage-linked securities including subprime home loans, in what was believed to be the largest settlement in U.S. corporate history. The bank agreed to pay $9.65 billion in fines and $7 billion in relief to the victims of the faulty loans which included homeowners, borrowers, pension funds and municipalities.

BRIDGE POINT EDUCATION PAC: $3,000

  • In 2011, Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) chaired a hearing of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee that examined Bridgepoint Education, Inc., which had experienced near-exponential profit growth despite low graduation rates. Bridgepoint purchased two universities both were near bankruptcy—Ashford University in Iowa and the University of the Rockies in Colorado. When it purchased Ashford University in 2005, the university had less than 300 students but today has over 78,000 students, 99 percent of whom are online.
  • Harkin was critical of the fact that despite such growth of the company, student success was lacking. Sixty-three percent of students who enrolled at Ashford University during the 2008–2009 school year withdrew before completion of their respective programs. Harkin noted that Bridgepoint recorded more than $216 million in profits in 2010—86.5 percent of which came from federal funds. Harkin said of those figures, “In the world of for-profit higher education, spectacular business success is possible despite an equally spectacular record of student failure. Bridgepoint is a private company, but it is almost entirely dependent upon public funds … I think this is a scam, an absolute scam.”

BRISTOL-MYERS SQUIBB EMPLOYEE PAC: $2,000

  • The company was caught up in an accounting scandal in 2002 over a significant restatement of revenues from 1999 to 2001, the result of an improper booking of sales related by offering excess inventory to customers to create higher sales numbers. The company settled with the U.S. Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission for $150 million. In 2002, the company was involved in illegally maintaining a monopoly on Taxol, its cancer treatment, and it was again sued. The company settled for $125 million.

CAPITAL ONE FINANCIAL CORP.: $5,000

  • In July 2012, Capital One was sued for misleading millions of its customers, by charging them for payment protection or credit monitoring when they took out a card. The company agreed to pay $210 million and to refund two million customers.
  • In August 2014, Capital One and three collection agencies entered into an agreement to pay $75.5 million to end a consolidated class action lawsuit alleging that the companies used an automated dialer to call customers’ cellphones without consent.
  • In 2014, Capital One amended its terms of service to create a right for it to “contact you in any manner we choose”, including a” personal visit . . . at your home and at your place of employment.” It also asserted its right to “modify or suppress caller ID and similar services and identify ourselves on these services in any manner we choose.”

CHESAPEAKE ENERGY CORP. PAC: $10,000

  • Former Chief Executive Aubrey McClendon borrowed $1.1 billion against his stake in thousands of company wells. The loans, undisclosed to shareholders, were used to fund McClendon’s operating costs for the Founders Well Participation Program, which offered him a chance to invest in a 2.5 percent interest in every well the company drills. McClendon in turn used the 2.5 percent stakes as collateral on those same loans. Analysts, academics and attorneys who reviewed the loan documents said the structure raised the potential for conflicts of interest and raised questions on the corporate governance and business ethics of Chesapeake Energy’s senior management. The company disagreed that this is a conflict of interest or a violation of business ethics.
  • Current CEO Doug Lawler was responsible for laying off over 800 employees—roughly 16 percent of the workforce—within a few months of taking the position. Lawler released waves of employees over the course of a few months. All of the layoffs culminated in October of 2013 when Lawler released a staggering 800 employees nationwide, 640 of whom were from the corporate office in Oklahoma City.
  • In June of 2014, the state of Michigan filed felony fraud and racketeering charges against Chesapeake Energy, alleging that the company canceled hundreds of land leases on false pretenses after it sought to obtain oil and gas rights. Chesapeake Energy disputed all charges.

CHEVRON EMPLOYEES PAC: $10,000

  • In 2003 a class action lawsuit against Chevron was sued in Ecuadorian court for $28 billion for making residents ill and damaging forests and rivers by discharging 18 billion US gallons of formation water into the Amazon. Chevron claimed that agreements with the Ecuadorian Government exempted the company from any liabilities.
  • In 2011, Ecuadorian residents were awarded $8.6 billion, based on claims of loss of crops and farm animals as well as increased local cancer rates. The award was later revised to $19 billion on appeals, which was then appealed to the Ecuadorean National Court of Justice. Chevron described the lawsuit as an “extortion scheme” and refused to pay the fine.
  • Chevron’s activities at its century-old Richmond refinery have been the subject of ongoing controversy. The project generated over 11 million pounds of toxic materials and caused more than 304 accidents. The Richmond refinery paid $540,000 in 1998 for illegally bypassing waste water treatments and failing to notify the public about toxic releases. Overall, Chevron is listed as potentially liable for 95 Superfund sites, with funds set aside by the EPA for clean-up.
  • Chevron’s operations in Africa have also been criticized as environmentally unsound. In 2002, Angola became the first country in Africa to levy a fine on a major multinational corporation operating within its borders when it demanded $2 million in compensation for oil spills allegedly caused by Chevron.
  • On October 16, 2003, Chevron U.S.A. settled a charge under the Clean Air Act, which reduced harmful air emissions by about 10,000 tons a year. In San Francisco, Chevron was ordered to spend almost $275 million to install and utilize innovative technology to reduce nitrogen and sulfur dioxide emissions at its refineries. In 2000, after violating the Clean Air Act at an offline loading terminal in El Segundo, California, Chevron paid a $6 million penalty as well as $1 million for environmental improvement projects.

CITIGROUP: $3,500

  • In 2003, Citigroup published an investment brochure advising clients that “There is no ‘average consumer…Economic growth is powered by and largely consumed by the wealthy few.”
  • Heavy exposure to troubled mortgages compounded by poor risk management led Citigroup into trouble as the subprime mortgage crisis worsened in 2008. Citigroup announced on April 11, 2007, that it would eliminate 17,000 jobs, or about 5 percent of its workforce. Even after brokerage firm Bear Stearns ran into serious trouble in summer 2007, Citigroup decided the possibility of trouble with its CDO’s was so tiny that they excluded them from their risk analysis. With the crisis worsening, Citigroup announced on January 7, 2008 that it was considering cutting another 5 to 10 percent of its 327,000 member-workforce.
  • By November 2008, Citigroup was insolvent, despite its receipt of $25 billion in taxpayer funded federal TARP funds. On November 17, 2008, Citigroup announced plans for about 52,000 new job cuts—on top of 23,000 cuts already made during 2008.

COMCAST: $10,000

  • Comcast’s customer satisfaction often ranks among the lowest in the cable industry.
  • With $18.8 million spent in 2013, Comcast has the seventh largest lobbying budget of any individual company or organization in the United States. Comcast employs multiple former U.S. congressmen as lobbyists.
  • Comcast also supports lobbying and PACs on a regional level, backing organizations such as the Tennessee Cable Telecommunications Association and the Broadband Communications Association of Washington PAC. Comcast and other cable companies have lobbied state governments to pass legislation restricting or banning individual cities from offering public broadband service. Municipal broadband restrictions of varying scope have been passed in a total of 20 US States, including Louisiana.

DUKE ENERGY: $4,000

  • In 1999 the EPA initiated an enforcement action against Duke Energy for making modifications to old and deteriorating coal-burning power plants without getting permits under the Clean Air Act.
  • In 2002, researchers identified Duke Energy as the 46th-largest corporate producer of air pollution in the United States, with roughly 36 million pounds of toxic chemicals released into the air annually. Major pollutants included sulfuric and hydrochloric acid, chromium compounds, and hydrogen fluoride. The Political Economy Research Institute ranks Duke Energy 13th among corporations emitting airborne pollutants in the United States.

EMPLOYEES OF NORTHROP GRUMMAN PAC: $9,000

  • From 1990-2002, Northrop Grumman contributed $8.5 million to federal campaigns. The company gave more than $1 million to federal candidates in 2005-2006 election cycle, compared to $10.6 million given by all defense contractors in the same cycle. This was behind only General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin in the defense industry. Former Northrop Grumman Electronics Systems chief James Roche served as Secretary of the Air Force for two years under George W. Bush. Roche was eventually nominated to head the Army, but was forced to withdraw his nomination among accusations of mismanaging a contract with Boeing and of failing to properly handle the Air Force sexual assault scandals of 2003. At least seven former officials, consultants, or shareholders of Northrop Grumman held posts in the Bush administration.
  • Northrop Grumman has dealt with multiple scandals during its history. In 1995, Robert Ferro, an employee for TRW, a company acquired by Northrop Grumman, discovered that satellite components manufactured for the U.S. Air Force were faulty and likely to fail in operation. TRW allegedly suppressed Ferro’s report and hid the information from the Air Force, even after a satellite in space equipped with the faulty components experienced serious anomalies. Ferro later sued Northrop Grumman in federal court under the federal whistle-blower law. In April 2009 Northrop Grumman agreed to pay $325 million to settle the suit. Ferro was awarded $48.8 million of the settlement.
  • The company was sued in 1999 for allegedly knowingly giving the Navy defective aircraft. This suit sought $210 million in damages. Then in 2003, the company was sued for allegedly overcharging the U.S. government for space projects in the 1990s. Northrop Grumman paid $111.2 million to settle out of court.
  • In 2010, Virginia’s computer operations experienced a week-long computer outage. Northrop Grumman operated these systems under a $2.4 billion contract. As a result, as many as 45,000 citizens could not renew their driver’s licenses prior to their expiration. Computer systems for 26 of the state’s 89 agencies were affected and some data may have been permanently lost.

EXXON MOBIL CORP. PAC: $2,500

  • ExxonMobil has drawn criticism from scientists, science organizations and the environmental lobby for funding organizations critical of the Kyoto Protocol and seeking to undermine public opinion about the scientific conclusion that global warming is caused by the burning of fossil fuels. Mother Jones Magazine said the company channeled more than $8 million to 40 different organizations that have employed disinformation campaigns including “skeptical propaganda masquerading as journalism” to influence opinion of the public and of political leaders about global warming and that the company was a member of one of the first such groups, the Global Climate Coalition, founded in 1989. ExxonMobil’s support for these organizations has drawn criticism from the Royal Society, the academy of sciences of the United Kingdom. The Union of Concerned Scientists released a report in 2007 accusing ExxonMobil of spending $16 million, between 1998 and 2005, towards 43 advocacy organizations which dispute the impact of global warming. The report argued that ExxonMobil used disinformation tactics similar to those used by the tobacco industry in its denials of the link between lung cancer and smoking, saying that the company used “many of the same organizations and personnel to cloud the scientific understanding of climate change and delay action on the issue.” These charges are consistent with a purported 1998 internal ExxonMobil strategy memo, posted by the environmental group Environmental Defense, which said:

“Victory will be achieved when

  • Average citizens [and the media] ‘understand’ (recognize) uncertainties in climate science; recognition of uncertainties becomes part of the conventional wisdom;
  • Industry senior leadership understands uncertainties in climate science, making them stronger ambassadors to those who shape climate policy;
  • Those promoting the Kyoto treaty on the basis of extant science appear out of touch with reality.”
  • In 2003, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York announced that J. Bryan Williams, a former senior executive of Mobil Oil Corp., had been sentenced to three years and ten months in prison on charges of evading income taxes on more than $7 million in unreported income, including a $2 million kickback he received in connection with Mobil’s oil business in Kazakhstan. Documents filed with the court said Williams’ unreported income included millions of dollars in kickbacks from governments, persons, and other entities with whom Williams conducted business while employed by Mobil. In addition to his sentence, Williams must pay a fine of $25,000 and more than $3.5 million in restitution to the IRS, in addition to penalties and interest.

 GENERAL DYNAMICS: $2,000

  • In 2008, General Dynamics agreed to pay $4 million to settle a lawsuit brought by the US Government claiming a GD unit fraudulently billed the government for defectively manufactured parts used in US military aircraft and submarines. The US alleged that from September 2001 to August 2003 GD defectively manufactured or failed to test parts used in US military aircraft.

GLAXOSMITHKLINE PAC:  $1,000

  • In July 2012 GSK pleaded guilty to criminal charges and agreed to a pay $3 billion to settle the criminal charges as well as civil lawsuits in the largest settlement paid by a drug company at the time. The criminal charges were for promoting Paxil and Wellbutrin for unapproved uses and failing to report safety data about Avandia. GSK paid $1 billion to settle the criminal charges. The remaining $2 billion was part of the civil settlement over unapproved promotion and paying kickbacks, making false statements concerning the safety of Avandia; and reporting false prices to Medicaid.

KOCH INDUSTRIES: $10,000

  • From 1999 to 2003, Koch Industries was assessed more than $400 million in fines, penalties and judgments. In 2000, for 300 reported oil spills which had taken place across six states, Koch paid the largest civil fine ever imposed on a company for the illegal discharge of crude oil and petroleum products. The company agreed to pay a $30 million civil penalty, improve its leak-prevention programs and spend $5 million on environmental projects.
  • In 1996, an 8-inch-diameter steel pipeline operated by Koch Pipeline Company ruptured near Lively, Texas and began leaking butane gas. The vapor cloud ignited when two residents drove their pickup truck through the flammable vapors to get to a neighbor’s house to report the leak. The two were killed in the explosion. In 1999, a Texas jury found that negligence had led to the rupture of the Koch pipeline and awarded the victims’ families $296 million—the largest compensatory damages judgment in a wrongful death case against a corporation in U.S. history.
  • In 2000, a federal grand jury returned a 97-count indictment against Koch Industries for excess emissions of 85 metric tons of benzene, a known carcinogen. In 2001, Koch Industries was fined $20 million, of which $10 million was a criminal fine and $10 million to clean up the environment.
  • In 2008, Koch Industries discovered that the French affiliate Koch-Glitsch had violated bribery laws allegedly securing contracts in Algeria, Egypt, India, Morocco, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia after an investigation by Ethics Compliance officer, Egorova-Farines. After Koch Industries’ investigative team looked into her findings, the four employees involved were terminated. Egorova-Farines reported her findings immediately, and even after Koch’s investigators substantiated the findings, her “superiors removed her from the inquiry in August 2008 and fired her in June 2009, calling her incompetent.”
  • Koch Industries has spent more than $50 million to lobby in Washington between 2006 and October 2011.
  • The company has opposed the regulation of financial derivatives and limits on greenhouse gases. It sponsors free market foundations and causes and is one of the leading benefactors of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).
  • According to the Center for Responsive Politics, many of Koch Industries’ contributions have gone toward achieving legislation on energy issues, defense appropriations and financial regulation reform. Koch Industries has been criticized for the role the company plays in affecting climate change policy in the U.S.

LOCKHEED MARTIN EMPLOYEES’ PAC: $2,000

  • Lockheed Martin received $36 billion in government contracts in 2008, more than any company in history. It does work for more than two dozen government agencies from the Department of Defense and the Department of Energy to the Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency. It’s involved in surveillance and information processing for the CIA, the FBI, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the National Security Agency (NSA), The Pentagon, the Census Bureau and the Postal Service.
  • Lockheed is listed as the largest U.S. government contractor and ranks third for number of incidents, and 21st for size of settlements. Since 1995 the company has agreed to pay $606 million to settle 59 instances of misconduct.
  • Through its political action committee (PAC), the company provides low levels of financial support to candidates who advocate national defense and relevant business issues. It was the top contributor to House Armed Services Committee chairman Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R-California), giving more than $50,000 in the most recent election cycle. It also topped the list of donors to Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI), chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee before his death in 2012.
  • Lockheed Martin Employees Political Action Committee is one of the 50 largest in the country. With contributions from 3,000 employees, it donates $500,000 a year to about 260 House and Senate candidates.
  • In March 2013, Maryland State Senate Majority Leader Rob Garagiola, while he was said to be dating a Lockheed Martin lobbyist, cosponsored a resolution which would give Lockheed Martin tax rebate worth millions of dollars related to hotel taxes paid at its CLE facility in Bethesda, MD. This was after Montgomery County Council refused to pass a similar resolution.

MARATHON OIL EMPLOYEES PAC: $12,000

  • Marathon gave $250,000 to the Supriya Jindal Foundation and Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration promptly awarded Marathon subsidiaries $5.2 million in state funds.

MERCK & CO.:  $5,000

  • A US Justice Department fraud investigation began in 2000 when allegations were brought in two separate lawsuits filed by whistleblowers who alleged that Merck failed to pay proper rebates to Medicaid and other health care programs and paid illegal remuneration to health care providers. In 2008, Merck agreed to pay more than $650 million to settle charges that it routinely overbilled Medicaid for its most popular medicines. The settlement was one of the largest pharmaceutical settlements in history. The federal government received more than $360 million, plus 49 states and Washington, DC, received over $290 million. One whistleblower received a $68 million reward.
  • From 2002 through 2005 the Australian affiliate of Merck sponsored the eight issues of a medical journal, the Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine, published by Elsevier. Although it gave the appearance of being an independent peer-reviewed journal, without any indication that Merck had paid for it, the journal actually reprinted articles that originally appeared in other publications and that were favorable to Merck. The misleading publication came to light in 2009 during a personal injury lawsuit filed over Vioxx. Nine of 29 articles in the journal’s second issue referred positively to Vioxx. In 2009, the CEO of Elsevier’s Health Sciences Division, Michael Hansen, admitted that the practice was “unacceptable.”
  • In December 2013, Merck agreed to pay a total of $27.7 million dollars to 1,200 plaintiffs in a class action lawsuit alleging that the company’s osteoporosis drug had caused them to develop osteonecrosis of the jaw.

 MICROSOFT CORP. PAC: $8,500

  • One of Microsoft’s business tactics, described by an executive as “embrace, extend and extinguish,” initially embraces a competing standard or product, then extends it to produce their own version which is then incompatible with the standard, which in time extinguishes competition that does not or cannot use Microsoft’s new version. Various companies and governments have sued Microsoft over this set of tactics, resulting in billions of dollars in rulings against the company.
  • Microsoft has been criticized for its involvement in censorship in the People’s Republic of China. Microsoft has also come under criticism for outsourcing jobs to China and India. There were reports of poor working conditions at a factory in southern China that makes some of Microsoft’s products.
  • To avoid providing stock options and medical and retirement benefits to employees, Microsoft hires thousands of temporary workers (temps) for the designing, editing and testing of its software. When a federal judge (upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court) outlawed the hiring of temps for longer than six months, Microsoft got around the ruling by laying off its temps for 100 days and then rehiring them.

MORGAN STANLEY: $2,000

  • In 2003, Morgan Stanley agreed to pay $125 million in order to settle its portion of a $1.4 billion settlement brought by New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, the National Association of Securities Dealers, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, (SEC) and a number of state securities regulators, relating to intentionally misleading research motivated by a desire to win investment banking business with the companies covered.
  • Morgan Stanley settled a sex discrimination suit brought by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for $54 million in July 2004. In 2007, the firm agreed to pay $46 million to settle a class action lawsuit brought by eight female brokers.
  • In July 2004, the firm paid NASD a $2.2 million fine for more than 1,800 late disclosures of reportable information about its brokers.
  • In September 2004, the firm paid a $19 million fine imposed by NYSE for failure to deliver prospectuses to customers in registered offerings, inaccurate reporting of certain program trading information, short sale violations, failures to fingerprint new employees and failure to timely file exchange forms.
  • The New York Stock Exchange imposed a $19 million fine on January 12, 2005 for alleged regulatory and supervisory lapses, the largest fine ever imposed by NYSE at the time.
  • In 2005, a Florida jury found that Morgan Stanley failed to give adequate information to Ronald Perelman about Sunbeam thereby defrauding him and causing damages to him of $604 million. In addition, punitive damages were added for total damages of $1.450 billion after the firm’s attorneys infuriated the court by failing and refusing to produce documents, and falsely telling the court that certain documents did not exist. The ruling was overturned in 2007.
  • Morgan Stanley settled a class action lawsuit in 2006 by both current and former Morgan Stanley employees for unfair labor practices instituted upon those in the financial advisor training program. Employees of the program had claimed the firm expected trainees to clock overtime hours without additional pay and handle various administrative expenses as a result of their expected duties. Morgan Stanley settled for $42.5 million.
  • In May the firm agreed to pay a $15 million fine after the Securities and Exchange Commission accused the firm of deleting emails and failing to cooperate with SEC investigators.
  • FINRA announced a $12.5 million settlement with Morgan Stanley in 2007 over charges that the firm’s former affiliate, Morgan Stanley DW, Inc. (MSDW), failed on numerous occasions to provide emails to claimants in arbitration proceedings as well as to regulators. The company had claimed that the destruction of the firm’s email servers in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York’s World Trade Center resulted in the loss of all email before that date. In fact, the firm had millions of earlier emails that had been retrieved from backup copies stored in another location that was not destroyed in the attacks. Customers who had lost their arbitration cases against Morgan Stanley DW Inc. because of their inability to obtain these emails to demonstrate Morgan Stanley’s misconduct received a token amount of money as a result of the settlement.
  • In July 2007, Morgan Stanley agreed to pay $4.4 million to settle a class-action lawsuit for incorrectly charging clients for storage of precious metals.
  • In August 2007, Morgan Stanley was fined $1.5 million and paid $4.6 million in restitution to customers related to excessive mark-ups in 2,800 transactions. An employee was charged $40,000 and suspended for 15 days.
  • Under a 2008 settlement with New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo, the firm agreed to repurchase approximately $4.5 billion worth of auction rate securities. The firm was accused of misrepresenting auction rate securities in their sales and marketing.
  • In April 2010, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission announced the firm agreed to pay $14 million related to an attempt to hide prohibited trading activity in oil futures.
  • The Department of Justice sought a $4.8 million fine from Morgan Stanley for its part in an electricity price-fixing scandal. Con Edison estimated that the crime cost New York state consumers about $300 million. Morgan Stanley earned revenues of $21.6 million from the fraud.
  • Morgan Stanley agreed to pay a $5 million fine to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and an addition $1.75 million to CME and the Chicago Board of Trade after employees improperly executed fictitious sales in Eurodollar and Treasury note futures contracts.
  • On August 7, 2012, it was announced that Morgan Stanley would have to pay $4.8 million in fines in order to settle a price fixing scandal, which has been estimated to have cost New Yorkers $300 million.

MONSANTO CO. CITIZENSHIP PAC: $1,000

  • In 2003, Monsanto reached a $300 million settlement for manufacturing and dumping of the toxic chemical polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) in Alabama.
  • In 2004, Monsanto, along with Dow and other chemical companies, were sued by a group of Vietnamese for the effects of its Agent Orange defoliant, used by the U.S. military in the Vietnam War. The case was dismissed.
  • In 2005, the US DOJ filed a Deferred Prosecution Agreement in which Monsanto admitted to violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and making false entries into its books and records. Monsanto also agreed to pay a $1.5 million fine. The case involved bribes paid to an Indonesian official.
  • The Monsanto Company Citizenship Fund has donated more than $10 million to various candidates since 2003. In 2011, Monsanto spent about $6.3 million lobbying Congress and the U.S. Department of Agriculture about regulations that would affect the production and distribution of genetically engineered produce.
  • US diplomats in Europe have worked directly for Monsanto.
  • Monsanto gave $186,250 to federal candidates in the 2008 election.
  • Monsanto spent $8.1 million opposing the passage of Proposition 37 in California, making it the largest donor against the initiative. Proposition 37, which was rejected in November 2012, would have mandated the disclosure of genetically modified crops used in the production of California food products.
  • More recently, as of October 2013, Monsanto and DuPont Co. are backing an anti- labeling campaign with roughly $18 million so far dedicated to the campaign.

NATIONAL RIFLE ASSOCIATION POLITICAL VICTORY FUND: $4,500

NEWS CORP. PAC: $1,000

  • In 1999, The Economist reported that NewsCorp paid comparatively lower taxes and NewsCorp Investments made $20.1 billion in profits over the previous 11 years but had not paid net corporation tax. It also reported that after an examination of the available accounts, NewsCorp could normally have been expected to pay a corporate tax of approximately $350 million. The article explained that in practice, the corporation’s complex structure, international scope and use of offshore tax havens allowed News Corporation to pay minimal taxes.
  • In July 2011, NewsCorp closed down the News of the World newspaper in the United Kingdom due to allegations of phone hackings. The allegations include trying to access former Prime Minister Gordon Brown‘s voice mail, and obtain information from his bank accounts, family’s medical records, and private legal files. Allegations of hacking have also been brought up in relation to former Prime Minister Tony Blair, and the Royal Family.

 PHARMACEUTICAL RESEARCH & MANUFACTURERS OF AMERICA (PhRMA): $2,000

  • Former Congressman Billy Tauzin (R-Louisiana) resigned from Congress and began work as the head of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, or PhRMA, a powerful trade group for pharmaceutical companies. Two months before resigning as chair of the committee which oversees the drug industry, switching from regulator to lobbyist, Tauzin played a key role in shepherding through Congress the Medicare Prescription Drug Bill, a bill which was criticized by opponents for being too generous to the pharmaceutical industry.
  • This link was explored at great length in an April 1, 2007 interview by Steve Kroft of 60 Minutes. The report, Under the Influence, pitted Rep. Walter B. Jones (R-N.C.) and Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.) against Tauzin and accused him of using unethical tactics to push a bill that “the pharmaceutical lobbyists wrote.” Along with Tauzin, many of the other individuals who worked on the bill are now lobbyists for the pharmaceutical industry.

 

PFIZER, INC. PAC: $6,500

  • In September 2009, Pfizer pleaded guilty to the illegal marketing of the arthritis drug Bextra for uses unapproved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and agreed to a $2.3 billion settlement, the largest health care fraud settlement at that time. Pfizer also paid the U.S. government $1.3 billion in criminal fines related to the “off-label” marketing of Bextra, the largest monetary penalty ever rendered for any crime. Called a repeat offender by prosecutors, this was Pfizer’s fourth such settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice in the previous ten years.

SAFARI CLUB INTERNATIONAL PAC: $1,000

  • SCI has been criticized by the Humane Society for supporting the hunting of endangered African antelope at fenced game ranches in Texas and Florida and for giving awards for the hunting of big cats and elephant, lion, rhino and buffalo in Africa.
  • In 2005, controversy erupted over tax write-offs taken by big game hunters for donations of trophies to museums. IRS rules allowed only the fair market value of such donations to be deducted. In most cases, the donations were worth only a fraction of the claimed value, and often accumulated in museum storage facilities.
  • For the tax year ending June 2006, SCI reported $2.9 million in revenue from SCI publications, $3.2 million in membership dues, $205,967 in interest on savings and temporary investments, $75,771 from sales of assets other than inventory, $6.9 million from special events such as the annual convention, $156,014 from sales of inventory, and $6,089 miscellaneous income.
  • In 2007, the New York legislature earmarked $50,000 of public funds for SCI.

GOLDMAN SACHS GROUP PAC: $4,000

  • A federal appeals court upheld the conviction of former Goldman Sachs Group Inc director Rajat Gupta, one of the biggest successes in federal prosecutors’ long-running probe to stop insider trading on Wall Street.
  • Federal prosecutors and Securities and Exchange Commission officials also investigated whether a senior Goldman investment banker, Matthew Korenberg, fed inside information to a Galleon Group portfolio manager named Paul Yook, according to separate reports in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

HOME DEPOT PAC: $10,000

  • In July 2005, former employee Michael Davis filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the Home Depot, alleging that his discharge was in retaliation for refusing to make unwarranted backcharges against vendors. Davis alleges that the Home Depot forced its employees to meet a set quota of backcharges to cover damaged or defective merchandise, forcing employees to make chargebacks to vendors for merchandise that was undamaged and not defective.
  • In the settlement of the litigation, Home Depot changed some of its corporate governance provisions. Home Depot also agreed to pay the plaintiff’s counsel $6 million in cash and $8.5 million in common stock.

UNITEDHEALTH GROUP PAC: $5,000

 

  • In 2010, UnitedHealth Group spent more than $1.8 million on lobbying activities to achieve favorable legislation, and hired seven different lobbying firms to work on its behalf. In addition, its corporate political action committee spent an additional $1 million on lobbying activities in 2010.
  • In 2006, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) began investigating the conduct of UnitedHealth Group’s management and directors, for backdating of stock options. Investigations were also begun by the Internal Revenue Service and prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York. The investigations came to light after a series of Wall Street Journal stories in May 2006, claiming backdating of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of stock options by UHC management. The backdating apparently occurred with the knowledge and approval of the directors, according to the Journal. On October 15, 2006, CEO William McGuire was forced to resign, and relinquish hundreds of millions of dollars in stock options. In December 2007, the SEC announced a settlement under which McGuire would repay $468 million, as a partial settlement.
  • In June 2006, the American Chiropractic Association filed a national class action lawsuit against the American Chiropractic Network (ACN), which is owned by UnitedHealth Group and administers chiropractic benefits, and against UnitedHealth Group itself, for alleged practices in violation of the federal Racketeer Influence and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO).

WALMART STORIES PAC: $4,000

  • Wal-Mart is the beneficiary of $96.5 million in economic development subsidies in Louisiana and $1.2 billion in tax breaks nationwide. http://www.walmartsubsidywatch.org/state_detail.html?state=LA Yet, in 2011, Walmart, four of whose owners are among the 11 richest Americans, decided to roll back health care coverage and to increase premiums for its employees. (Does this sound familiar, Bobby Jindal?) Wal-Mart still boasted that 90 percent of its employees had health coverage, neglecting to mention that more than half of those got their coverage through their spouses’ group coverage. The company provides no health coverage at all for new part time employees despite the company’s 24.7 percent gross profit martin that same year.
  • An April 2012 New York Times investigative report revealed that a former Walmart executive alleged that, in September 2005, Walmart de Mexico paid bribes throughout Mexico in order to obtain construction permits, information, and other favors. Concerns were raised that Walmart executives in the United States concealed the allegations. Reportedly, bribes were given to speed up construction permits, which gave Walmart a substantial advantage over its business competitors. A follow-up investigation by The New York Times published December 17, 2012, revealed evidence that regulatory permission for siting, construction, and operation of 19 stores were obtained through bribery.
  • A paper published in Farm Foundation in 1997 found that some small towns can lose almost half of their retail trade within ten years of a Walmart store opening.
  • A 2004 paper by two professors at Penn State University found that counties with Walmart stores suffered increased poverty compared with counties without Walmarts due to displacement of workers from higher-paid jobs in retail stores which customers no longer choose to patronize. A study in Nebraska looked at two different Walmarts, the first of which had just arrived and was in the process of driving everyone else out of business by cutting their prices to the bone. In the other Walmart, “they had successfully destroyed the local economy, there was a sort of economic crater with Wal-Mart in the middle; and, in that community, the prices were 17 percent higher.”
  • The Economic Policy Institute estimates that between 2001 and 2006, Walmart’s trade deficit with China alone eliminated nearly 200,000 U.S. jobs. Another study found that a new store increases net retail employment in the county by 100 jobs in the short term, half of which disappear over five years as other retail establishments close.
  • Walmart has been criticized by labor unions, community groups, grassroots organizations, religious organizations, environmental groups, and even Walmart’s own customers and employees. They have protested against the company’s policies and business practices, including charges of racial and gender discrimination. Other areas of criticism include the corporation’s foreign product sourcing, treatment of product suppliers, employee compensation and working conditions, environmental practices, the use of public subsidies, the company’s security policies and slavery. Wal-Mart denies doing anything wrong and maintains that low prices are the result of efficiency.

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Fleming PR flunky tries to separate his boss from Payday Loans but we have Secretary of State’s corporate records

Posted in Campaign Contributions, Congress, Lobbyist, Media, PACs, Public Records on September 5, 2014| 26 Comments »

Occasionally we manage to strike a raw nerve with our blog posts about political shenanigans in Louisiana. Our post on Tuesday (Sept. 2) about U.S. Rep. John C. Fleming’s campaign contributions apparently was a case in point.

But it wasn’t the fact that Fleming, a Republican from Minden and a physician, has taken more than $200,000 from special interest political action committees (PACs) this election cycle.

Nor was there any dispute about our claim that Fleming brooks no dissenting opinion and blocks access to his Facebook page to anyone who disagrees with him.

But apparently, he doesn’t want it known that he once owned and/or operated a payday loan company.

On Friday (Sept. 5) we received a terse email from Fleming’s communications director, one Doug Sachleben, protesting that part of our post as being incorrect.

Sachleben did not say whether he works out of Louisiana or Washington, but that really is irrelevant. Here is the verbatim content of his email:

In your piece on my boss, the portion below is wrong. Rep Fleming has never owned or operated a payday loan company. I’d appreciate if you removed that.

 Doug Sachtleben

Communications Dir.

Rep John Fleming

He then lifted a quote from our Tuesday blog post, apparently for our benefit:

“Fleming, a doctor who apparently did not make enough money as a medical practitioner, once ran a payday loan company, an enterprise that offers short-term loans to low income families at the friendly annualized interest rate of up to 390 percent.”

Well, we hate being wrong. That’s why we researched our story in advance.

Accordingly, we went to our original source, the corporate records contained on the Louisiana Secretary of State’s web page.

In response to Sachleben, we copied and pasted a number of corporations listed in John C. Fleming’s name. These included Fleming Expansions, Fleming Acquisitions, Minden Family Care Center (a Professional Medical Corporation), Fleming for Congress, LLC, 1 Subway, LLC, Fleming Payday Loans, LLC.

Each of the corporations included the name of John C. Fleming as either an officer or an agent and in some instances, both. In a few cases, Fleming’s wife Cynthia also was listed as an officer.

More importantly, each of the six corporations had the same domicile address: 119 Homer Road in Minden.

Fleming and his wife also were owners, officers and agents in a dating service, Fleming Dating Development, Inc.

We replied to Sachleben, attaching a copy of the Fleming Payday Loans, LLC corporate records.

He wrote back this explanation:

At that time there were a lot of employees requesting advances on their paychecks. To pay people in advance of their work would have been problematic for many reasons and an accounting nightmare. The Fleming Group formed an LLC on paper with the thought of offering temporary interest-free loans to only its employees to accommodate their requests. The more it was considered, the more problematic it appeared; so they scrapped the idea entirely. There was never any desire or consideration to get into the payday loan industry as a business.

Wow.

In his incredulous clarification, he neglected to explain how a “problematic idea” managed to be incorporated on September 2, 2004, and the affidavit to dissolve was not filed until Aug. 4, 2009—a year after he elected to Congress. Why would Fleming leave a “problematic idea” on the books for five years when he would have been required to file annual reports, tax returns and other paperwork?

And while he’s at it, perhaps Sachleben can also offer either a denial of those campaign contributions (taken directly from Fleming’s campaign finance reports) or explain why his boss would accept funds from outfits with such tawdry records of fraud, influence peddling and other unsavory activity.

Here are the Secretary of State’s web page printouts on Fleming’s corporate entities:

 

FLEMING EXPANSIONS, L.L.C. Limited Liability Company MINDEN Active

 

Previous Names
Business: FLEMING EXPANSIONS, L.L.C.
Charter Number: 34627521K
Registration Date: 4/20/1998

 

Domicile Address
119 HOMER RD
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Mailing Address
119 HOMER ROAD
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Status
Status: Active
Annual Report Status: In Good Standing
File Date: 4/20/1998
Last Report Filed: 3/27/2014
Type: Limited Liability Company

 

Registered Agent(s)

 

Agent: MIKE TOLAND
Address 1: 119 HOMER RD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055
Appointment Date: 3/30/2011

 

Officer(s) Additional Officers: No 

 

Officer: JOHN C. FLEMING
Title: Member
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055
FLEMING PAYDAY LOANS, L.L.C. Limited Liability Company MINDEN Inactive

 

Previous Names
Business: FLEMING PAYDAY LOANS, L.L.C.
Charter Number: 35772196K
Registration Date: 9/2/2004

 

Domicile Address
119 HOMER ROAD
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Mailing Address
C/O JOHN C. FLEMING
119 HOMER ROAD
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Status
Status: Inactive
Inactive Reason: Voluntary Action
File Date: 9/2/2004
Last Report Filed: 8/18/2008
Type: Limited Liability Company

 

Registered Agent(s)

 

Agent: JOHN C. FLEMING
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055
Appointment Date: 9/2/2004

 

Officer(s) Additional Officers: No 

 

Officer: JOHN C. FLEMING
Title: Manager
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

FLEMING FOR CONGRESS, L.L.C. Limited Liability Company MINDEN Active

 

Previous Names
Business: FLEMING FOR CONGRESS, L.L.C.
Charter Number: 36736015K
Registration Date: 4/30/2008

 

Domicile Address
119 HOMER ROAD
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Mailing Address
119 HOMER ROAD
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Status
Status: Active
Annual Report Status: In Good Standing
File Date: 4/30/2008
Last Report Filed: 4/8/2014
Type: Limited Liability Company

 

Registered Agent(s)

 

Agent: MIKE TOLAND
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055
Appointment Date: 11/30/2011

 

Officer(s) Additional Officers: No 

 

Officer: JOHN C. FLEMING, III
Title: Manager
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

MINDEN FAMILY CARE CENTER (A PROFESSIONAL MEDICAL CORPORATION) Business Corporation MINDEN Active

 

Previous Names
PARK CITY HEALTH SERVICES (A PROFESSIONAL MEDICAL CORPORATION) (Changed: 3/14/2012)
Business: MINDEN FAMILY CARE CENTER (A PROFESSIONAL MEDICAL CORPORATION)
Charter Number: 34480626D
Registration Date: 12/19/1994

 

Domicile Address
119 HOMER RD.
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Mailing Address
119 HOMER RD.
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Status
Status: Active
Annual Report Status: In Good Standing
File Date: 12/19/1994
Last Report Filed: 12/3/2013
Type: Business Corporation

 

Registered Agent(s)

 

Agent: MIKE TOLAND
Address 1: 119 HOMER RD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055
Appointment Date: 12/2/2010

 

Officer(s) Additional Officers: No 

 

Officer: JOHN C. FLEMING, M.D.
Title: President, Director
Address 1: 1240 COUNTRY CLUB CIRCLE
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Officer: CYNTHIA B. FLEMING
Title: Director, Secretary
Address 1: 1240 COUNTRY CLUB CIRCLE
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

FLEMING ACQUISITIONS, L.L.C. Limited Liability Company MINDEN Inactive

 

Previous Names
MAIL BOXES 1, L.L.C. (Changed: 10/8/1999)
Business: FLEMING ACQUISITIONS, L.L.C.
Charter Number: 34525360K
Registration Date: 4/25/1996

 

Domicile Address
119 HOMER RD.
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Mailing Address
119 HOMER RD.
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Status
Status: Inactive
Inactive Reason: Voluntary Action
File Date: 4/25/1996
Last Report Filed: 5/2/2012
Type: Limited Liability Company

 

Registered Agent(s)

 

Agent: MIKE TOLAND
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055
Appointment Date: 4/8/2011

 

Officer(s) Additional Officers: No 

 

Officer: JOHN C. FLEMING, JR.
Title: Member
Address 1: 119 HOMER RD.
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Officer: CYNTHIA B. FLEMING
Title: Member, Manager
Address 1: 119 HOMER RD.
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Officer: MIKE TOLAND
Title: Manager
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

1 SUBWAY, L.L.C. Limited Liability Company MINDEN Active

 

Previous Names
Business: 1 SUBWAY, L.L.C.
Charter Number: 34529383K
Registration Date: 5/31/1996

 

Domicile Address
119 HOMER RD.
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Mailing Address
119 HOMER RD.
MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Status
Status: Active
Annual Report Status: In Good Standing
File Date: 5/31/1996
Last Report Filed: 5/12/2014
Type: Limited Liability Company

 

Registered Agent(s)

 

Agent: MIKE TOLAND
Address 1: 119 HOMER RD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055
Appointment Date: 5/16/2011

 

Officer(s) Additional Officers: No 

 

Officer: JOHN C. FLEMING, JR.
Title: Member
Address 1: 119 HOMER RD.
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Officer: CYNTHIA B. FLEMING
Title: Member
Address 1: 119 HOMER RD.
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

 

Officer: MIKE TOLAND
Title: Manager
Address 1: 119 HOMER ROAD
City, State, Zip: MINDEN, LA 71055

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