OPINION - Shields and Brooks 9/27/2019

"Shields and Brooks on the politics of impeachment" PBS NewsHour 9/27/2019

REMINDER:  An 'impeachment inquiry' is just gathering evidence of the charge.  It takes a "Charge of Impeachment," presented to the House for a vote, to start actual impeachment.

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s political news, including the details of the phone call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s decision to open an impeachment inquiry into the matter and potential 2020 political reaction to impeachment.

Judy Woodruff (NewsHour):  And now back in Washington, fallout from the whistle-blower's complaint, as the formal impeachment inquiry picks up steam.

And to help analyze this historic week, I'm joined by Shields and Brooks.  That is syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

Hello to both of you.

So much going on this week, but I think we know where to start.

And that is — David, looking back at this conversation that took place in July between President Trump, the President of Ukraine, the White House continues to say this is perfectly appropriate, the President said perfect, conversation with the leader of another country.  Democrats are saying it was a violation of his oath, an impeachable offense.

David Brooks, New York Times:  Yes.

I'm a little mystified.  I think they're sincere.  They thought it was exculpatory.  But I don't see how they could actually think that.

I mean, the crucial thing to do with that transcript is to look at the logic chain of the thing.  So Trump says, we have been very generous to you.  You haven't always been generous to us.  We have been more generous than the others.

And then — then that follows with, well, maybe you can do us a favor.  And that favor is to investigate the Bidens.

So when you just break down the logic chain, it's a very clear, we did this for you, you owe us, here's what you can do for us.

And that is — it's not an explicit quid pro quo, but it comes pretty close, I think.

Judy Woodruff:  Are there shades of questions here about what happened in that conversation, Mark, or is it clear-cut for you?

Mark Shields, syndicated columnist:  It's clear-cut, Judy.

I mean, what it puts to rest is the lie about the confidence of the Trump campaign:  We're leading in all polls.  We're ahead.

He was so terrified, so intimidated, the President of the United States got on the phone with the leader of Ukraine to get dirt on the one Democrat who in every major poll was beating him and that candidate's son.

I mean, this shows the terror, the intimidation.  And the false bravado is just totally exposed.  And it is — David — I think David was more than kind.  It is totally explicit.

This is a country, Judy, that has a smaller army than that of Sri Lanka.  I mean, it's sitting on the doorstep of Russia, that has shown nothing but imperial totalitarian impulses toward it, translated into physical action.  It's got an economy smaller than that of El Salvador.  And we're holding $451 million?

And the President of the United States — it's a supplicant, mendicant.  It's the boss to the lowest employee.  I mean, the power is totally disproportionate.  And anybody has to acknowledge that who sees it.

Judy Woodruff:  And, David, you still have Republicans, though, saying, highly appropriate for the United States to be saying to the leader of Ukraine, we want you to clean up corruption in your country, that was what…

David Brooks:  Yes.  Well, that is appropriate, I suppose, to say.

But the Republicans are not going to break on this.  And that's, I think, when — as we look at impeachment — I vaguely remember Watergate.  I was young.  But I remember a sense of gravity, a sense that we're stepping outside our party lines.  At least some people did that, Sam Ervin [D-NC], other people, Howard Baker [R-Tn].  And we're going to weigh the evidence.  And this is so serious, we can't just play normal politics.

That's not going to happen this time.  To me, this is already feeling like very normal politics, where the Democrats are going to be all here and the Republicans will be all here, and the idea of stepping outside your partisan affiliation for the sake of the truth, that's just not the way the game is played anymore.

Judy Woodruff:  Well, I want to ask you both about the role that the whistle-blower played in all this.

We learned several days ago that this is someone in the intelligence community, in the last few days, Mark, reporting, that it's an analyst at the CIA.  We don't have the name.  In fact, we're not supposed to have the name.  This person is supposed to be — identity is supposed to be protected.

But the President is calling this individual a spy, in effect, saying, this is somebody who's disloyal to the country.

Mark Shields:  Last week, the President branded the person a partisan hack, you will recall.  It's gone now to treachery.

I mean, the person who did it, Judy, assuming that it's a person of rational — and I think it's an intelligent and comprehensive and well-written complaint — had to know what he or she was putting at risk, in the hothouse in which we live here in Washington, that the identity will eventually be made public.

And I think it can only be revealed and described as act of great — of great courage to do so.

Judy Woodruff:  And pulling in, David, a number of other administration officials, which is what's launching the congressional…

David Brooks:  Yes.

That was the big thing I took away from the report, that it was — it's bigger than just one phone call.

Mark Shields:  Yes.

David Brooks:  It's partly the cover-up, but he said it was over a series of months.  There's a lot of people who were in a panic about this.

And so it's not just that one phone call, and then he heard about it.  But there was a process.  There were people who were freaked out about it.  And so there's a little more here than just one person who's going to be involved in this.

Mark Shields:  David's right, Judy, that he laid out a blueprint.

That's what the letter does and the statement does.  It's a blueprint to pursue investigation, to interview and expand.

Judy Woodruff:  And the fact that this person, what, spent four months, collected — talked to a number of different people.

Mark Shields:  Yes.

Judy Woodruff:  Didn't just rashly set this — set this out there and throw it out.

Mark Shields:  No.

Judy Woodruff:  But the question then comes down to is, David, the impeachment inquiry.

The House is doubling down.  We had Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence, on the program last night, saying, this is more serious than the Mueller report, which they spent months and months considering.

David Brooks:  Yes.

It's certainly narratively cleaner.  You can understand it, where Russia was much more complicated.  And, to me, the decision to do impeachment is a mistake.

They — I do agree Trump did something impeachable, but this is a political process, not a legal process.  There's no obligation to prosecute.

And, to me, it's a mistake for a couple reasons.  If your object is to get Donald Trump out of the White House, impeachment doesn't get you there, because the chance that you will get 20 senators, 20 Republican senators, to vote to vote Donald Trump out of office seems to me so remote, it's minuscule.

So the likely outcome of this is that Donald Trump will say, see, I was acquitted in the Senate.  I'm vindicated.  I beat these people.

And so he will get a little victory.  And then both parties will go into revolt.  And so that's the way it likely looks to end up.

In the meantime, you're trampling over your Democratic primary season.  You're not having the debate the voters want, which is about climate change and health care and jobs and stuff like that.

You're focusing all the attention on the Democratic side, or the bulk of it, to the Congress, not to the Presidential candidates.  And, to me, so what Pelosi has done, I think, here is taken a decision that has a very low chance of succeeding, to get him out of office, but has huge risks in ways we can't even imagine.

And so I'm a little nervous about where impeachment is going to get us.

Judy Woodruff:  You think the Democrats are doing the right thing, or not?

Mark Shields:  The Democrats are doing the only thing they can do.

I mean, what this President has done is not outrageous.  It's not indefensible.  It's criminal.  And that's what he's done.  He has totally abdicated, abrogated and corrupted his oath of office.

So when it comes to making this decision, I think the preeminent national American political leader of the 21st century is the Speaker of the House, more so than any President.  She single-handedly passed the Affordable Care Act.

She is the one major figure in the national firmament of any Presidential candidate who opposed the folly and the debacle and the tragedy of the war in Iraq.  She put at risk her majority to pass the Affordable Care Act, covering 17 million Americans, two million of whom have lost their coverage as a result of Donald Trump's policies in the last year alone.

And she knew she was losing the majority.  And she came back.  She has not — she has avoided the rush to join the pound-of-flesh club, let's get — get him for double-parking outside an orphanage on the Capitol — on Christmas Eve.

This is just too serious.  You can't turn your back on it.  I agree with David it may not be politically good timing, expedient.  It would be an act of total irresponsibility not to act when you have the evidence given to the Democrats.

Judy Woodruff:  How do you…

David Brooks:  Yes, there's this thing called the ethical responsibility.  What's the actual outcome of the decision?

And maybe she couldn't act, but she said, I will not do impeachment unless there's a bipartisan upswell of support for this.

And there's not that.  And that will never happen right now.

And so I think she was — she was forced into it by the pressure in her own party, their own caucus.  But the House is not the central question here.  The Senate is the central question here.  And it's the Senate that's going to give Trump this victory.

And, in the meantime, I just think she's given Trump the fight he wants, which is the fight against the congressional Democrats, not about policy, not about things that actually affect people's lives, but just a personality, reality TV role with inside the Beltway.

And, to me, that's the fight he wants.  I don't know where it'll go.  It'll spin wildly out of control over the next several months.  But it's — to me, it's not — the ethical responsibility is, what can I do to get Donald Trump out of the White House?  And this is not the right path, in my view.

Mark Shields:  I would say this, Judy, that, unlike David and perhaps Secretary Clinton, I do not believe people on the other side are irredeemable.

I really do believe that, when confronted with the evidence and the reality, and that this — we have seen just the beginning.  This is the tip of the camel's nose that we have seen.

I think…

Judy Woodruff:  You means in terms of…

Mark Shields:  Of what's gone on.

And I think, when people come and are under oath and are sworn to testify, I think we will find more.  And I think Republicans, at the core, are Americans before they're Republicans.  And, yes, there's a herd mentality and a silo attitude right now, but I do think that, when the — when the evidence becomes overwhelming, which I think it will be, I think they will act.

Judy Woodruff:  What do you think, David?  If not an impeachment inquiry, what should the — what should Democrats do?

David Brooks:  Well, they could have censured him and then say, let's have an election.  We're in an election year.  Let's have an election about this.

And then they can investigate and lay before the American people everything that's happened.  I think the inquiry is totally fine.  But let's not have this process swallow up an election year.

We have elections for a reason.  We happen to be in the middle one.  And let's do that.  And I think this election was a — it's a good moment for the Democratic Party.  It's an exciting election, a lot of ideas.

And to overshadow that, to me, a lot of people are going to take a look at this and say, well, we could have settled this with 100 million voters around the country or 100 millionaires in the Senate.  Who should have the power here?

Mark Shields:  He — this is question, Judy, of, he is asking, if not demanding and coercing, an ally, a subservient ally, let's be very frank about it — I mean, in the relationship between the United States and Ukraine, Ukraine is subservient to the United States on — in all candor.

He's asking them to interfere in an American election, to spill dirt on an opponent.

I mean, we can't have that.  I mean, we can't pretend that that's tolerable at all and, oh, we will just wait until the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary.

It's — I'm sorry.  It's just too grave.

Judy Woodruff:  Is there — is there something, David, that would make an impeachment inquiry the right thing to do, or is it — I mean, is there anything this President can do?

(CROSSTALK)

Judy Woodruff:  Yes, are you saying there's nothing that…

David Brooks:  No, I'm not saying that.

But I agree with Mark on the severity of what he did.  I'm not saying that he — I think he did an impeachable offense.  I'm just saying, look at our context.  And our context is, we're in the middle of an election year.  And we should not walk down a path that will lead ultimately to failure in 99 percent.

I really do not think — and Mark and I may disagree on this — that the Republican senators who hung with Donald Trump through Charlottesville, through three years of moral turpitude, of 1,000 outrages which we speak about on every Friday, I just don't think they're going to break with him.

And I don't think the Republican voters are going to break with him.  They will find some way.

Judy Woodruff:  And, Mark, what about that?

Mark Shields:  I guess I have more confidence in the Republicans than David does.

But I'd say — and I don't argue.

Judy Woodruff:  But, Mark — but let me just…

Mark Shields:  This is totally disruptive.  I mean, it's totally disruptive to the process.

David's right.  It totally intrudes and puts everything else aside.  But I will say this.  If you're picking sides in the Democrats, you want the Intelligence Committee.  You want it to be Adam Schiff against Devin Nunes.  I mean, that's a mismatch in talent.

Judy Woodruff:  And in just five seconds, you're saying it's worth it to go through with this even if the Senate does not vote to convict?  You're saying it's worth it?

Mark Shields:  Yes, it is.

I mean, we have — we cannot sit here and pretend that this didn't happen and that it's not serious, what this President has done.  And it should be disqualifying.

Judy Woodruff:  Mark Shields, David Brooks, thank you.

TRUMP AGENDA - Abuse of Presidential Power

This revelation that Trump, during a call about giving Ukraine aid and a new weapon system, 'requested' a favor to have Ukraine investigate a political rival IS, without doubt, abuse of Presidential Power.

Remember the scene from "The Godfather" where the Don's lawyer goes to Hollywood to 'request' that a producer make a movie staring the Don's 'friend?'  The next day the producer wakes up with the severed head of his race horse in his bed?  That's what Trump did, send his mob layer Rudy Giuliani to talk about investigating a political rival.

Trump used American diplomacy for his own personal political gain.  And his release of the memo of the call proves he did it.  Also the whistleblower’s complaint confirms and substantiates the crime.

For Republicans to continue to claim that this should not be looked into is just short of treason and of betrayal of their oath of office.

"Questions over possible abuse of power overshadow Trump’s agenda at UN" PBS NewsHour 9/23/2019

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SUMMARY:  After President Trump acknowledged that he spoke to Ukraine's president about investigating possible 2020 rival Joe Biden, he spent the day at the U.N. fending off questions about the potential abuse of power.  Meanwhile, the administration's refusal to share a whistleblower’s complaint is pushing some Democrats closer to the question of impeachment.  Yamiche Alcindor joins Judy Woodruff for more.

"Impeachment calls grow as Trump defends withholding Ukraine aid" PBS NewsHour 9/24/2019

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SUMMARY:  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi formally announced the beginning of an impeachment inquiry Tuesday after a whistleblower alleged that the President tried to force a foreign leader to aid his reelection.  At the United Nations, Trump faced questions about his own actions, and he seemed to confirm and defend the fact that he withheld hundreds of millions of dollars from Ukraine.  Lisa Desjardins reports.

"What spurred House Democrats to ramp up impeachment efforts?" PBS NewsHour 9/24/2019

NOTE:  An 'impeachment inquiry' is the equivalent of a Grand Jury officially gathering  evidence of a charge via subpoenas, etc.  To actually impeach requires a Charge of Impeachment be brought to the floor of the House for a vote.

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SUMMARY:  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Tuesday announced an official impeachment inquiry -- but what exactly ramped up Democrats’ political momentum toward impeachment?  And what's next for President Trump and Republicans?  Yamiche Alcindor and Lisa Desjardins join William Brangham for a broader look at the latest developments.

"What lawmakers learned from Trump’s Ukraine call memo" PBS NewsHour 9/25/2019

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SUMMARY:  The release of a five-page memo describing President Trump's July phone call with Ukraine's president revealed new details of Trump’s actions regarding Ukraine.  The text shows that immediately after Volodymyr Zelensky brought up military aid, Trump asked him for "a favor."  Lisa Desjardins reports, then joins Yamiche Alcindor and Judy Woodruff for more on reactions from Trump and Congress.

And from Trump's personal defender......

"Justice Department found Trump didn’t commit a campaign finance crime raised by whistleblower" PBS NewsHour 9/25/2019

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SUMMARY:  According to the Justice Department, the original whistleblower account of President Trump’s actions on Ukraine raised the possibility of a criminal act by Trump, related to campaign finance.  But federal prosecutors reportedly decided that they could not identify a campaign finance violation from the two men's phone call.  John Yang learns more from Devlin Barrett of The Washington Post.

"How a President’s call to a foreign leader becomes a memo — and who gets to see it" PBS NewsHour 9/25/2019

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SUMMARY:  How does the White House capture a conversation between a President and another foreign leader?  And who gets to review that material afterward?  For more context on the phone conversation between President Trump and Zelensky, Judy Woodruff talks to Larry Pfeiffer, former senior director of the White House Situation Room.

"Whistleblower alleges White House tried to suppress Zelensky call details" PBS NewsHour 9/26/2019

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SUMMARY:  It was an explosive day on Capitol Hill, as a redacted version of the whistleblower letter was released publicly, and the acting director of national intelligence testified before the House Intelligence Committee about his handling of it.  Lisa Desjardins reports on what the whistleblower complaint describes, the role of Congress and how President Trump is responding to the developments.

"In private, Trump ‘lashing out’ about whistleblower complaint" PBS NewsHour 9/26/2019

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SUMMARY:  Amid a political swirl over his interactions with the Ukrainian president, President Trump is denying the July phone call between the two leaders included anything improper.  But behind the scenes, Trump is “lashing out” in frustration that details of that call were communicated to the person who filed the whistleblower complaint.  Yamiche Alcindor joins Judy Woodruff to discuss the latest.

"Former DOJ official calls Trump’s Ukraine phone call ‘fundamentally wrong’" PBS NewsHour 9/26/2019

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SUMMARY:  John Carlin, who previously served as the top national security official at the Justice Department, joins Judy Woodruff to discuss why he finds the details of President Trump’s call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky so disturbing, and what it would mean if White House officials tried to suppress that information.

"Why the House is moving so quickly on Trump impeachment inquiry" PBS NewsHour 9/27/2019

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SUMMARY:  It has been a historic week for President Trump and Congress, with startling revelations about an intelligence community whistleblower’s complaint against the President ultimately leading to the launch of a House impeachment inquiry.  Yamiche Alcindor reports on the whirlwind of events and joins Judy Woodruff to discuss who besides Trump might be involved and how fast the investigation is moving.

"The legal framework protecting whistleblowers in the U.S." PBS NewsHour 9/29/2019

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SUMMARY:  The modern-day False Claims Act protects whistleblowers who point out fraud and abuse in government.  John Phillips, who helped author the law, joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss the rights whistleblowers have.  Phillips is a founding partner at the law firm Phillips and Cohen and a former Ambassador to Italy under the Obama administration.

OPINION - Shields and Brooks 9/20/2019

"Shields and Brooks on the whistleblower complaint, Saudi oil attack" PBS NewsHour 9/20/2019

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SUMMARY:  Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s political news, including reports of a whistleblower complaint that might involve President Trump, the debate about whether a sitting President can commit a crime and the U.S. response to attacks on Saudi oil facilities.

Judy Woodruff (NewsHour):  And now we turn to the political analysis of Shields and Brooks.  That is syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

Hello to both of you.

Let's start with our lead story tonight.  And that is the whistle-blower from the intelligence community.

The word gets out — or this person is alleging that he that the President, in a conversation with — now we think it's the President of Ukraine, urged the president of Ukraine, Mark, to investigate Joe Biden's son.

And we have a — there's still no — the President denies it, and others do, but now we have several news outlets backing up the story.  And I was just handed — and you have seen it — a statement by Joe Biden.

He says:

"If these reports are true, there's truly no bottom to President Trump's willingness to abuse his power and abuse our country.  This behavior is particularly abhorrent because it exploits the foreign policy of our country and undermines our national security for political purposes."

How seriously should we be taking these allegations?

Mark Shields, syndicated columnist:  I think they're enormously serious.

And the fact that The Wall Street Journal is leading this story, along with The New York Times and The Washington Post, but this is not false or fake news or anything of the sort.  It's not a political vendetta of any sort.

And this is quite beyond a Playboy model or a frat party at an Ivy League school or anything of the sort.  This is really serious.  This is totally exploiting the national security, putting at risk the national security of the United States for narrow political, personal interests, if, in fact, the reports are true.

And I guess the most disturbing thing to me, Judy, was the President accused the whistle-blower, who, at enormous risk, and it required considerable courage, of being an extreme partisan, which means, (A) that somebody in the White House knows who the whistle-blower is.

This is mafia-like threats.  We know who you are.  And they have investigated his political affiliation or her political affiliation.  I mean, so, I think it's enormously grave.

Judy Woodruff:  And, in fact, the President — David, the President was saying today to the television cameras that people in the White House were making fun of all this.

Are we looking at something where it's going to be a he said/he said situation going forward?

David Brooks, New York Times:  Well, presumably, the call was listened to by others and recorded.  So, I'm not sure it was recorded, but it was certainly listened to.  These calls are not — it's not just a one-on-one call.  There's people on the line.

You know, I think it is pretty grave.  Most Presidents go into the White House thinking, I'm here to serve the office, I'm here to serve America.

Donald Trump is using America to serve him and American foreign policy to serve him.  And most Presidents go into the office thinking that the phrase my fellow Americans means something and that we have greater loyalty to our fellow Americans than we do the people in outside countries.

And he's basically using another country to be oppo research on his fellow American.

And I think this rises to more a level — I'm not sure this really is foundationally changing, but it rises to a different revel, if there's a connection between the foreign aid and the promise.

Judy Woodruff:  Right.

David Brooks:  That really is using — suborning U.S. government money for your own private gain.  And that's clearly corruption of a high order.

Judy Woodruff:  And, as both of you are saying, Mark, we don't know for a fact that this happened.  But the evidence is now building, the reporting is building.

And there are two strands.  It is urging the leader of another country to get involved in a political campaign, but then the quid pro quo, potentially.

Mark Shields:  No, exactly, Judy.

To say, look, be in touch with my Dr. Dirt, my oppo research guy, who once was America's mayor and is now doing smear jobs.

Judy Woodruff:  Rudy Giuliani.

Mark Shields:  Rudy Giuliani.  How the mighty have fallen to that point where he's an errand boy to be a hit man on political opponents.

No, David put it very well.  I mean, this is a total, total corruption of the — if it's valid and if it's accurate — and I think that the news reports are done very soberly, quite honestly, because they take their position — their mission seriously.

If it's true, Judy, then I don't see how the Democrats can back off on impeachment investigation.

Judy Woodruff:  And I want to ask you about that because this week, David, as both of you have pointed out, the President's lawyers were in court.

They were arguing against a New York lawsuit, an attempt to get the President's tax returns to be turned over, to be made public.  And the President's lawyers are saying you can't investigate a President while he's sitting in office.

What we're learning today in these reports about Ukraine raise questions about that.

David Brooks:  Yes, this was the Nixon defense with David Frost, that, if a President does it, it's not illegal.  And it didn't work for Nixon.  I'm not sure it would work for here.

I mean, a basic principle of our government is that no person is above the law.  And so I don't think that will work.

I am struck — I do think, if there's a link to the foreign aid, the Democrats obviously have to launch a different and new investigation.

I'm struck mostly by, when President Trump does something out in the open, or Rudy Giuliani does something out in the open, like, it doesn't become a big thing.  Now that we have something secret that the press have uncovered, suddenly, it blows up.

But Giuliani wasn't shy about this.  And the fall of Giuliani is one of the great stories of our age.  I covered him a lot when he was mayor, extremely brilliant, extremely sharp, not the man I see today.

The one continuity is that he would sit around with his staff and watch "The Godfather" movies over and over again.

Mark Shields:  Wow.

David Brooks:  And the mob behavior — this really is mob behavior.  It's like, let's dig up dirt on this guy.

That's the way it strikes me, more than anything else.

Judy Woodruff:  Well, and, again, Mark, with these — with the President's lawyers fighting back, which they have been — they have been fighting all these attempts to get any information turned over.

Mark Shields:  Right.

Judy Woodruff:  But this is the first time we have heard them argue a President can't be investigated.

Mark Shields:  Can't be investigated.

I agree with David about the Nixon defense.  Nixon, of course, invoked that defense in 1977, three years after he had been forced out, in an interview with David Frost.

But no President — he did prove that, and by his own statement and his own actions, that no President can be above the law.

And, no, I really think the gravity of this is yet to be fully appreciated.

TRUMP ABUSE OF POWER - The Whistleblower Complaint

"Amid whistleblower reports, what’s the state of U.S.-Ukraine relations?" PBS NewsHour 9/20/2019

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Reports of a whistleblower complaint that might involve President Trump, potentially related to his conversations with the president of Ukraine, have raised myriad questions.  Yamiche Alcindor has the latest details, and for a look at the geopolitical angle of the story, Judy Woodruff speaks to Nina Jankowicz of the Wilson Center, an independent, non-partisan research institute.

"Why whistleblower standoff represents a ‘unique juncture’ for U.S. government" PBS NewsHour 9/20/2019

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Amid new reports of a whistleblower complaint that might involve President Trump and his interactions with a foreign leader, the President continues to deny any wrongdoing.  Judy Woodruff talks to Joel Brenner, who was the National Security Agency’s Inspector General under President George W. Bush, about why he expects Congress to investigate further.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION - Their Worst Fear, Whisleblowers

They don't want their wrong doings exposed, so they slap 'secret' on everything they don't want the American people to know.  So anything Climate Change is verboten.

"Interior official turns whistle-blower, claiming retaliation for climate change work" PBS NewsHour 8/2/2017

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  A government scientist who studied dangerous climate change in the Arctic got an ironic reassignment at the Interior Department from the Trump administration, collecting checks from oil and gas companies.  Joel Clement, the former director of the Interior Department Office of Policy Analysis, believes he was reassigned because he worked on climate change.  Clement joins William Brangham to explain.

GREED FILE - Habitat for Humanity NYC

"How Habitat for Humanity Went to Brooklyn and Poor Families Lost Their Homes" by Marcelo Rochabrun, ProPublica 4/1/2016

Excerpt

In 2010, the New York City affiliate of Habitat for Humanity received a $21 million federal grant to work on a city neighborhood hit particularly hard by the foreclosure crisis and help stabilize it.

The funds would allow Habitat-NYC to launch the most ambitious project in its 32-year history.  Its neighborhood pick was Bedford-Stuyvesant, a historically poor neighborhood in central Brooklyn, where the charity would focus on buying and renovating abandoned apartment buildings.

There was just one problem.  With few vacancies in the gentrifying area, longtime tenants were pushed out of their apartments — some into homelessness — clearing the way for developers to sell to Habitat at a hefty profit, a ProPublica investigation has found.

Ultimately, Habitat's project came with a cost:  While scores of families gained new homes, other even needier ones were displaced.

Though Habitat promoted the properties it acquired to renovate as “long-vacant,” four of nine were still occupied shortly before the charity moved to buy them, records show.  In two cases, Habitat targeted buildings just days after the last families living there moved out.

The deals, and what local Habitat executives said about how they were being accomplished, left some inside the charity so upset that at least two employees emailed anonymous complaints to the nonprofit's international headquarters in Georgia.

“Habitat-NYC's Director [of] Real Estate and Construction speaks openly about making deals with developers, saying that we can not buy buildings from them until they get rid of all their tenants,” one of the employees wrote in a May 2012 email, which was provided to ProPublica.  “We are spending federal money to throw low-income New Yorkers out of buildings.”

ProPublica's reconstruction of the events was based on hundreds of pages of internal Habitat emails and memos, as well as a review of public real estate records related to those buildings.  ProPublica tracked down former tenants and used public complaints filed with the city's housing department as well as court records to establish the buildings' occupancy.

Between 2010 and 2011, at least seven Bed-Stuy families were pushed out of their rental apartments shortly before Habitat purchased them, ProPublica found.  All had relied on federal housing subsidies or New York's rent regulation laws to afford their units.  None were evicted in court.  Three of the families ended up homeless.

Internal emails show that Habitat officials were willing to consider buildings even when they were aware that they hadn't been empty for long.  “The Jefferson building I researched before is now vacant, and I am speaking with the owner,” Bill Bogdon, the director of real estate and construction, wrote to a colleague in 2011.  “The challenge with this one is the recent occupancy.”

Overall, with privately raised funds heaped onto the $21 million grant, Habitat spent $43 million on the Bed-Stuy housing initiative.

Some $8.4 million went to buy six properties from developer Isaac Katz and limited liability corporations he represented.  In 2006, New York's Attorney General sued Katz and his associates over a scheme in which they allegedly sold blighted buildings to dozens of minority homebuyers at artificially inflated prices.  Katz settled his share of the suit for $750,000, admitting no wrongdoing.

“There's zero doubt in my mind that [Katz is] a bad guy and did bad things,” wrote then-Habitat-NYC Executive Director Josh Lockwood in a June 2011 email, responding to a colleague's inquiry.  “Agreed its unlikely that an investigative reporter would target us specifically, but obviously we'd need to be prepared in the event s/he does.”

One day after Lockwood wrote the email, Habitat's Real Estate Investment Committee approved the purchase of three additional buildings from what they considered to be a group controlled by Katz for $6 million.

Katz's attorney said his client never had an ownership stake in the buildings, and was merely facilitating their sale to Habitat.

One of the buildings was the elegant, but rundown brownstone on Madison Street where Tashemia Tyson, a single mother of three, rented a third-floor apartment with public assistance.  Around three months before Habitat began discussions to acquire the building, Tyson said Katz began pressuring her to leave.

Katz's attorney denied Tyson's allegations, saying that his client “never spoke to Tyson” and that all the units were vacant when he facilitated the sale to Habitat.

The apartment had no heat.  “He told us that just as they were going to fix the boiler, the pipes burst,” Tyson said.  Reluctant to move, she said she relied on her gas stove for heat and hauled water buckets up the stairs to cook and to bathe for more than a week.

Finally, in February 2011, she said she accepted an offer from Katz of six months' free rent at another building, but couldn't afford the new apartment once the regular rent kicked in.  Today, she sleeps in a shelter in the Bronx.

Habitat said in a statement that “at no point were we aware that any tenant had been forcibly moved or incentivized to move out of their homes in properties we were intending to purchase.  Moreover, we would condemn the use of any such tactics.”  The charity added that they had retained outside legal counsel to investigate complaints made about their handling of the federal grant, but said the lawyers found no evidence of wrongdoing and that Habitat International concurred with their finding.

A spokesperson for Habitat International said “the anonymous hotline submitter… did not have documentation and their concerns were speculative.”

Bogdon called the allegations made against him in the whistleblower email “hearsay and erroneous.”  He also said that the Jefferson building he had discussed with his colleague was never purchased.

Lockwood, who is now the CEO of the Red Cross's greater New York region, declined to comment.

Habitat acknowledged that they had struggled to find vacant properties in Bed-Stuy despite their extensive efforts and that “many of the [grant]-appropriate properties in that area were owned by Isaac Katz.”

Katz's lawyer denies that he owned many properties.

But Habitat said that they “undertook numerous steps to ensure that our actions adhered to all grant guidelines.”  They said they had paid no more than the appraised value for each property and that Katz and other developers signed good-faith agreements affirming that no tenants had been improperly displaced.

“If we are able to determine that any former residents were affected by such tactics, we are willing to work with them to connect them to affordable housing resources,” Habitat said.

Paul Aloe, an attorney representing Katz, said “Mr. Katz was in no way involved in any harassment or removal of any tenants from the properties.”  Later, he added, “Mr. Katz only got involved at all when the subject buildings were vacant.”

Karen Haycox, the CEO of Habitat-NYC, who joined the charity in 2015, long after the Bed-Stuy deals, said in statement, “we are proud that Habitat for Humanity-New York's participation in the [federal grant program] enabled our organization to help 105 families in need of affordable housing become homeowners.”

Four dozen of those families moved into new homes built on vacant land.  Still, the majority of families helped by the project moved into units made available, in part, because others had been displaced

Many of those who bought Habitat's renovated homes earned around $50,000 a year — almost double the median income for renters in the neighborhood and about five times as much as the disability income of Charles Watson, a tenant who lived a floor below Tyson and ended up living on the streets after he was pushed out.  Watson did not remember the name of the person who pushed him to leave.

“I didn't want to move,” Watson said.  “They wanted everybody out because they knew they were going to sell and make the apartments into condos.  And they knew that would be a lot of money.  That's what it was all about, anyway: money.”

Josh Lockwood had a bold vision for Habitat-NYC when he was named its acting executive director in 2007

“In the face of New York City's crushing housing shortage, Habitat-NYC is adapting our volunteer building model to a large-scale project,” Lockwood was quoted saying in the charity's summer newsletter that year.

For most of its history, Habitat-NYC built only a handful of single-family homes annually.  It was a model pioneered by Habitat International, the Christian charity that sprung to fame in the 1980s thanks in part to former President Jimmy Carter's close involvement.

Under Lockwood's leadership, the charity moved into large-scale construction, breaking ground on a 41-unit complex in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn.  It was celebrated as the largest building project ever undertaken by a Habitat affiliate in the United States.

Lockwood was a rising star in the nonprofit world.  In 2010, Crain's New York Business honored Lockwood as one of the city's “40 under 40.”

The federal grant was crucial in Lockwood's expansion plans.  Now, Habitat would develop more than 100 units in one project.  But taking the funds, part of the Obama administration's stimulus package, would require Habitat to modify another aspect of its building model.

In the past, Habitat acquired vacant lots and buildings from the city at nominal prices.  With the federal grant money, Habitat would be going on the open market for the first time.  The nonprofit also had to move forward on an accelerated timeline as it had agreed to spend half of the $21 million grant by the end of 2011, only a year and a half after receiving access to the money.

On the surface, it made sense that Habitat chose to work in Bed-Stuy.  The neighborhood had the highest foreclosure rate of multifamily rental properties in the city, according to a report by New York University's Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy, and Habitat had worked in the area.

The charity purchased nine apartment buildings to renovate in Bedford-Stuyvesant with the help of federal dollars starting in 2010.  (Map source: City of New York; Credit: Al Shaw/ProPublica)

But according to city data, the neighborhood had few vacancies.  That's because tenants who live in old, multifamily buildings are usually protected from eviction.  New York's rent regulation laws afford those tenants the right to renew their leases even in the case of foreclosure.

All seven families who moved shortly before Habitat bought their buildings lived in rent-regulated units.

“If I were looking for vacant buildings as a result of the foreclosure crisis Bed-Stuy would not have been the first place to look,” said Harold Shultz, a former deputy commissioner at the city's housing department.

The rules governing the grant did not set out how long a property had to be vacant to be eligible for acquisition, but federal officials did not want their money to entice developers to empty out buildings to score a sale.

During a web seminar with the federal department of Housing and Urban Development in June 2010, a Habitat-NYC employee asked, according to a transcript of the meeting, if it would be okay to make an offer on an occupied building where “the tenants were not all paying their rent and there might be some eviction proceedings going on.”

“I see that as a big problem,” an official replied.  If Habitat were to buy that property, he explained, the federal funds would be linked to the eviction of tenants.

By the end of the month, Habitat began targeting several buildings for acquisition.  They worked with a real estate broker named Jordan Bardach, who knew Isaac Katz.  At the time, Katz was still paying off his settlement to the attorney general.

Bardach has operated several ventures under the name “Imagine.”  One of them, Imagine Equities, advertises services on its website to help “remove tenants” in case of “future building renovations and upgrades.”  Another, Imagine Living, lists on its website the buildings Habitat ultimately purchased.  In 2013, he and Katz developed an app that “speeds up” the process for landlords to get tenants “paying rent again or evicted swiftly.”

Through a lawyer, Bardach said “Habitat reached out to me because of my general experience and asked for assistance in acquisitions.”

Three of the buildings Habitat acquired with Bardach's help were long vacant.  But another, 849 Halsey St., still had three tenants shortly before Habitat targeted it for acquisition in late June, according to city housing records, and letters mailed to these tenants that were obtained by ProPublica.

Twana Midgette said she left the building in June 2010 after she found what looked like an eviction notice on her door.  “Because of the conditions of the building, I didn't even put up a fight, and I didn't have anyone to contact,” Midgette said.  She now lives in upstate New York, where she said she continues to pay rent with public assistance.

Melinda Ortiz remained as long as she could.  “They said they wanted to gut the apartments.  They even started working on the apartments downstairs,” she said.  “They said that they weren't going to accept any more money.”  Ortiz left shortly after Midgette and has spent the past few years moving from apartment to apartment.

David Coachman, a tenant who lived in a rent-stabilized unit, said he left on June 12, after accepting a $10,000 settlement.  Four days later, a Habitat employee visited the property, HUD records show.  “They wanted me out because they wanted the whole building empty,” he said.  Today, Coachman lives with his son in Flatbush, Brooklyn.

On July 19, 2010, Katz signed a document that said he would notify Habitat if there had been tenants at 849 Halsey in the past three months and would “not order current occupant(s) to move, or fail to renew a lease, in order to sell the property to us as vacant.”

That was a little more than a month after the three tenants left.

Habitat declined to say whether Katz had told them about the tenants when he signed the document.

The tenants all said they had been pressured to leave, but do not remember the names of the people who spoke to them.  Katz's attorney told ProPublica his client hadn't purchased the building until early July.  “When Katz purchased the building, it was vacant,” he said.

If Habitat had independently tried to verify the occupancy history of the building, they might have found housing records that documented a call from Ortiz's apartment to register complaints of bedbugs, mold and a broken banister.  The date of the call was June 1, 2010 — 15 days before a Habitat official first visited the property.

“I found all the units to be vacant,” the official wrote to HUD.

Katz's LLC closed on the sale of 849 Halsey to Habitat in late January 2011.

That month, Katz also sold a building at 203 Marion St. to the charity for about $620,000.

It was a remarkably quick and lucrative flip.  Katz had purchased the six-unit property earlier that day for about $380,000 from Lena and Percy Spellman, an elderly African American couple who had owned it since 1983.

Internal Habitat documents provided to ProPublica show that Habitat first targeted the property for acquisition the previous June, when it was still owned by the Spellmans.

Katz's lawyer said this was “incorrect,” but did not elaborate.

Property records show that the Spellmans did not sign a contract agreeing to sell the property to Katz until July 30.

“I'm not very up to date on real estate law, but I don't know how you can sell something you don't own,” said Jerome Spellman, the son of the building's longtime owners.  “And that's what he did.”

Habitat officials deny this was the case.  In a statement, they said Katz already had a binding contract in hand when they first learned about the property.  “There was no legal way Habitat-NYC could have directly purchased the property from the Spellmans,” they said.

Michael Kozek, a real estate lawyer, who reviewed the documents for ProPublica, said the Spellmans may have cause for complaint.

“The circumstances indicate something suspect,” he said.  “It appears that the Spellmans were deprived of the full value of their property.”

STUDENTS - Whistleblowers Prevent Shooting

"These student whistleblowers spoke up to prevent a shooting" PBS NewsHour 4/22/2015

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  One year ago, two students in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, began sharing plans to gun down their classmates.  They may have gotten away with it had it not been for a group of students who alerted school authorities.  Young journalists from NewsHour’s Student Reporting Labs look at the actions of the whistleblowers that led to the arrest of the potential shooters.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  This month we have been bring you stories from high school students around the country reporting on how the concept of school safety is evolving.

Tonight, we travel to the town of Lebanon, Pennsylvania, where a potential attack by students was foiled one year ago.

As part of our ongoing Student Reporting Labs series called The New Safe, student television network correspondent Nick Weiss investigates what inspired a handful of brave students to take action.

NICOLE MALINOSKI, Principal, Cedar Crest High School:  You know, the first thing I do when I wake up every morning is think about the safety and security of all students here.  It’s actually even before education, just because of school safety, how it’s been in the media and, unfortunately, you know, things that have happened over the last number of years.

I was actually out of the building the day that this occurred and I received a text message from Ms. May, who’s an assistant principal here.  She asked me if I could call ASAP.  She had something very important to discuss with me.

CALIFORNIA - New Law Protects Whistleblowers

"California Protects Wage-Theft Whistleblowers" by Jeffrey Bishku-Aykul, In These Times 11/14/2013

In a victory for both immigrant laborers and California workers as a whole, Gov. Jerry Brown signed bill AB 263 last month, protecting workers against employer retaliation for wage-theft claims.

Now, any employer in the state that punishes or threatens to punish employees for filing an oral or written complaint over unpaid wages will be fined up to $10,000 per employee.  The bill also offers specific protections against “unfair immigration-related practices,” which include contacting immigration authorities in retaliation against worker complaints, among other measures.

The Public Policy Institute of California has estimated that there are more than 1.8 million undocumented workers in the state.  Some employers have responded to employee grievances by using such threats as deportation to “hold workers hostage,” says legislative advocate Caitlin Vega, of the California Labor Federation (CLF), which has lobbied for AB 263.

But it doesn't always stop there, as Orange County day laborer José Ucelo Gonzalez learned in 2012: Gonzalez, who is undocumented, landed in the custody of immigration officials when he was falsely accused of robbery after seeking compensation for a paving job.  “Existing law simply wasn't enough to protect this portion of the workforce,” says CLF spokesman Steve Smith.

While amending California law, AB 263 also recognizes that low-wage immigrant workers “have the greatest number of work-related injuries and fatalities” and that they “are the most frequent victims of wage theft and are also exposed to the greatest hazards at work.”

AB 263 passed in the California Senate on September 9 and in the Assembly the next day.  As the bill sat at Gov. Brown's desk, Assemblyman Roger Hernández, who sponsored the legislation, and groups such as the CFL and the AFL-CIO called on him to sign it.

Gov. Brown finally signed AB 263 in October, along with several other bills protecting immigrants.  Among them was AB 4, also known as the Trust Act, which prevents undocumented immigrants changed with minor crimes from facing deportation.

“While Washington waffles on immigration,” Gov. Brown declared, “California's forging ahead.”

AMERICA - More on the NSA Surveillance Issue

"Whereabouts of NSA Whistleblower Unknown as Lawmakers Call for His Prosecution" (Part-1) PBS Newshour 6/11/2013

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  U.S. lawmakers are calling for NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.  Speaker of the House John Boehner called Snowden a "traitor" and says he put Americans at risk by disclosing the information.  But not every member of Congress sees Snowden as the problem.  Gwen Ifill reports.

"How Does the Government Manage Workers With Access to Classified Information" (Part-2) PBS Newshour 6/11/2013

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  Edward Snowden's leak of classified NSA documents bring up concerns about the reliance on contractors within the intelligence community.  Gwen Ifill talks to Irving Lachow of Center for a New American Security and Dana Priest of The Washington Post about how the government protects employees' access to sensitive information.

COMMENT:  Do to my background in computers and security (including from my Navy carrier) and a previous civilian job related to phone systems, here are some facts.

■ The internet (aka World Wide Web) has NEVER been private.  The internet is like holding a conversation in the middle of a shopping mall and expecting that it will never be overheard.  To expect privacy on the internet is nieve.

■ As to the phone surveillance, IF what the NSA says they are collecting is true, they are correct.  From my phone related job, I am familiar with the  'meta-data' being collected (calling phone, called phone, duration, country codes, etc).  It is the same data that is collected from a Phone Switch System for your phone billing.  The connection between a phone number and a name is done by a SEPARATE billing system computer, so your name is not collected without getting access to a phone billing computer, which would require a subpoena.