Secretary of Agriculture and former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack is at the center of two egregious abuses of tax payers, one of which has received substantial straight reportage from an outlet whose usual practice is to protect liberal politicians from their misfeasance and malpractice. It is hardly encouraging news for those Democrats dreaming that Vilsack will challenge Terry Branstad in 2014.
As the New York Times (NYT) explains in its lengthy article, the Pigford program was a settlement authorization set up to compensate a limited number of black farmers who were discriminated against at the hands of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in loans and other financial aid projects.
Ever since the Clinton administration agreed in 1999 to make $50,000 payments to thousands of black farmers, the Hispanics and women had been clamoring in courtrooms and in Congress for the same deal. They argued, as the African-Americans had, that biased federal loan officers had systematically thwarted their attempts to borrow money to farm.
But a succession of courts — and finally the Supreme Court — had rebuffed their pleas. Instead of an army of potential claimants, the government faced just 91 plaintiffs. Those cases, the government lawyers figured, could be dispatched at limited cost.
They were wrong.
On the heels of the Supreme Court’s ruling, interviews and records show, the Obama administration’s political appointees at the Justice and Agriculture Departments engineered a stunning turnabout: they committed $1.33 billion to compensate not just the 91 plaintiffs but thousands of Hispanic and female farmers who had never claimed bias in court.
The deal, several current and former government officials said, was fashioned in White House meetings despite the vehement objections — until now undisclosed — of career lawyers and agency officials who had argued that there was no credible evidence of widespread discrimination. What is more, some protested, the template for the deal — the $50,000 payouts to black farmers — had proved a magnet for fraud.
The article goes on to itemize the political and bureaucratic machinations intertwined with the program, exposing how “it became a runaway train, driven by racial politics, pressure from influential members of Congress and law firms that stand to gain . . .” Most of the payouts have gone to minorities for whom there is no evidence of discrimination or that they were even farmers!
There are many jaw dropping revelations in the article. According to the NYT “the push for payouts pitted Mr. Vilsack and other political appointees against career lawyers and agency officials,” i.e. responsible good government bureaucrats.
The Times’s examination was based on thousands of pages of court and confidential government documents, as well as interviews with dozens of claimants, lawyers, former and current government officials and others involved in the cases over the past 14 years. Many officials spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing rules against disclosing internal government deliberations and, in a few cases, the desire not to be drawn into a racially charged controversy.
As a result of the article, various conservative news and blog sites have justifiably posted “we told you so” articles. Breitbart and Investors Business Daily are two of them. They were early and consistent in exposing the scandal, which because of the dominant liberal media never got traction until now. Iowa Congressman Steve King* has been an early and fearless critic of the Pigford waste and corruption and deserves watch-dog plaudits on that score. Our own Senior Editor has been on top of the story from the first inklings as has contributor Susan Frazer.
The NYT article is recommended reading because it is a thorough exploration of the scandal and for Iowans in particular, highlights Vilsack’s culpability in the line of decision making and his incredible nonchalant attitude about the waste. And of course the sponsoring newspaper is a liberal Democrat bastion. Vilsack is now officially mired in the muck of the Pigford scandal by the nation’s liberal newspaper of record.
Subsidizing Illegal Border Jumping and Immigrant Fraud
Vilsack’s abuse of tax payer dollars does not end with the Pigford scandal. In case there was any confusion that the Agriculture Department was just a big county extension agency helping farmers make the best decision on seed hybrids, in fact it is essentially a welfare agency. Seventy-five percent of its budget goes to subsidy programs, largely food stamps which is definitively a welfare program for individuals and in effect for farmers.
Vilsack also oversees the distribution of welfare benefits (food stamps) to illegal immigrants. A traditional requirement for legal immigration is that the immigrant family not be a burden on taxpayers. But what does Vilsack’s department do? It advises the Mexican embassy that illegal border jumpers need not declare their immigration status to qualify for food stamps for their children.
The abuse is inherent in both the fungibility of the stamps, as the illegal activity is inextricably subsidized even if theoretically limited, and the condition that seems to be identified in this article from Judicial Watch , the organization which helped expose the practice, that no restriction as to status is required to be made in order to receive benefits. Furthermore, the opportunity to verify legal status is officially forgone. The laws of the United States are thwarted by agencies of the government.
No humanitarian considerations suffice to justify such irresponsibility to tax payers or the aggrandizement and political influence peddling at its core. Not only do we have foreign aid programs for such purposes (the illegal recipients are after all foreign nationals, many of whom are not interested in US citizenship, and are not truly “immigrants), food relief can go on under the auspices of their own government.
This is not about stopping someone on suspicion of illegal status, this is about verification upon application for benefits and the assurance that the benefits do not go to people here illegally to the detriment of people who are entitled to benefits and to the sustainability of that program. Enough food to sustain illegal immigrants on their way out of the country to the back of the line behind those respectful of our laws, is enough burden for humanitarian purposes.
As it stands under Vilsack’s watch it is not only an open ended matter as to the burdens placed on tax payers by Pigford but also as regards welfare food stamps for non-citizens. Vilsack is intent on financing illegal immigration making it more attractive, or as liberals like to say “sustaining” a key source of new Democrat voters. It is all for political power, damn the country, damn any incentive for Mexico to improve its conditions, damn taxpayers.
More on Vilsack, welfare pimp and ingrate
The Iowa Republican refers to Vilsack as “Poohsack.” Visit their linked site for their take on the Pigford story as well. The photo is from the TIR website
More of an aside really, but we cannot help wondering how did a person such as Vilsack get such a position? We can only surmise that it is about amenability to government by decree not the superficiality (to Obama) of being a former farm state governor. More importantly to Obama, was Vilsack being a committed welfare state clown prince and political hack. And that he is, see photo at left. Henry Wallace of Iowa was a former Ag Secretary and VP of the United States, and a socialist. But Wallace actually had agricultural roots, but as to Vilsacks roots, well yes to the socialist part, not so much as to the agricultural roots.
Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Tom Vilsack was placed in a Roman Catholic orphanage. He was adopted in 1951 by Bud and Dolly Vilsack. Bud Vilsack was a real-estate agent and insurance salesman, and Dolly was a homemaker.Vilsack attended Shady Side Academy, a preparatory high school in Pittsburgh. He received a bachelor’s degree in 1972 from Hamilton College in New York. While at Hamilton he joined the Delta Upsilon Fraternity. He received a Juris Doctor (J.D.) in 1975 from Albany Law School. He and his wife settled in Mount Pleasant, Iowa, in 1975. . . .
Vilsack met his future wife, Ann Christine “Christie” Bell, in a cafeteria while at college in New York in October 1968. Vilsack approached Bell and asked, “Are you a Humphrey or a Nixon supporter?” She replied “Humphrey” and they soon began dating. The couple was married on August 18, 1973, in Bell’s hometown of Mount Pleasant, Iowa. Vilsack and his wife moved to Mount Pleasant in 1975, where he joined his father-in-law in law practice.
We remember Tom Vilsack’s perfidy regarding support for Women’s Right to Know legislation as an Iowa politician. He said he would support laws to insure informed choice (not much meaningful freedom to choose comes out of basic ignorance ) or so Right to Life groups credited him at the time. The legislation was designed to insure that women considering abortion were adequately informed of facts of fetal life, the various risks inherent in abortion and the availability of alternative help. Instead he stood in the way, carrying Planned Parenthood’s water, ultimately heading off useful legislation with the weakest alternative.
I find it unfathomable how an adoptee can support abortion on demand as Vilsack does but beyond that, the incredible treachery he showed toward adoption as a life affirming option, something he benefited from. His views are as if to say his life has meaning but indifference is the order of the day as to other children vulnerable to their mothers ignorance about the adoption alternative. R Mall
* We are thinking Chuck Grassley might want to get out front on this given his involvement early on with Pigford legislation, however limited he intended it. When will our Republican politicians learn that it is not uncharitable to protect tax payers with tightly drawn legislation, that otherwise legislation grows by bureaucratic and judicial interpretation to something unrecognizable, in this case a fraud inviting monstrosity.
“Vilsack approached Bell and asked, “Are you a Humphrey or a Nixon supporter?” She replied “Humphrey” and they soon began dating.”
This is a pretty solid way to pick up babes you gotta admit. Remids me of that “It’s Always Sunny” episode where Mac signs up to be in the pro choice rally just to get easy chicks.