If there was ever a test case for whether voters cared about the abusive earmarking practice than the race in WV-01 would be it. This year Rep. Alan Mollohan found himself the subject of a federal investigation into his use of earmarks to create a series of nonprofits headed by his real estate partners. Mollohan, like other West Virginians sent off to Washington, is a prolific earmarker and has created an entire technology corridor — this technology corridor being the reason for the investigation — in northern West Virginia through earmarks. But will voters punish Mollohan for his earmarking or do they see his perch on the Appropriations Committee as a means of attracting money and jobs to a seriously depressed state economy.

While Mollohan’s opponent, state Del. Chris Wakim, is counting on voter anger over Mollohan’s earmarking editorials like this make me think that people in West Virginia really like their pork.

Byrd’s the man who’s leading the hogs to the trough, followed by Congressman Alan Mollohan, who reportedly has earmarked $480 million for West Virginia over the past decade.

Now we can’t be as naive to think that just Byrd and Mollohan are the only ones behind these earmarks, but we’d like to see Sen. Jay Rockefeller and Reps. Nick Rahall and Shelley Moore Capito make the list as well.

It might be pork, but West Virginians should clearly love it.

It’s putting meat on our tables.

West Virginia and Alaska are two states that are dependent upon the practice of earmarking. Many rural areas are also increasingly relying on this secretive process to help them obtain road improvements, jobs, and numerous other amenities that they can’t afford themselves.

Rural areas tend to be the most targeted for earmarks and other federal assistance. It puts meat on their tables. Mollohan certainly is facing some backlash for his actions, but nothing akin to what Republicans who have done similar things are facing this year. Any other year and Mollohan’s actions, despite West Virginia’s appetite for pork, might have caused this election to be a toss-up but Mollohan looks to be safe again. The current political climate, where voters would rather pull a lever for Clem Kadiddlehopper over any Republican, is certainly helping Mollohan as much, if not more, than his ability to put pork on the table.

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Today, Sunlight is posting an online poll asking the public if Congress is doing enough to address ethics and lobbying reform in the wake of recent scandals. We’ve posted one serious question and another one with a touch of humor: do you think it more likely that there would be a live sighting of Elvis before the current congressional leadership showed real leadership on the need for reform? (The poll is viewable here, and bloggers are encouraged to copy the source code and post it on their own sites.)

Why the cynical question? Here’s a brief guide to the issue.

Six months ago, lobbyist [sw: Jack Abramoff] admitted to corrupting government officials and pleaded guilty to three counts of conspiracy, fraud and tax evasion. Two very powerful Members of Congress have resigned their seats under a cloud of ethics charges, one of whom — [sw: Randy Cunningham] — is in jail, and one — [sw: Tom DeLay] — is under indictment in Texas.

Seven other Members — Senators [sw: Conrad Burns] and [sw: Bill Frist], and Congressmen [sw: Dennis Hastert], [sw: William Jefferson], [sw: Jerry Lewis], [sw: Alan Mollahan] and [sw: Bob Ney] — are currently under investigation by either the congressional ethics committees or law enforcement authorities (see this Congresspedia page for details). David Safavian, a top official at the General Services Administration, was found guilty by a jury on four counts of lying and obstruction of justice. And at least 11 government officials and former and current congressional staffers have either pled guilty or are under investigation for bribery, conspiracy, accepting bribes, corrupting elected officials, violations of lobbying rules, and numerous as yet unnamed reasons.

Six months ago, after Abramoff pled guilty, everyone in Congress was for reform:

"I intend to move forward aggressively and quickly to have the House of Representatives address lobbying reform. Over the past several months, I have spoken with many members about the need for such reforms. I have been encouraged by the breadth and boldness of their ideas. Now is the time for action." Dennis Hastert. 1/8/06.

"It’s a good time for us to look at more disclosure. I think you’ll see a congressional reaction to this totally unacceptable situation involving Jack Abramoff that’s both prompt and appropriate." — Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), 1/8/06.

"I believe that to regain the trust of the American people that this institution must go further than prosecuting the bad actors. We need to reform the rules so it’s clear beyond a shadow of a doubt what is ethically acceptable for members of Congress." — Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), 1/17/2006.

"First, we must ban privately sponsored travel in the House of Representatives. I know fact-finding trips are important. This body considers legislation that affects people that cannot always travel to Washington to petition their government. Private travel has been abused by some, and I believe we need to put an end to it. Second, I think we need to tighten even further the gift rules. A Member of Congress should be able to accept a ball cap or a t-shirt from the proud students at a local middle school, but he or she doesn’t need to be taken to lunch or dinner by a lobbyist. Recent months have shown that we need a more transparent system. Our plan dramatically increases the reporting of lobbyist activities." — Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), 1/17/06.

"Yesterday we marked the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King. I thought about one of his letters from a Birmingham jail, in which he wrote that, We should always be careful about the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. And that’s why I believe we’re in a position today where we have an opportunity to be bold and strong, and that’s why this is a terrific opportunity for us. … The speaker has just talked about the issue of a ban on privately funded travel. I believe that it’s also very important for us to proceed with a significantly stronger gift ban, which would prevent members and staff from personally benefiting from gifts from lobbyists. One of the things that we’re considering is the prospect of going to the provisions that have been set forth by the White House, which have existed under Democratic and Republican administrations. … We also are proposing that we increase from one year to two years the post-employment lobbying ban that exists for members and senior staff." — David Dreier (R-Calif.), 1/17/06

That was then.

Now, six months later, the Washington Post reports that these calls for change are "a fading concern." The Post recounts, "Lawmakers considered a range of provisions, including a ban on privately funded junkets, a prohibition against taking gifts and an end to steeply discounted travel by private jet. Instead, they decided to strengthen and double the number of lobbyists’ public disclosure reports, and they discarded — or will probably discard — almost everything else." Powerful members of both chambers objected strongly to a ban on privately financed travel, and they were joined by major lobby groups. An independent office of public integrity was shot down in committee.

Currently there are two versions of lobbying and ethics reform. One is S. 2349, the Lobbying Transparency and Accountability Act of 2006; the other is HR 4975, the Lobbying Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006. Both bills have cleared their respective houses. The vote on HR 4975 fell on mostly partisan lines 217-213. Meanwhile, S. 2349 passed by a margin of 90-8 with the eight votes coming mostly from those who wanted tougher legislation. Both bills are in conference, however only the Senate has named conferees. Senate Conferees: Daniel Inouye (D-HI), Chris Dodd (D-CT), Trent Lott (R-MS), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Ted Stevens (R-AK)

The House has yet to name conferees. The most current statement from the House and the Senate on reform came on June 9^th from Sen. Bill Frist and Speaker Dennis Hastert: "Today, we asked lobbying reform conferees to complete their final package before the Fourth of July recess. Lobbying and ethics reform remains an important priority for Congress. We are confident that the conferees will work hard and deliver a conference report that will build trust with the American people by making our government more transparent and accountable." This Washington Post story gives the most recent account of the legislation.

Despite a series of scandals showing serious abuses of power, including the use of privately financed travel, gifts to legislators and staff by lobbyists, and the secretive earmarking of taxpayer dollars to the benefit of private interests, often with close ties to legislators and lobbyists, we think this Congress has done nothing to restore the trust of the public in the integrity of its work.

It’s time to find out what you think.

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• The Washington Post and The Hill finally run stories on [sw: Dennis Hastert]’s land deal in Kendall County, Illinois. The Post story looks at Hastert’s land deal along side the land deals of Reps. [sw: Ken Calvert] (R-Calif.) and [sw: Gary Miller] (R-Calif.). Both Calvert and Miller made large sums of money off of land that they helped, through the earmarking process, become more profitable. Their stories are here and here respectively.
• New tax records show that Rep. [sw: Alan Mollohan] (D-W.Va.) steered $179 million in federal earmarks to companies that contributed to charities that he is associated with. According to Bloomberg, "The money went to 21 companies and nonprofit groups that contributed $225,427 to the Robert H. Mollohan Family Charitable Foundation in 2004 — almost half of the charity’s revenue". Charities connected to politicians (or spouses of politicians) are a way for companies and interests to curry favor from a legislator out of the public eye. Numerous lawmakers have used their charities inappropriately including Senators Rick Santorum (R-Penn.) and Bill Frist (R-Tenn.). I’m sure that there are many more political charity abuses that go unnoticed.
• The Senate Indian Affairs Committee just released their final report on the Jack Abramoff tribal scandal, "Gimme Five — Investigation of Tribal Lobbying Matters". The Arizona Republic reported this morning that the report is expected to "read more like a summer mystery novel with chapters missing than a tell-all account of former GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff’s corrupt influence in Washington." Since Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) refused to call members of Congress to testify before his committee those "missing chapters" will have to be filled in by the Justice Department and our courts.
• Most members of Congress do not read the bills that they vote on. Rep. [sw: John McHugh] (R-N.Y.), the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee personnel subcommittee, did not know that a provision existed in a bill that he crafted that he "philosophically" opposed. Oops. Maybe we should pay attention next time. Or we could make bills available 72 hours before they are voted on (as Readthebill.org is pushing) so that maybe somebody else could have caught what John McHugh didn’t.
  

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• The federal government spent over $1.4 billion on fraudulent assistance to fake victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. One man spent 70 days at a hotel in Hawaii on taxpayer money.
• [sw: Alan Mollohan] (D-WV), who resigned his seat on the House Ethics Committee after he became the subject of a federal inquiry, released corrections to his financial disclosure forms yesterday, according to the New York Times. Mollohan "filed some two dozen corrections to his past six annual financial disclosure forms, saying his accountant had uncovered ‘a relative handful of unintentional and immaterial mistakes.’" He had left out one major transaction in which in he took out a "$2.3 million ‘back-to-back loan’". Mollohan stated that he did not feel that he had to report this previously because the net value was zero.
• The judge ruling in the David Safavian trial is weighing whether to toss a juror because she spoke to persons outside of the juror pool about the case. The prosecution wants her tossed, while the defense wants her to stay.
• The Defense Appropriations bill for FY 07 contains $1 billion less in earmarks than the previous year’s bill did. Well, they did get rid of [sw: Duke Cunningham], so that’s about what I’d expect.
• Yesterday Redstate reported that [sw: Jerry Lewis] (R-CA), under fire for earmarking and connections to lobbyists, inserted a $500,000 earmark to renovate the swimming pool in Banning, California. Today, the San Bernardino Sun picks up the story along with criticism of Lewis from his fellow caucus members. Jeff Flake (R-AZ): "It’s just ridiculous. Cities ought to pay for their own pools." Banning is represented by lobbyist David Turch, who has lost numerous county and municipal clients to the now-radioactive lobbying firm of Copeland Lowery Jacquez and White.

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In Washington people are always dealing in information, money, and secrets. Sometimes you need to peddle information to get a seat at the table or to help write bills for your lobbying clients. Other times you need to throw money around, ingratiate yourself with the locals and take them out to a skybox and watch Gilbert Arenas score 40 points. Throw a fund raiser for your favorite legislator (i.e.: the guy who’s vote you need to switch). How else are you going to stop that bill that would help millions of people but hurt your client? Usually you tout these accomplishments and get patted on the back. But sometimes, you do something that you don’t want anyone to know about and you need to hide your information, or your money, somewhere. Anywhere. Where do you hide it? Well, we gathered up a group of Washington insiders with first hand experience in hiding stuff and asked them how they would go about hiding money or information in Washington (follow the link):

Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA): (writes on note, then passes to me) The best place to hide your cash is to break it into $10,000 blocks and hide each one in a separate frozen food container, then put the cash-strapped frozen food containers in the freezer. I wish we could stop writing these damn notes like the FBI is watching us!

Former Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX): First get a "Safe House" (use money provided by tribal gambling interests, Russian military contractors, and other shady groups that are represented by your BFF). Next let a front group set up by your former chief of staff run a phony operation out of the "Safe House". After that’s done you can easily illegally funnel money provided by your lobbyist friend through the group and into attack ads against the Democrat Party. There is one last important thing: When you get accused of breaking the law the best place to hide is behind a cross. Accuse those pursuing you of waging a war on Christians.

Lobbyist Jack Abramoff: Set up a lot of phony nonprofits. Give them honorable names and missions like "Capital Athletic Foundation", a nonprofit dedicated to helping children through athletics, or something thing like that. Then get your naïve and/or corrupt lobbying clients to funnel money into the charities. Use the money for whatever you want: negative campaigning against enemies or fund right-wing paramilitary operations in a foreign country. Or, of course, you can spend the money on the most important thing of all: golf golf GOLF!!!!

Former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-CA): A good place to hide your money is in a shady real estate deal. Just sell your house at an inflated cost. All you have to do is write a few earmarks for the guy buying your house at the ballooned price and you’re golden. Plus, it’s impossible to find an earmark in legislation.

Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-WV): It’s true. I would hide my money in federal earmark legislation, too. Nobody can find it there.

Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA): Yeah, that’s pretty much the case. 

Iran-Contra figure Fawn Hall: A lady hides things in her blouse or her boots. And then, if it’s money, she spends it on heroin and crack cocaine.

Former Mayor Marion Barry: Did someone say what I think they just said?

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After 16 months of deadlock and inaction the House Ethics Committee has launched two investigations into members of the House, according to the Washington Post. The Ethics Committee has agreed to look into the cases of Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH), alleged to have taken bribes from Jack Abramoff in return for favorable action, and Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA), who is alleged to have solicited bribes in an international telecommunications deal. The panel refused to hear the case of the retiring former Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX), who has already been indicted in Texas on money laundering charges and has been closely tied to Jack Abramoff since the mid-90s. The gridlock on the panel actually began due to three admonishments of DeLay in 2004. After the third admonishment Speaker Dennis Hastert and DeLay purged the panel’s Republicans, installing DeLay supporters who aggravated the Democrats on the panel by attempting to change the rules on how the ethics process worked. The deadlock ended when the ranking Democrat Alan Mollohan (D-WV) stepped down after he was alleged to have misstated his personal finances and used federal earmarks to enrich himself. The current ranking Democrat is Howard Berman (D-CA) and the chairman is Doc Hastings (R-WA).

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The Charleston Daily Mail is reporting that “two dozen organizations in northcentral West Virginia with ties to Rep. Alan Mollohan reportedly have been subpoenaed, and one nonprofit has reportedly shipped 160 cartons of documents to the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.” A source states that “between 25 and 30 organizations in north central West Virginia who have received subpoenas that are extremely broad.” The head of two organizations, the Institute for Scientific Research and the West Virginia High Technology Consortium Foundation, states that “the complaint filed by the NLPC is nothing more than a witch hunt” and that he intends “to provide anything and everything I can to [prosecutors] to demonstrate” that his organizations are innocent of any violations.

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The investigation into Rep. Alan Mollohan’s (D-WV) personal finances has taken a new turn with the introduction of Mollohan’s bankrupt distant cousin Joe Jarvis and his son, Skeeter. The New York Times reports on Mollohan’s relationship with the scam man Jarvis:

The relative, Joseph L. Jarvis Jr., faced $1 million debts in a personal bankruptcy case when he partnered with Mr. Mollohan in 1996, a few years after his aerospace company failed to fulfill its federal contracts and also filed for bankruptcy.

The 1995 West Virginia deal in Mr. Mollohan’s district eventually soured too, and Mr. Jarvis walked away owing Mr. Mollohan’s nonprofit group $67,681.63 in rent.

Still, Mr. Jarvis, Mr. Mollohan and their wives enjoyed a lucrative real estate partnership managing condominium rentals at the Remington, a 52-unit building that bills itself as “Washington’s best kept secret.” The couples own 27 Remington condos, which have more than tripled in value, to $8 million, over the decade.

There is no evidence to show that Mollohan in any way helped Jarvis obtain federal funds for his many (failed) projects. But that didn’t keep Jarvis from constantly talking up his relationship with the high ranking Democrat. Jarvis seems like your average scammer who happened to have relatives in powerful positions allowing him to be a much more successful scammer than he probably was destined to be. Scandals need these characters, like the lifeguard who lived in the Delaware beach house owned by Michael Scanlon that was supposed to be a think tank or the owner of Shirlington Limousine, who is alleged to have ferried prostitutes to Duke Cunningham in the Watergate. No good politician is without his or her wacky relative - a Roger Clinton or a Neil Bush. Jarvis is no different.

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Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-WV), under fire for writing earmarks to non-profits that he founded while his personal finances skyrocketed, plans on admitting, as early as today, “that he misstated some transactions in his congressional filings”. According to the Washington Post Mollohan plans to explain how his personal wealth grew so fast while also admitting that he misstated a number of items in his personal financial disclosure forms. The Post also gives a good explanation of the history of Mollohan’s string of non-profits which he created to diversify the West Virginia economy.

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A page one story by Jeffrey Birnbaum in Monday’s Washington Post recounts the growing ethical cloud surrounding West Virginia Democratic congressman Alan Mollohan, now under investigation by federal authorities looking into federal money he funneled to agencies – and some business partners – in his congressional district.

To boost jobs in his district, Mollohan established a network of nonprofit organizations and helped deliver federal funds to them, often through earmarked appropriations. At the same time, he invested as a partner in real estate deals with the head of one of those agencies and with the owner of a company that’s received “substantial federal aid.” Those investments have proved lucrative indeed.

 “From 2000 to 2004,” Birnbaum reports, “his assets grew from no more than $565,000 to at least $6.3 million.”

How did Birnbaum know that? He didn’t need an inside source at the IRS to slip him Mollohan’s tax filings; he could piece together a good part of that information by checking the congressman’s personal financial disclosure report, a document that must be filed annually by thousands of high-level government employees, including every member of Congress.

Those reports, due annually on May 15 – that’s right, they’re due today – are public information and images of past reports can be found in a remote corner of the Center for Responsive Politics’ OpenSecrets website.

You can also find links to the reports directly from the campaign contribution profile of any member – here’s Mollohan’s – by clicking on the “Personal Finances” tab from the menu on the left.

Once you’ve navigated to the right spot, what you’ll find are photo images of the hand-written reports filed by members. Don’t count on a complete rundown of their finances or copies of their tax returns. Investments, real estate holdings and other assets are reported in ranges, not precise dollar amounts – that’s why news stories like Birnbaum’s usually hedge their language with words like “no more than” and “at least.”

In Mollohan’s case, the figures cited in those reports may be more incomplete than they’re supposed to be. According to Birnbaum’s story, “Mollohan plans to divulge that he misstated on House financial disclosure forms the amount of loans and income from some of his real estate holdings.”

While the information in the disclosure reports may be incomplete, imprecise, and sometimes barely legible – they’re generally filed in the member’s own handwriting, after all – there’s nothing like them if you’re trying to see whether a particular congressional career has been an enriching one.

One final note: Those personal financial disclosure reports are one of the many reasons that the OpenSecrets website won yet another Webby Award last week as the best political website on the Internet. The Webbys are considered the Oscars of the Internet, and this is the third time in the award’s 10-year history that OpenSecrets has taken home the honors in the political category. Congratulations to the tireless researchers at CRP who bring information like this out of the filing cabinets and into the public domain.

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