Category Archives: Department of Homeland Security

14th Amendment Does Not Give Birthright Citizenship

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It is about time that this matter gets full attention and debate.
The most important word is but 2 letters: We the People OF meaning loyalty, honor and duty.

He unabashedly wades into politically dangerous territory and yet continues to be rewarded by favorable poll results. He has clearly tapped into a reserve of public resentment for inside-the-Beltway politics. How far this resentment will carry him is anyone’s guess, but the Republican establishment is worried. His latest proposal to end birthright citizenship has set off alarm bells in the Republican party.

The leadership worries that Trump will derail the party’s plans to appeal to the Latino vote. Establishment Republicans believe that the future of the party depends on being able to capture a larger share of this rapidly expanding electorate. Trump’s plan, however, may appeal to the most rapidly expanding electorate, senior citizens, and may have an even greater appeal to the millions of Republicans who stayed away from the polls in 2012 as well as the ethnic and blue-collar Democrats who crossed party lines to vote Republican in the congressional elections of 2014. All of these voters outnumber any increase in the Latino vote that Republicans could possibly hope to gain from a population that has consistently voted Democratic by a two-thirds majority and shows little inclination to change.

And Nothing Odd About Supporting Such a Reading Critics say that Trump’s plan is unrealistic, that it would require a constitutional amendment because the 14th Amendment mandates birthright citizenship and that the Supreme Court has upheld this requirement ever since its passage in 1868. The critics are wrong. A correct understanding of the intent of the framers of the 14th Amendment and legislation passed by Congress in the late 19th century and in 1923 extending citizenship to American Indians provide ample proof that Congress has constitutional power to define who is within the “jurisdiction of the United States” and therefore eligible for citizenship. Simple legislation passed by Congress and signed by the president would be constitutional under the 14th Amendment.

Birthright citizenship is the policy whereby the children of illegal aliens born within the geographical limits of the U.S. are entitled to American citizenship — and, as Trump says, it is a great magnet for illegal immigration. Many of Trump’s critics believe that this policy is an explicit command of the Constitution, consistent with the British common-law system. This is simply not true. Congress has constitutional power to define who is within the “jurisdiction of the United States” and therefore eligible for citizenship. Although the Constitution of 1787 mentioned citizens, it did not define citizenship. It was in 1868 that a definition of citizenship entered the Constitution with the ratification of the 14th Amendment. Here is the familiar language: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” Thus there are two components to American citizenship: birth or naturalization in the U.S. and being subject to the jurisdiction of the U.S.

Today, we somehow have come to believe that anyone born within the geographical limits of the U.S. is automatically subject to its jurisdiction; but this renders the jurisdiction clause utterly superfluous. If this had been the intention of the framers of the 14th Amendment, presumably they would have said simply that all persons born or naturalized in the U.S. are thereby citizens.

Indeed, during debate over the amendment, Senator Jacob Howard, the author of the citizenship clause, attempted to assure skeptical colleagues that the language was not intended to make Indians citizens of the United States. Indians, Howard conceded, were born within the nation’s geographical limits, but he steadfastly maintained that they were not subject to its jurisdiction because they owed allegiance to their tribes and not to the U.S. Senator Lyman Trumbull, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, supported this view, arguing that “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” meant “not owing allegiance to anybody else and being subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States.”

Jurisdiction understood as allegiance, Senator Howard explained, excludes not only Indians but “persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, [or] who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers.” Thus, “subject to the jurisdiction” does not simply mean, as is commonly thought today, subject to American laws or courts. It means owing exclusive political allegiance to the U.S. Furthermore, there has never been an explicit holding by the Supreme Court that the children of illegal aliens are automatically accorded birthright citizenship. In the case of Wong Kim Ark (1898) the Court ruled that a child born in the U.S. of legal aliens was entitled to “birthright citizenship” under the 14th Amendment. This was a 5–4 opinion which provoked the dissent of Chief Justice Melville Fuller, who argued that, contrary to the reasoning of the majority’s holding, the 14th Amendment did not in fact adopt the common-law understanding of birthright citizenship.
The framers of the Constitution were, of course, well-versed in the British common law, having learned its essential principles from William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England. As such, they knew that the very concept of citizenship was unknown in British common law. Blackstone speaks only of “birthright subjectship” or “birthright allegiance,” never using the terms “citizen” or “citizenship.” The idea of birthright subjectship, as Blackstone admitted, was derived from feudal law. It is the relation of master and servant: All who are born within the protection of the king owed perpetual allegiance as a “debt of gratitude.” According to Blackstone, this debt is “intrinsic” and “cannot be forfeited, cancelled, or altered.” Birthright subjectship under common law is the doctrine of perpetual allegiance. America’s Founders rejected this doctrine. The Declaration of Independence, after all, solemnly proclaims that “the good People of these Colonies . . . are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved.” So, the common law — the feudal doctrine of perpetual allegiance — could not possibly serve as the ground of American citizenship. Indeed, the idea is too preposterous to entertain.
For All GOP Candidates Consider as well that, in 1868, Congress passed the Expatriation Act. This permitted American citizens to renounce their allegiance and alienate their citizenship. This piece of legislation was supported by Senator Howard and other leading architects of the 14th Amendment, and characterized the right of expatriation as “a natural and inherent right of all people, indispensable to the enjoyment of the right of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Like the idea of citizenship, this right of expatriation is wholly incompatible with the common-law understanding of perpetual allegiance and subjectship. One member of the House expressed the general sense of Congress when he proclaimed: “The old feudal doctrine stated by Blackstone and adopted as part of the common law of England . . . is not only at war with the theory of our institutions, but is equally at war with every principle of justice and of sound public policy.” The notion of birthright citizenship was characterized by another member as an “indefensible doctrine of indefeasible allegiance,” a feudal doctrine wholly at odds with republican government. Nor was this the only legislation concerning birthright citizenship that Congress passed following the ratification of the 14th Amendment. As mentioned above, there was almost unanimous agreement among its framers that the amendment did not extend citizenship to Indians. Although born in the U.S., they were not subject to the jurisdiction of the U.S. Beginning in 1870, however, Congress began to pass legislation offering citizenship to Indians on a tribe-by-tribe basis.
Finally, in 1923, there was a universal offer to all tribes. Any Indian who consented could become a citizen. Thus Congress used its legislative authority under Section Five of the 14th Amendment to determine who was within the jurisdiction of the U.S. It could make a similar determination today, based on this legislative precedent, that children born in the U.S. to illegal aliens are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. A constitutional amendment is no more required today than it was in 1923. A nation that cannot determine who becomes citizens or believes that it must allow the children of those who defy its laws to become citizens is no longer a sovereign nation. Legislation to end birthright citizenship has been circulating in Congress since the mid ’90s and such a bill is circulating in both houses today. It will, of course, not pass Congress, and if it did pass it would be vetoed. But if birthright citizenship becomes an election issue and a Republican is elected president, then who knows what the future might hold. It is difficult to imagine that the framers of the 14th Amendment intended to confer the boon of citizenship on the children of illegal aliens when they explicitly denied that boon to Indians who had been born in the United States. Those who defy the laws of the U.S. should not be allowed to confer such an advantage on their children. This would not be visiting the sins of the parents on the children, as is often claimed, since the children of illegal aliens born in the U.S. would not be denied anything to which they otherwise would have a right. Their allegiance should follow that of their parents during their minority. A nation that cannot determine who becomes citizens or believes that it must allow the children of those who defy its laws to become citizens is no longer a sovereign nation. No one is advocating that those who have been granted birthright citizenship be stripped of their citizenship. Equal protection considerations would counsel that citizenship once granted is vested and cannot be revoked; this, I believe, is eminently just. The proposal to end birthright citizenship is prospective only.
Political pundits believe that Trump should not press such divisive issues as immigration and citizenship. It is clear, however, that he has struck a popular chord — and touched an important issue that should be debated no matter how divisive. Both the Republican party and the Democratic party want to avoid the issue because, while both parties advocate some kind of reform, neither party has much interest in curbing illegal immigration: Republicans want cheap and exploitable labor and Democrats want future voters. Who will get the best of the bargain I will leave for others to decide.
*** For more reading and to see who are in this fight…
Further, Jeb Bush was actually correct too when it comes to the Chinese and their operation to gain birthright citizenship.

 

Creepy Underworld Advertised on Billboards Escort Service

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Read with caution, fair warning.

Raid of Rentboy, an Escort Website, Angers Gay Activists


For some gay activists, it had shades of bathhouse raids and gay-bar roundups from decades ago. On Tuesday, federal authorities burst into the Union Square office of the gay-escort website Rentboy.com and arrested the chief executive and several employees on prostitution charges.


Rentboy, which federal authorities called the biggest male-escort website, had been around for almost two decades, allowing escorts to pay to advertise themselves. It was well known in the gay community, hosting pool parties, dances and awards shows throughout the country. Many members of the L.G.B.T community have criticised the authorities for allowing certain escort services like Asian VIP Service to continue while targeting the male-escort industry.
After federal authorities charged its top executives with promoting prostitution, seized the website and went after the business’s assets on Tuesday, many gay activists were infuriated. The Transgender Law Center, a civil-rights group, criticized the arrests, as did some male sex workers from websites similar to teentuber xxx. Several activists said they would use the episode to renew calls to decriminalize prostitution.

“To many in our community this feels like a throwback to when the police raided gay bars in the ’50s and ’60s,” Justin Vivian Bond, a performer and an activist who is transgender, wrote in an email. “This invasion of a consensual hookup site which is run for and by members of the L.G.B.T. community feels like a real slap in the face after gentrification and the Giuliani and Bloomberg administrations drove so many gay bars out of business and forced people to meet online instead of in person,” the activist added, referring to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

Danny Cruz said he had posted ads on Rentboy “to supplement income” for about seven years, starting when he moved to New York. He said he had talked regularly to the executives who were arrested, both about his business and about staying safe.

“I don’t see why the government would be interested in what two people do behind closed doors,” Mr. Cruz, who is now involved in the Sex Workers Outreach Project in Los Angeles, said.

Khaalid Walls, a spokesman for the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which participated in the investigation, said in an email that “any insinuation that a specific population was targeted is categorically false.”

The federal complaint says that although Rentboy.com, whose headquarters are on 14th Street at Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, had a disclaimer telling visitors that they could not exchange money for sex, that was “clearly” happening. Escorts, the complaint says, posted ads including penis size, pay rate and preferred fetishes, and the site’s visitors then contacted them directly. On a separate website, DaddysReviews.com, clients would review the individual escorts, the complaint says.

The seven current and former Rentboy executives were charged with conspiring to violate the Travel Act by promoting prostitution, and each faces up to five years in prison.

Mr. Walls said: “As the investigative arm of the Department of Homeland Security, ICE is responsible for the enforcement of laws that promote the legitimate movement of people, goods and currency in domestic and foreign transactions. Our allegation with this case is that the business and its principals purported itself to be an escort service while promoting criminal acts, namely illegal prostitution.”

Rentboy’s chief executive, Jeffrey Hurant, 50, said in an interview excerpted in the criminal complaint that “there is no place on this website where somebody says I’ll have sex for money because that is against the law.”

The director of the site, Michael Sean Belman, 47, said in another interview excerpted in the complaint: “We say that escorts are selling their time only.”

“What happens between you and the escort is up to you,” he said. “That way it’s legal.” (The complaint says he “incorrectly” summarized the legality.)

Derrick De Lise, publisher of the online magazine Queer Voices, said the fact that the government went after a gay-escort website, without making mention of protecting sex workers, made it seem as though the site’s gay affiliation attracted the government attention.

In 2014, federal authorities seized myRedBook, a California-based site with ads for sex. But unlike in the Rentboy case, the charges included money laundering. The authorities also said myRedBook allowed child prostitution, which has not been cited in the Rentboy case.

MyRedBook’s owner, Eric Omuro, was charged with using the mail and the Internet to promote prostitution and with laundering money derived from the site. Mr. Omuro pleaded guilty in 2014 to using a facility of interstate commerce with the intent to facilitate prostitution, and admitted that the site allowed prostitutes to post ads. He was sentenced to 13 months in prison. In an affidavit submitted for sentencing, the Federal Bureau of Investigation said it had found more than 50 juveniles advertised for prostitution on his site.

Mr. Omuro was the first website operator to be convicted on prostitution charges, the Department of Justice said.

“It’s troubling to think that we’re investing resources and time to target Rentboy and sex workers,” said Alex Garner, a writer and activist in Washington, “when what we really should be having is a reasonable and thoughtful conversation about the decriminalization of sex work. We have an entire police force we should be overhauling, we have murders of trans women happening in large numbers, and we’re devoting our time and energy to cracking down on sex work. Who’s choosing to prioritize it?”

Nellin McIntosh, a spokeswoman for the United States attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York, which is prosecuting the case, declined to comment.

We Are the Government, Here to Help Local Communities

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Creepy and shovel ready, kinda sorta…

From the White House:

Here’s How the Federal Government is Working with Local Communities to Create Change, in One Map:

Summary:
Get the facts and data behind the programs the Obama administration has put in place in partnership with the communities they intend to serve, all across the country.

As the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, it’s my job to oversee the implementation and enforcement of the President’s priorities across the Administration.

You might call us the nerve center where goals become initiatives, and initiatives become programs at work on the ground in local communities and states across the country.

With that in mind, let’s go back to basics for a second and focus on something we can all agree on:

Any plans that we want to make for improving communities across the country need to be hatched in partnership with those communities — by the people who live in them, work in them, and stand to benefit from them.

Take a look at the federal programs at work in your area.

This week marks ten years since the neighborhoods of New Orleans were left devastated by Hurricane Katrina. Since then, community partnerships with the federal government have helped revitalize those communities. They’ve made sure the city’s vital health clinic system stays funded and delivering high quality services. They’ve laid the groundwork to open the Loyola Avenue-Union Passenger Terminal Streetcar Line in the city’s business district. They’ve brought the number of homeless veterans in New Orleans to a functional zero by December of 2014 – more than a year ahead of the proposed goal. (Hear straight from a New Orleanian about the role open data played in the city’s transformation.)

There are projects like these at work across the country, whether you realized it or not.

Over the course of the past six years, this Administration has been steadily creating programs in partnership with the communities they intend to serve – from southeastern Kentucky to Fresno to Detroit.

While there are a lot of things we have been up to from addressing climate change to poverty alleviation, we are taking a new approach — one that relies on communities developing plans that best fit their needs rather than the laundry list of programs the government has. It’s pretty simple. First, we partner with communities by seeking out their plans or vision. Second, we take a one-government approach that crosses agency and program silos to support communities in implementing their plans for improvement. Finally we focus on what works, using data to measure success and monitor progress.

Take a look at how local programs have changed New Orleans communities.
Construction and development of the Loyola Avenue-Union Passenger Terminal Streetcar Lines had stalled out, leaving low-income areas underserved for decades. A $45 million TIGER grant ensured the streetcar expansion was completed by 2013, and has connected residential neighborhoods — including low-income communities — directly with Amtrak and intercity bus service.
See how local programs have transformed communities within Fresno, CA.
The plot of land at Belmont and Poplar Avenues was virtually abandoned. AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps has since installed water-saving irrigation, cleaned up the alleys, built a community garden, and planted native trees.

 

We wanted to give the American public a sense of exactly what that looks like – and give you the opportunity to take a look at what’s at work in your area. So today, we released a snapshot view of the Obama administration’s community-based initiatives. It combines datasets from initiatives across more than 15 Federal agencies – and we’re adding datasets and features as we continue building it.

Take a look – see what’s at work in your area.

Then, share how you’ve seen these programs at work in your community. If you’ve got a photo, share that with us, too.

From the start, this map has been built in the open, and source code is available on GitHub. We want to know what you think, and how we can improve it – so share your thoughts with us here.

Democrats Say the Economy is Great, This Guy Knows

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Have you met Marc Lasry? You know the guy who is co-owner of the Milwaukee Bucks…

NO WONDER AMERICA IS IN TROUBLE: FRAUD, COLLUSION, CONSPIRACY and well read on….

He is a billionaire hedge fund manager and he was Chelsea Clinton’s old boss. Lasry’s daughter was married in 2013, she and her husband both worked as interns for Obama’s Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel. Further, he is a close friend and bundler for the Clintons, and Bill suggested that Obama name Lasry as Ambassador to France, but then that nomination came to a screeching halt. Why you ask?

Well there was a big bust at the Carlyle Hotel where poker games were arranged and often included people like Leonardo DiCaprio, Ben Affleck and even Matt Damon, but there was yet one other poker player, a Russian, of the Russian mafia that is.

Then Lasry is also tight with one of those old czars that Obama hired, Steve Rattner, he was the car czar, you remember ‘cash for clunkers’ and the auto bailouts? Yeah, that guy.

Anyway, this hedge fund and financial guru of Moroccan descent, says the economy is great and is rolling along being quite stable. What?

It is no wonder that Barack Obama never talks about the lack of jobs or the 18 trillion of debt. It appears both Lasry and Obama know nothing of the U.S. financial condition and perhaps even Treasury secretary Jack Lew and Federal Reserve Chairman both just keep the duck take applied to the unstableness.

Obama Mega-Donor, Clinton Foundation Donor: ‘The Economy is Fine’

FreeBeacon: Billionaire hedge fund co-owner Marc Lasry, a mega-donor to President Obama and the Clinton Foundation, says that the “economy is fine” after the Dow Jones industrial average tumbled 1,000 points in the first minutes of trading on Monday.

“What I have told investors is the economy is fine but now is a great time to be buying some things when they get hit,” Lasry told the New York Times. “Other people may be having issues. For us, that is an opportunity as opposed to a problem.”

Lasry, co-owner of the $13.9 billion hedge fund Avenue Capital Group, is one of President Obama’s top campaign bundlers.

Since 2008, Lasry has contributed $282,900 to Democratic candidates and committees, including $9,600 to Obama. He also raised more than $500,000 for Obama’s reelection.

Additionally, Lasry is listed as donating between $100,000 and $250,000 to the Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton Foundation.

Lasry has also held fundraisers for Hillary Clinton’s campaign. On May 13, Lasry held $2,700 per person fundraiser at his home in New York City. “I think she will best represent this country and do what’s right for everybody so therefore I will do whatever I can to help her,” he said.

The billionaire was also offered an ambassadorship to France by Obama but had to withdraw his name when FBI tapes linked him to a high-stakes poker ring tied to Russian mobsters.

In case you want to know more about that Russian mafia thing…

The FBI Busted A Russian Gambling Ring That Catered To Wall Streeters, Oligarchs, And Hollywood Stars

More than thirty people were charged by federal authorities in a massive illegal gambling, money laundering, and extortion scheme tied to Russian organized crime, according to an indictment in the U.S. District Court Southern District of New York.

The operation allegedly involved two criminal organizations, Nahmad-Trincher (based in Los Angeles and NYC), which catered to millionaires, billionaires and poker pros, and Taiwanchik-Trincher (based in Kiev, NYC, and Moscow), which serviced oligarchs from Russia and the former Soviet Union.

According the indictment, these groups had operations spanning across continents with defendants located in Los Angeles, Russia, New York and the former Soviet Union, bank accounts in Switzerland, holding companies in Cyprus and the United States, and a gambling website in Taiwan.

The characters in the drama include the son of a billionaire art dealer, a Bronx plumber, a JPMorgan branch manager, a real estate firm in New York, a car repair shop in Brooklyn, and a Russian man charged with allegedly bid-rigging the Salt Lake City 2002 Olympic Games, etc.

Basically, this goes deep.

The Taiwanchik-Trincher Organization, which the indictment identifies as an “international organized crime group with leadership based in New York City, Kiev, and Moscow,” was allegedly led by Alimzhan Tokhtakhounov (a.k.a. “Alik”), Vadim Trincher (a.k.a. “Dima”), and Anatoly Golubchick (a.k.a. “Tony”), the indictment said. They are all named as defendants.

You might recognize the name Tokhatkhounov. He was the guy charged with allegedly bribing officials at the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, according to the indictment.

Based in Russia, Tokhatkhounov was allegedly referred to as “Vor,” which is defined as a Russian term meaning “Thief-in-Law.”

It’s basically like a version of the “Godfather,” and is a moniker bestowed on the highest-level criminal figures from the former Soviet Union. According to the indictment, a “Vor” gets tribute from other criminals, offers protection, and uses “their authority to resolve disputes among criminals.”

Tokhatkhounov’s group allegedly ran an illegal gambling business, money laundering, extortion, and other criminal operations. The crux of their business, however, was a series of high-stakes poker games and gambling activities frequented by oligarchs.

Nahmad-Trincher, based in Los Angeles and NYC, was structured in much the same way, but catered to Wall Streeters, pro athletes, and Hollywood stars, The New York Times reported.

No famous figures were named specifically in the indictment.

Names or not, we’re talking big money here — like $50 million running through Cypriot and American shell companies, or $499,800 sent to a bank account in Taiwan owned by an illegal gambling website operating in the United States, or $850,000 moving from a Swiss bank account to a U.S. bank account under the control of Noah “The Oracle” Seigel.

To hide all these transactions, says the complaint, the Trincher groups relied on a sophisticated money laundering operation. Not only did they run money through a Brooklyn car garage, a real estate company, and an online used car dealership, but they also used a JP Morgan branch manager in NYC named Ronald Uy.

Uy, who was named as a defendant, allegedly assisted “in structuring several transactions at the Bank designed in part to avoid generating currency transaction reports,” according to the indictment.

Of course, gambling doesn’t work out for everyone all the time. When one client wins, another one must lose. Losers playing in the Trincher group’s high stakes games could, according to the Feds, expect violence or at least threats of it.

In one case,” Nahmad-Trincher allegedly took control of 50% of “Client-3’s” Bronx-based plumbing business when he racked up $2 million in gambling debt.

There were several arrests made today in New York, Los Angeles, Miami and other places, according to the New York Post.

Earlier this morning, the FBI raided Helly Nahmad Art Gallery at the swanky Carlyle Hotel in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. The Feds were looking for Helly Nahmad, the son of billionaire art baron David Nahmad.

 

 

Dept. of Energy, Fleecing of the Taxpayers

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Report: DOE Failed to Catch Solyndra’s Misrepresentations

by Lachlan Markay: Inspector general releases findings of years-long investigation into bankrupt solar company

A years-long investigation into the Department of Energy’s support for the bankrupt solar company Solyndra faults DOE officials, contractors, and the company itself for the department’s eventual loss of hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars steered to the firm.

The DOE’s inspector general on Wednesday released the results of the investigation. It was undertaken in conjunction with the Department of Justice, which, the report reveals, decided early this year not to pursue any criminal charges in the matter.

Solyndra received a $535 million stimulus-backed DOE loan guarantee as part of the Obama administration’s early push for renewable energy subsidies. The company filed for bankruptcy in 2011 and laid off 1,100 employees, eventually costing taxpayers more than $500 million.

The company became a symbol of opposition to the administration’s green energy subsidy programs. Critics said its investors’ political connections had helped it to obtain taxpayer money despite obvious problems with its business.

Wednesday’s report, from DOE’s inspector general, notes these concerns, but says that the political factors supporting Solyndra’s government assistance were not examined during the investigation.

“While not the focus of the investigation, we were mindful of the concerns that had been raised regarding possible political pressure applied in the Solyndra decision-making process,” the report noted.

“Employees acknowledged that they felt tremendous pressure, in general, to process loan guarantee applications. They suggested the pressure was based on the significant interest in the program from Department leadership, the Administration, Congress, and the applicants.”

The report faults some unnamed DOE officials for failing to account for problems with the company’s business model shortly before it guaranteed financing for its solar panel production.

A week before the closing of Solyndra’s loan, an employee in the DOE’s Loan Programs Office (LPO) noticed a report from another branch of the department, the office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, that projected a per-watt cost of rooftop solar systems well below what Solyndra charged for its products.

According to the report, the LPO employee sent three emails to superiors noting the troubling data, yet no action was taken and DOE moved ahead with its Solyndra loan guarantee.

“This information should have raised serious questions concerning the viability of Solyndra’s financial model and Solyndra’s corresponding ability to service its debt payments. Instead, it was apparently disregarded,” the report found.

By that point, according to the report, Solyndra was already lying to the department about the company’s financial health: it inflated sales figures and misrepresented the costs of its solar panels to both DOE and engineering and financial contractors hired to assess its loan guarantee application.

The report primarily blames Solyndra for those misrepresentations, but it also faults LPO officials for failing to recognize apparent discrepancies in the information the company was providing.

In the run-up to the closing of its DOE-guaranteed loan, Solyndra assured the White House Office of Management and Budget and the credit rating agency Fitch, hired to assess the company’s financial prospects, that its panels were selling well and fetching a competitive price.

However, just weeks before, the company had provided DOE with a spreadsheet that “if read carefully” would have demonstrated to LPO officials that the company was inflating promises of future contracts and hiding the true costs of its products and that it “internally viewed the sales contracts as broken.”

“It is clear that there were shortcomings in the Department’s due diligence process,” the IG found, but it placed the bulk of the blame on the company itself for providing misleading and at times inaccurate information to department auditors and loan officials.

William Yeatman, a senior fellow and energy policy expert with the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said he was suspicious of IG findings that seemed to absolve the department of responsibility for ensuring the accuracy of information used to support the loan guarantee.

“The report raises more questions than answers,” Yeatman said in an email. “Outwardly, it passes the buck to Solyndra. But if you pay attention to the details, it demonstrates a woeful lack of due diligence by the Energy Department.”

“However, the IG refused to investigate a likely cause of this ineptitude—political pressure, which the report acknowledges was a factor—for whatever reason,” he added.

Since Solyndra’s bankruptcy, two other companies backed by the same loan guarantee program, Fisker Automotive and Abound Solar, have also filed for bankruptcy protection.

A third, Vehicle Production Group, ceased operations and laid off its entire staff in 2013. Another company, AM General, bought up VPG’s remaining assets, and its DOE-backed $50 million loan, for which it paid just $3 million.

Meanwhile:

EPA withholds mine spill documents from Congress

by Tori Richards: A congressional committee blasted the Environmental Protection Agency today for blocking release of documents related to the Gold King mine disaster, which poured deadly chemicals into the largest source of drinking water in the West.

“It is disappointing, but not surprising, that the EPA failed to meet the House Science Committee’s reasonable deadline in turning over documents pertaining to the Gold King Mine spill,” said Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX). “These documents are essential to the Committee’s ongoing investigation and our upcoming hearing on Sept. 9. But more importantly, this information matters to the many Americans directly affected in western states, who are still waiting for answers from the EPA.”

Smith – who frequently spars with the EPA – is chairman of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee. EPA director Gina McCarthy has been asked to appear and answer questions about the agency’s role in creating a 3-million-gallon toxic spill into Colorado’s Animas River on Aug. 5. Critics say McCarthy and the EPA have been unresponsive, secretive and unsympathetic toward millions of people who live in three states bordering the river.

For several days, the EPA didn’t notify the states of Utah, New Mexico or the Navajo Nation that the spill was coming their way. McCarthy waited a week before visiting Colorado and even then she refused to tour Silverton, the town nearest the Gold King mine where EPA contractors unleashed the toxic plume into waterways that feed the Colorado River. The agency withheld the name of the contractor working on the project and other details that are generally considered public information. Lastly, the Navajo Nation, which relies on the river for drinking water and farming, received an emergency supply from the EPA in oil-contaminated containers.

Smith also blasted McCarthy for traveling to Japan while controversy over the spill continues to swirl. He criticized President Barack Obama, as well.

“EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy is currently crusading on climate-change action in Japan while President Obama, who has yet to visit the areas affected by the spill, is touring the U.S. to tout EPA’s latest regulation that will do little to impact climate change and will only further burden Americans with higher electric bills,” Smith said.

And it’s not just the public and the media that have been frustrated by the EPA’s inaction.

“Time and again, the EPA has failed to be cooperative, forthright, or reasonable in its dealings with my Committee and with Congress in general,” Smith told Watchdog. “The agency embodies all the dysfunction, misguided priorities, and government overreach that angers so many Americans. The EPA seems to have a clear disregard for the very people it is intended to serve.”

The hearing is scheduled to last just a day and could include testimony from the firm that was contracted to stem the flow of toxic water from several mines above Silverton. Smith said in a statement last week that people affected by the spill continue to deal with limited information and uncertainty.

“As the agency entrusted by the American people to protect the environment and ensure the nation’s waters are clean, the EPA should be held to the highest standard,” Smith said. “The Science Committee needs to hear from the EPA about steps it is taking to repair the damage and to prevent this from ever occurring again.”

One official familiar with the committee but not authorized to speak said House members have been dismayed by an increased number of reports showing either incompetence or flat-out disregard in a variety of situations not limited just to the Animas River spill.

And at least one state senator has started an investigation into allegations that the EPA purposely caused the spill to create a Superfund site – a designation that the tiny town of Silverton has repeatedly rebuffed.

“EPA gets a failing grade from me for pursuing an extreme agenda at the expense of our nation’s economy, American interests, and, in this case, environmental protection,” Smith told Watchdog. “The more I review reports from the spill, the more questions I have about EPA’s faulty processes and failure to communicate with local residents and officials.”