[env-trinity] FPPC launches probe into Democratic Party in response to Consumer Watchdog report

[Dan Bacher]

http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/9/24/1573828/-FPPC-launches-probe-in-response-to-Consumer-Watchdog-s-Brown-s-Dirty-Hands-report



Governor Jerry Brown speaks at a climate conference in Toronto,  
Ontario, Canada. Photo by  Salvatore Sacco, Canadian Press Images.

FPPC launches probe into Democratic Party in response to Consumer  
Watchdog report

by Dan Bacher

The California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) announced on  
September 23 that it has opened an investigation into the California  
Democratic Party in response to a report by a prominent consumer group  
claiming that the party acted as a “laundry machine” to funnel  
donations from oil, energy and utility companies to Brown’s 2014  
election campaign.


In her letter to the Santa Monica-based Consumer Watchdog, Galena  
West, Chief of the FPPC’s Enforcement Division, said the division  
“will investigate the California Democratic Party for alleged  
violations of the Political Reform Act’s campaign reporting provisions  
resulting from information contained in your sworn complaint (Brown’s  
Dirty Hands Report.)”

She said the FPPC will not not be opening an investigation into “the  
other persons,” including Governor Brown, identified in the complaint  
at this time.

West said Consumer Watchdog will next receive notification upon final  
disposition of the case, but didn't provide any time frame for the  
case’s disposition.

“However, please be advised that at this time we have not made any  
determination about the validity of the allegations you have made or  
about the culpability, if any of the persons you identify in your  
complaint,” she said.

After receiving the FPPC letter, Jamie Court, president of Consumer  
Watchdog, said, “We are pleased that the FPPC has launched an  
investigation into the troubling pattern of contributions to the  
California Democratic Party by oil, utility and energy companies  
uncovered in ‘Brown’s Dirty Hands.’”

“The Party and members of the Administration who worked for it have a  
lot of questions to answer. Political parties shouldn’t be used as  
laundry machines for money from unpopular companies or for campaign  
contributions in excess of candidate-permitted limits,” he stated.

Consumer Watchdog released Brown’s Dirty Hands on August 10, 2016, at  
a time when Brown faces increasing criticism from environmental,  
consumer and public interest groups regarding administration policies  
they say favor oil companies, energy companies and utilities over  
fish, water, people and the environment.

The report tabulated donations totaling $9.8 million dollars to Jerry  
Brown’s campaigns, causes, and initiatives, and to the California  
Democratic Party since he ran for Governor from 26 energy companies  
with business before the state, according to Court. The companies  
included the state’s three major investor-owned utilities, as well as  
Occidental, Chevron, and NRG.

“An exhaustive review of campaign records, publicly-released emails  
and other documents at PUCPapers.org, court filings, and media  
reports, showed that Brown personally intervened in regulatory  
decisions favoring the energy industry, and points to Brown and his  
operatives having used the Democratic Party as a political slush fund  
to receive contributions from unpopular energy companies in amounts  
greater than permitted to his candidate committee,” Court said.

The report alleges that energy companies donated $4.4 million to the  
Democratic Party, and the Democratic Party gave $4.7 million to  
Brown’s re-election between 2011 and 2014. Consumer Watchdog submitted  
its report to the FPPC as a sworn complaint.

“The timing of energy industry donations around important legislation  
and key pro-industry amendments, as well as key regulatory decisions  
in which Brown personally intervened, raises troubling questions about  
whether quid pro quos are routine for this administration,” said  
consumer advocate Liza Tucker, author of the report. “While Brown  
paints himself as a foe of fossil fuels, his Administration promoted  
reckless oil drilling, burning dirty natural gas to make electricity,  
and used old hands from industry and government, placed in key  
regulatory positions, to protect the fossil fuel-reliant energy  
industry.”

In response to my request for a comment on the FPPC probe,  Deborah  
Hoffman, Governor Brown’s Deputy Press Secretary replied, “Thanks for  
reaching out. Questions  are best directed to the party being  
investigated. As noted in the response letter, the FPPC ‘will not be  
opening an investigation regarding the other persons identified’ in  
the complaint. I don't expect we’ll be commenting.’”

Brown spokesman Evan Westrup told the San Diego Union Tribune on  
August 10, in response to the report, “The governor’s leadership on  
climate is unmatched. These claims are downright cuckoo.”

“Westrup cited a host of Brown policies and decisions since he was  
elected in 2010 that were aimed at protecting the environment," the  
publication said. (www.sandiegouniontribune.com)

In the Sacramento Bee’s early September 25 edition. Michael Soller, a  
spokeperson for the Democratic Party, said, “We received the letter,  
we’re aware of it and we’ve been fully cooperating with the FPPC.”

State law limits the amount that individuals, businesses and  
committees can contribute to political candidates. In the 2014  
election cycle, a single donor was limited to $54,400 for a candidate  
for governor, according to Tucker.

However, donors can give unlimited amounts of money to political  
parties. During the 2014 cycle, parties were allowed to give up to  
$34,000 from each donor to a candidate per year.

In one of many examples of the alleged use of the party as a “laundry  
machine” for political contributions to Brown cited in the report,  
Chevron donated a total of $350,000 to the Democratic Party on  
December 23, 2013. Seven days later, the Democratic Party donated  
$300,000 to Brown for Governor 2014. On the same day Chevron donated  
the maximum to Brown’s campaign, $54,400.

“Less than two months later after Brown came out publicly to oppose a  
proposed oil severance tax,” according to Tucker. “The weakened  
fracking bill also helped Brown aide Nancy McFadden, who held up to  
$100,000 in Linn Energy that would acquire Berry Petroleum and its  
3,000 California fracking wells.”

Following an ethics complaint filed by Consumer Watchdog against  
McFadden, the  FPPC on March 24 opened an investigation into her  
failure to report the dates and times of stock sales in PG&E, her  
former employer.

The FPPC said there was “insufficient evidence” to pursue an  
investigation into whether McFadden violated other conflict of  
interest laws. However, the agency said it would look into the  
“apparent failure of Ms. McFadden to disclose the status of her stock  
ownership in Pacific Gas and Electric.”

Tucker said she was pleased that the FPPC  was continuing their  
investigation into McFadden. “It’s a very good sign that the  
investigation is still open,” she said.

In the report, Tucker said the timing of certain donations “coincided  
with legislative or regulatory action on behalf of these companies.”  
Among the examples detailed in the report are the following:

• “Southern California Edison donated $130,000 to the California  
Democratic Party, its largest contribution up until that time, on the  
same day PUC President Michael Peevey cut a secret deal with an SCE  
executive in Warsaw, Poland to make ratepayers cover 70 percent of the  
$4.7 billion cost to close the fatally flawed San Onofre nuclear  
plant.  Brown backed the dirty deal, telling Edison’s CEO personally,  
according to an email from the CEO uncovered by the Public Records  
Act, that he was willing to tell the media on the day of the plant’s  
shuttering that the company was acting responsibly and focused on the  
right things. Three days prior to SCE’s announcement that it would  
close San Onofre permanently, the company donated $25,000 to the  
California Democratic Party.

•Emails from PG&E’s top lobbyist Brian Cherry to his boss claim that  
Brown personally intervened with a PUC Commissioner to persuade him to  
approve a natural gas-fired power plant called Oakley for the utility.  
In a January 1, 2013 email, Cherry described a New Year’s Eve dinner  
with Peevey where Peevey reminded him “how he and Governor Brown used  
every ounce of persuasion to get [Commissioner Mark] Ferron to change  
his mind and vote for Oakley…Jerry’s direct plea was decisive.” PG&E  
donated $20,000 to the California Democratic Party the day after the  
PUC voted for the project. An appeals court would later strike down  
the decision because PG&E had not proved its necessity.

•While PG&E’s lobbyist and then-PUC President Michael Peevey fed names  
to Brown’s executive secretary, former PG&E vice president Nancy  
McFadden, to appoint the critical swing-vote PUC commissioner who  
would cast pro-utility votes, PG&E donated $75,000 to the California  
Democratic Party. The same day that Brown appointed ex-banker Mark  
Ferron to the commission, PG&E donated another $41,500. The  
appointment lifted the value of PG&E’s stock and the PG&E stock held  
by McFadden and valued as high as $1 million.

•Chevron donated $135,000 to the California Democratic Party the same  
day lawmakers exempted a common method of well stimulation from  
legislation meant to regulate fracking. After the bill passed with an  
amendment dropping a moratorium on fracking permits, Occidental gave  
$100,000 to one of Brown’s favorite causes, the Oakland Military  
Institute. Brown signed the weakened bill.”

For the FPPC letter announcing the investigation, go here: www.consumerwatchdog.org/ 
...

To read Brown’s Dirty Hands, go here: www.consumerwatchdog.org/...

For a video on the report, go here: www.youtube.com/…

As this FPPC investigation proceeds, the big corporate money behind  
Governor Jerry Brown's controversial environmental policies is facing  
increasing scrutiny from public trust advocates. November 4 will be  
the second anniversary of the passage of Proposition 1, Governor Jerry  
Brown’s controversial water bond, a measure that fishing groups,  
California Indian Tribes, grassroots conservation groups and  
environmental justice advocates opposed  because they considered it to  
be a water grab for corporate agribusiness and Big Money interests.

Proponents of Proposition 1 contributed a total of $21,820,691 and  
spent a total of $19,538,153 on the successful campaign. The  
contributors are a who’s who of Big Money interests in California,  
including corporate agribusiness groups, billionaires, timber barons,  
Big Oil. the tobacco industry and the California Chamber of Commerce.  
They provide a quick snapshot of the corporate interests behind the  
questionable environmental policies of Brown. For more information, go  
to: www.counterpunch.org/...) Jerry

Background: Brown’s real environmental  legacy exposed

While Jerry Brown often receives fawning coverage from the mainstream  
media when he appears at climate conferences in California and across  
the globe,  his policies on fish, wildlife, water and the environment  
are among the most destructive of any governor in recent California  
history.

The Governor’s “legacy project,” the Delta Tunnels/California Water  
Fix, poses a huge threat to the ecosystems of the Sacramento, San  
Joaquin, Klamath and Trinity river systems. The project is based on  
the untenable premise that taking more water out of a river before it  
reaches the estuary will somehow “restore” the San Francisco Bay Delta  
and its precious fish and wildlife species.

Unfortunately, the California WaterFix is not the only environmentally  
devastating policy promoted by Governor Jerry Brown. Brown is  
promoting the expansion of fracking and extreme oil extraction methods  
in California and is overseeing water policies that are driving winter  
run-Chinook salmon, Delta and longfin smelt and other species closer  
and closer to extinction.

As if those examples of Brown’s tainted environmental legacy weren’t  
bad enough, Brown has promoted carbon trading and REDD policies that  
pose an enormous threat to Indigenous Peoples around the globe; has  
done nothing to stop clearcutting of forests by Sierra-Pacific and  
other timber companies; presided over record water exports from the  
Delta in 2011; and oversaw massive fish kills of Sacramento splittail  
and other species in 2011.

Jerry Brown also oversaw the “completion” of so-called “marine  
protected areas” under the privately funded Marine Life Protection Act  
(MLPA) Initiative, overseen by a Big Oil lobbyist and other corporate  
interests, in December 2012. These faux “Yosemites of the Sea” fail to  
protect the ocean from oil drilling, fracking, pollution, corporate  
aquaculture and all human impacts on the ocean other than sustainable  
fishing and gathering.

Brown spouts “green” rhetoric when he flies off to climate conferences  
and issues proclamations about John Muir Day and Earth Day, but his  
actions and policies regarding fish, water and the environment should  
be challenged by all of those who care about the future of California  
and the West Coast.

For more information about the real environmental record of Governor  
JerryBrown, go to: www.dailykos.com/...;
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www2.dcn.org/pipermail/env-trinity/attachments/20160924/643e6b39/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Brown.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 18608 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://www2.dcn.org/pipermail/env-trinity/attachments/20160924/643e6b39/attachment.jpg>