Pigford: The Unexamined Obama Administration Scandal

The Obama administration has again been protected from a troubling scandal by the mainstream media (MSM) using the tactic of omission to simply ignore the scandal, its reality and the negative blowback attendant to a disturbing story.  As sunlight began to illuminate the scandal’s inconvenient and troubling facts, charges of racism were used to temporarily silence those sounding the alarm.  Seemingly, the alarm-ringers’ only crime was having the temerity to respond to the abuses of Pigford with a politically incorrect point of view to those abuses.

The under-reported scandal referenced is generally identified as Pigford.  Pigford’s germination occurred in 1997 as a lawsuit (Pigford vs. Glickman) alleging that 91 African-American farmers were unfairly denied loans by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) due to racial discrimination which prevented the complainants from farming.  In 1999, the black farmers won their case.

Pigford has the distinction of being an out of control waste of taxpayer funds and/or a cynical attempt by the Obama administration to curry favor with certain minority groups  to which neither President Obama nor Attorney General Eric Holder can plead ignorance of involvement.  Both have had knowledge since the court ruled on the Pigford lawsuit; in 2008 then Senator Barack Obama supported and voted for the funding of the initial settlement.  Since then Eric Holder (and Obama) have been involved in overseeing and managing the Pigford ‘judgment fund’.

Yet can Pigford be fairly described as a scandal? 

Pigford began innocently enough as a lawsuit to redress a perceived wrong negatively affecting a group of 91…  But then the number climbed to 400…then 1,600…then… 

The number of black farmers has metastasized, nay exploded, and the aggrieved group now includes not only blacks, but Hispanics, Native Americans and females.  In fact over 90,000 people have filed claims seeking a payment under the terms of the original Pigford court ruling.  That decision, now referred to as Pigford #1, was anticipated to cost approximately $120 million including legal fees. 

Pigford #2 is the appellation used to identify an expanded payment regime that funds more African-American payments, Native Americans, Hispanics and females.  This regimen grew out of the fact that thousands of claimants missed the original Pigford #1 filing deadline of October 12, 1999.  Interestingly potential Native American claimants were estimated at 5,300 while ‘plaintiff’ lawyers pegged the exposure at an estimated 19,000 Native Americans.  The ‘judgment fund’ announced by Agricultural Secretary Thomas Vilsack and Eric Holder in 2010 was expanded from just over $120 million to $1.25 billion given the expectation of many more filers.

However, the explosion of claimants has caused payouts to reach $4.4 billion and has swelled legal fees to over $130 million.  More importantly the claim’s process created a rush to get a share of the monies allocated to the ‘judgment fund’ even if no real claim existed.  Essentially the process encouraged people to lie and spawned a cottage industry.  Claimants had only to file applications for a $50,000 payment by stating that they had ‘thought’ about applying for loans to become a farmer.  Proof of a claimant’s intent to farm also included a statement from that petitioner saying he or she had attempted to farm by planting a batch of tomatoes in his or her backyard and having that statement verified by a family member.   In essence the need to be a farmer at the time of the alleged discriminatory actions by the USDA was not a requirement to share in the financial redress.   

Fraud was endemic to the claims process -- for example every apartment… in a New York City building received a settlement of at least $50,000.  Further, some families received checks of $50,000 for each family member (see NYT’s fraud identification narrative of 4-26-13).  These payments were dispensed by the judgment fund’s monitor, whose management and control fell to the Executive Branch and Justice Department.  Due to the application ‘vetting process’ the payouts were criticized by both Representative Steve King (D-IA) and journalist Andrew Breitbart as payoffs to Obama’s/Democrats’ preferred groups to gain a favored political position with those entities. 

King and Breitbart had the courage to indelicately point out that some of payouts were ridiculous, fraudulent and highly politicized.  Both Congressman King and Breitbart were predictably charged with racism by many in the MSM; and only because The New York Times printed their recent investigatory story have some MSM members begrudgingly ceded the veracity of King’s and Breitbart’s concerns. 

The combination of the racial criticism, the MSM’s silence regarding Pigford, and the quarantine on additional Pigford narratives subsequent to the NY Times’ article have emphasized the media’s concern for the damage an ongoing discussion of Pigford could cause the president.  Potential stories may have included added evidence of rampant fraud and controversy:

• A review of the Shirley Sherrod incident/resignation that became an embarrassing chapter in the Obama administration and might have brought into question the fairness of the payout her family received from Pigford which was rumored to total in the millions.  Time magazine also reported that the Sherrods’ received compensation of approximately $330,000 for mental suffering after it was determined that Ms. Sherrod did not use racist tactics in dealing with white farmers, a charge that led to her resignation from the USDA.

• The NY Times’ article disclosing that in 16 ZIP codes in Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, and North Carolina the number of successful Pigford claims exceeded the total number of farms that existed in 1997.

• The possible resurrection of a contentious conversation on the redistribution of wealth by whatever means to correct previous wrongs for certain minorities a la the Van Jones reparations argument.

• The blatantly racially charged comments similar to those of Mr. Al Pires, a lead attorney for African-American Pigford farmers, who asserted the USDA was “the biggest racist the world has ever seen.”

Thus, Pigford is another scandal that has received little attention and even less discussion than many of the scandals currently receiving attention.  Nevertheless, this scandal is another example of an administration out of control.  This is perhaps because Americans elected a leader without a modicum of real world management experience -- a person who believes ideology trumps organizational discipline, who believes that political cronies are automatically qualified as leaders/managers, and who uses lies/dissembling as a tool to obscure factual information from the American people. 

In sum, the damage generated by the Pigford scandal, and all the others, continues to be muted by the MSM’s lack of interest in reporting the facts integral to each issue and their lack of desire to dig for more information.  But given the daunting mass of scandals existent, President Obama’s administration will be described in the future by objective historians as the most scandalous in history.  

Obama’s Transparency – Fade to Black

President Obama assertively stated, “This is the most transparent administration in history, and I can document how that is the case”.  Obama made the comment without batting an eye or even causing a lightning strike…in fact his comment was uttered with his usual sincerity and hubris.  Obama, however, was remiss in not tying the added phrase, “the most ethical administration” in history, to the transparency statement as is often his want.  

The President did this as his administration simultaneously battled to suppress details of the CIA's secret drone program that uses a targeted kill list even if the target is an American citizen.  Then just days later Obama disappeared during a mini vacation in Florida to play golf (some with Tiger Woods) for four days without press access.

  

The press that usually spreads rose petals in the President’s path was generally outraged by the lack of access during the golfing and an astonishing amount of criticism ensued.  For example, Anne Compton of ABC News said, “The way the president’s availability to the press has shrunk in the last two years is a disgrace…This White House goes to extreme lengths to keep the press away.”  

The mainstream media (MSM) has slowly begun to recognize Obama’s tactics of marginalization, manipulation and a failure to practice transparency, particularly with those that would ask tough questions.  These tactics when placed in the context of the transparency Obama promised on day one of his presidency…”to be the most open and transparent in history”… have become of late quite grating to the MSM and some in the public.

Perhaps the importance of transparency/openness bears some discussion.  The American Heritage dictionary defines transparency as, “the quality or state of being transparent… guileless, candid, open; easily understood or detected.”  From a governmental standpoint transparency can be “understood as the availability and accessibility of relevant information about the functioning of the polity” (Curtin & Meijer, 2006).  The professors go on to say an organization’s transparency can be measured by the “depth of access it allows,” “the depth of knowledge about processes it is willing to reveal” and the “attention to citizen response.”

Transparency and openness have obvious strengths that include increasing organizational efficiency, reducing corruption, assisting in evaluating performance and certainly building public support and legitimacy.  It can also be argued that transparency lowers costs since the decision processes are open to scrutiny, criticism and positive revision.  Certainly in other venues (e.g. business) decisions that are clear, logical, rational, truthful and accurate are accepted and gain support with greater ease within an organization.

The Obama administration has developed and published a statement on transparency to the White House web site.  The statement establishes a goal of “creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government” and has paragraph long sections on transparency, participation and collaboration.  Ironically the site also has a legal disclaimer at its conclusion.  Based on the executive branch’s record, people both inside and outside of government may be wondering if anyone in the administration has read the statement.

Numerous examples of a lack of transparency exist in this administration and warrant mention, some egregious: 

• In May 2008, during the campaign, Obama did not release his full medical records.  Instead he submitted a one-page doctor’s letter that raised the eyebrows of some but not those of The New York Times and other MSM news sources.

• During the mid-term campaigns of 2010 Democrats and President Obama railed against ‘anonymous foreign donors’ yet Democrats established new political organizations (PACs) for 2012 using models that allowed a majority of their donors to be veiled.  The most notable example was Bill Burton’s Priorities USA.  Priorities, in an infamous ad, charged Romney with “murder” because a Bain Capital termination removed an individual’s health coverage.

• President Obama promised the White House would maintain a detailed (and public) visitor log.  According to the Center for Public Integrity both the names and details relative to meetings have routinely been omitted.  Politico observed that “five junior staff aides together received more than 4,440 visits”…”by contrast, then chief of staff Rahm Emanuel famed for his workaholic schedule, was listed as having fewer than 500 visits.”  The practice of obfuscating the visitor log and the frequency of visits continues to this day.

• Both the ACLU and the Sunlight Foundation have taken serious exception with the administration’s proposed changes to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) guidelines.  In essence the Department of Justice (DOJ) would be given the unilateral power to decide that documents do not exist and therefor prevent congressional and judicial oversight.  The DOJ already has the power to deny access to documents for national security reasons; a process that is open to appeal.  The proposed change in the guidelines, at core, would authorize and allow administration lying.

• Relatively early in Obama’s presidency Operation Fast and Furious reared its head.  The operation was a gun-walking program designed to track the placement of weapons into the hands of key drug cartel leaders in Mexico.  The DOJ essentially lost track/control of the weapons that then began to surface at crime scenes; one of which was found to have killed a border patrol agent.  As information began to reach the public and congress, administration officials went to the foxholes.  Eventually executive privilege was cited by Obama to protect Attorney General Eric Holder and others involved.  Investigatory efforts continue to be stonewalled by the administration.

The forgoing examples do not include Obama’s efforts to hide facts relative to Benghazi, aggressive efforts to stop FOIA requests from being fulfilled, demands to force disclosure of James Risen’s (a New York Times reporter) source on a security matter and the growing EPA scandal …the examples can go on ad nauseam.  Just this week it was discovered that key White House operatives had threatened both Bob Woodward and Lanny Davis for writing critical narratives on administration activities.  The lack of transparency coupled with intimidation is apparently a new Obama tactic.

Even in the face of much of the above, the President received an award last year for his administration’s transparency -- ironically presented behind closed doors.  Nevertheless a growing level of indignation is finally rising in the long dormant MSM… a media that has essentially been a no critique zone for President Obama until his recent lack of transparency, openness and media manipulation. 

Katherine Meyer, a Washington lawyer and FOIA expert, said “It’s kind of shocking to me to say this, but of the six (six administrations doing FOIA work), this is the worst on FOIA issues.  The worst.  There’s just no question about it.”  David Sobel, a senior counsel at the Electronic Frontier Foundation states that “despite the positive rhetoric that has come from the White House…guidance (on transparency) has not been translated into real world results in actual cases…Basically the reviews are terrible.”  

Thus does President Obama’s recent claim regarding his administration’s transparency and openness stand up to critical evaluation?  Given the dismal record exposed in the forgoing only a crazed few would give his recent assertion any credence at all.  The Obama record can be reasonably called a fade to black by utilizing manipulation, stonewalling, a compliant media, lying and outright threats to hide its failures and scandals.