Epstein, D C of A
koch whore, now milLer 3 am 1st legal
AN 8 26
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AN 8 26
President Donald Trump's lawyers filed an appeal on Wednesday alleging that they are the victims of a judge's abuse after they were sanctioned in court and the president was slapped with a gag order.
After losing a case last month, Trump's lawyers are now asking that sanctions against them and the Trump gag order be paused pending their appeal, Law&Crime reported.
At issue is Trump's "agreement" between the Justice Department and the IRS to create a nearly $1.8 billion "anti-weaponization fund" for anyone who felt they were wronged by previous administrations. Already, there are dozens of Jan. 6 attackers demanding millions in financial compensation despite being found guilty or pleading guilty.
Trump sued the IRS in the Southern District of Florida after his taxes, along with those of over 400,000 others, were exposed in a data breach. In his January filing, Trump demanded a $10 billion payout for damages from the IRS. Trump then claimed he had reached a "settlement" with the U.S. government, which he runs.
U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams didn't buy it. In her July ruling over the matter, she not only said that there can be no "settlement," but she also issued sanctions for the lawyers involved in the case.
Finding that “sanctions are appropriate here,” Williams said Trump’s personal attorney Alejandro Brito will be referred to the Florida Bar for “its consideration, review, and determination as to whether any disciplinary action is appropriate in light of the findings and rulings made in this order.”
Williams also banned another Trump lawyer, Daniel Epstein, from seeking admission to practice law in the Southern District of Florida for one year.
Further, she attacked acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche’s “apparent capacity to speak for both plaintiffs and defendants, sign a ‘settlement’ document on behalf of all parties to this action, and then repudiate part of that agreement, demonstrates that there was only one party whose interests were being represented throughout this case.”
Additionally, Williams restricted Trump, the government, their lawyers and certain related individuals from discussing or using the settlement agreement.
On Wednesday, those lawyers filed an appeal with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, alleging that the judge lacked the authority to issue sanctions.
"This appeal arises from the district court’s extraordinary abuse of its sanctions power. In this action, Plaintiffs President Donald J. Trump, Donald J. Trump Jr., Eric Trump, and The Trump Organization, LLC sued the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of the Treasury, pursuant to a congressionally-authorized remedy, over the undeniably unauthorized and illegal disclosure of their confidential tax-return information to the press," the filing said. "After reaching a settlement with the IRS and Treasury, Plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed the action, which the court so-ordered."
The lawyers alleged that the judge had no "proof of collusion and bad faith," while punishing them with a "sweeping, unconstitutional, and unlawful gag order" that targets the president himself.
"The injunction categorically forbids Movants from even 'referring to' the Settlement Agreement, and separately bars any use of its provisions in official proceedings," the brief continues. "That gag order wrongly silences the sitting President, the Government, private parties, and counsel on a matter of obvious public concern at a politically consequential moment — and denies the public the right to hear their views."
The filing says that any gag order against the president is "unconstitutional," meanwhile, any penalties against them could damage their careers.
The lawyers further claim that the judge wrongly believes that because Trump runs the government, he can't sue it. In this capacity, he was suing as a private person.
The brief said her sanctions "flowed from a single predicate legal error: that presidential supervision under Article II supposedly eliminated Article III adversity."
In fact, Williams' issue is not with the suit itself; it's that Trump controls whether or not to settle with himself.
IRS employees have sued over the Trump fund, saying that the agreement has a hidden legal trap.
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daniel Epstein
Vice President
Dan Epstein is an Assistant Professor of Law at St. Thomas University in Miami, Florida. Previously, he worked advising startups on regulatory matters at a private equity firm. His federal service includes being a Special Assistant to the President and Senior Associate Counsel to the President, and as a counsel for the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Earlier in his career, Mr. Epstein founded and ran Cause of Action, a public-interest law firm, where he represented clients in government investigations and litigated regulatory, constitutional, political, and public law matters. He holds a Ph.D. from George Washington University in Political Economy, a J.D. from Emory University School of Law, and a B.A. from Kenyon College.
Mercatus-Taught Oversight Techniques
Prior to working for Vitter's EPW Committee, Moore worked for U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Ca.) [11], serving as senior counsel for the minority staff of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee [25], headed by Issa.
The Watchdog Institute revealed in a February 2011 investigation that many of the so-called “oversight” investigations conducted by the Committee benefited corporate campaign contributors [26].
And many of Issa's Oversight Committee staffers, including Moore, attended Mercatus Center staff retreats. Mercatus schooled them in oversight tactics and techniques.
“In February 2009…Issa…approved a trip to a Mercatus-funded retreat for his committee staff director, Larry Brady,” wrote The Watchdog Institute [26]. “On his disclosure form, Brady, who did not respond to an interview request, cited the purpose of the trip: 'Provide in-depth briefings on issues of relevance to oversight investigations.'”
Daniel Epstein's Koch Connection
Daniel Z. Epstein, executive director of Cause of Action — which did the presser premiering the Vitter green billionaire's club report [27] to the U.S. public — formerly served as counsel for Issa's Oversight Committee before launching Cause of Action [28].
Epstein, who worked alongside Moore for the Oversight Committee's investigations team [29], introduced Vitter at the event.
U.S. Sen. David Vitter (L), Dan Epstein (L); Photo Credit:
[6]
On the day of the release and the day after the release of the report, Cause of Action published [30] four [31] different [32] items [33] on its website promoting it, including issuing a public statement [30].
According to a 2009 article appearing in The Hill, Epstein served as “an associate in legal reform at the Koch Foundation, working together with Koch Industries Inc.’s assistant general counsel.”
“The job was an interesting mixture of corporate culture with an emphasis on social change — I miss that synergy,” he told The Hill at the time [29].
On his personal website, Epstein lists that 2008-2009 gig as “Counsel, Legal Reform at CGKF [28].” CGKF is shorthand for the Charles G. Koch Foundation [34] and an in the Marin Independent Journal confirms Epstein worked there from June 2008 through January 2009 [35].
Beyond Koch ties, Epstein also has personal financial ties that may make him averse to environmental regulations.
A financial disclosure form submitted by Epstein [36] when he worked for Issa's Oversight Committee shows that he had (or still has) personal investments in both Dominion Resources [37] and Duke Energy [38].
[39]
Both of those companies stand to lose from President Barack Obama's U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) coal-fired power plant regulations, as both Dominion [40] and Duke [41] own coal-fired power plant assets.
By Brooke Williams and Matt Pearce
WASHINGTON -- First as ranking minority member and now as chairman of one of the most powerful committees in Congress, San Diego Republican Darrell Issa has built a team that includes staff members with close connections to industries that could benefit from his investigations.
Issa took control of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform last month, and asked companies, nonprofits and industry associations for guidance on federal regulations. The committee, which includes 23 Republicans and 17 Democrats, has broad powers to investigate government and industry, and to issue subpoenas.
Issa's staff already has released findings sympathetic to industries bent on softening or eliminating certain government regulations. A preliminary report this month, for example, focused largely on Environmental Protection Agency standards and relied heavily on input from industry associations. Other standards the committee is targeting include new regulations on workplace safety and the financial services industry.
And some on Issa's staff know this territory from the inside.
Several have ties to billionaire brothers David and Charles Koch, who have made much of their fortune in oil and chemical businesses and have established a reputation as staunch small-government conservatives. Their influence through campaign contributions, lobbying and nonprofit groups--such as Americans for Prosperity, an activist organization with connections to the Tea Party movement--has become more pronounced since the shift in power in the House last November.
A Republican staff counsel for the oversight committee is the son of a lobbyist pushing for regulatory changes on behalf of big corporations. At least four other staffers once lobbied Congress for companies and industry associations. Another counsel worked for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, which Issa recently asked for input on government regulations.
Gary Bass, a regulatory expert who has monitored government transparency and spending for nearly three decades as founder of the nonprofit, OMB Watch, said it's business-as-usual to see Congressional committees staffed with people close to entities they monitor -- no matter which political party is in charge.
But Bass said that Issa has gone a step further by actively soliciting input from the business community, making the connection of his staff to those same business all the more troubling.
"What you're going to see are regulations that are tilted in favor of those interests," he said.
Frederick Hill, spokesman for Issa and the oversight committee, declined to answer questions about the staff's connections to lobbyists, business interests, the Koch companies, foundation or nonprofits.
"I only have a short comment for you on this subject," Hill wrote in an e-mail. "The Committee makes all hiring decisions based on the ability of individuals to help the committee do its job."
Issa declined to be interviewed for this article, as did representatives of Koch Industries, the conglomerate that the Koch brothers control.
Dave Levinthal, spokesman for the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan nonprofit that analyzes campaign finance and lobbying data, said that Issa's oversight committee needs to operate openly and to publicly disclose any potential conflicts.
"If there is even a whiff of conflict of interest, it's important for them to be transparent and upfront about any interests that the committee or its staffers might have," he said.
****
In mid-January, the**Watchdog Institute**, an independent nonprofit reporting center based at San Diego State University, obtained a list from majority spokesman Hill of 62 Republican committee employees in order to examine their work experience in light of Issa's ambitious investigative agenda.
The Institute also sought a list of Democratic staffers and contacted minority spokeswoman Jenny Rosenberg 11 times to obtain it. She only released the name of Staff Director David Rapallo.
The Committee on House Administration, which oversees the day-to-day operations of the House, released a list on Feb. 22 of all committee staff as of January, including more than 50 with the minority.
The Institute applied the same research standards to majority and minority staff members. Because the Democrats, however, haven't outlined an agenda akin to Issa's - aside from Friday's announcement to examine possible fraud in the mortgage industry - there wasn't a similar benchmark for the Institute to use to assess the backgrounds and corporate connections of the minority's staff.
Many among the minorityare longtime Hill staffers. Some worked for government agencies, nonprofits or law firms. Others are former lobbyists with connections to labor, energy and the petroleum and chemical industries.
On the Republican side, more than three-quarters of the staffers have been hired since Issa took over as ranking member of the committee at the beginning of 2009. In most cases, the Institute did not identify connections to companies or industries with a stake in oversight investigations.
Among those that do have connections, some have ties to the Kochs.
One person completed a Koch Associate Program with the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation and coordinated a regulatory studies program at the Mercatus Center. The center, a think tank heavily funded by Koch and co-founded by Richard Fink, the executive vice president of Koch Industries, has a long history of advocating against government regulations.
Another staffer,_ Daniel Epstein, was at the Koch foundation and worked "together with Koch Industries Inc.'s assistant general counsel" before joining the committee as Republican counse_l, according to a statement attributed to him in *The Hill* ((/)), a trade publication that covers Congress. Epstein did not respond to interview requests.
At least three more oversight staffers also have ties to the Mercatus Center, which counts two Koch Industries executives on its board of directors, including Charles Koch, the chairman and chief executive of Koch Industries.
Catherine Behan, spokeswoman for Mercatus, defended its independence, saying that its research is not guided or influenced by any outside business interests.
"We don't do directed research," she said. "No one comes to us and says 'we want to do a study on X.'"
In the past three years, Koch companies reported spending about $40.5 million lobbying on behalf of energy and manufacturing interests. The companies lobbied significantly on Environmental Protection Agency regulations--which oversight committee staffers scrutinized in a recent report and were the focus of many industry responses to Issa's solicitations for guidance on regulations.
Koch Industries does not appear among the more than 150 letters Issa sent to businesses soliciting their input about onerous government regulations. But Koch Industries has lobbied against some of the same laws that many businesses said they objected to when they responded to Issa's solicitation.
A lobbyist named Barney Skladany Jr. -- whose son, Jonathan Skladany, is Republican counsel on Issa's oversight team -- also lobbied Congress on environmental regulations that industries identified as onerous in their responses to Issa's request. Among Skladany Jr.'s clients: Dow Chemical, Mortgage Insurance Companies of America and Volkswagen. Jonathan Skladany declined to comment, and his father did not respond to an interview request.
***
Because of the oversight staff's connections to Koch Industries, the Watchdog Institute also examined Koch's campaign contributions to members of the oversight committee. Koch Industries has given more than $130,000 to sitting committee members since 2000, mostly to Republicans.
Current Republican committee members received at least $72,750 from Koch Industries in the last election. Most are freshman, who received at least $42,750.
Koch Industries began contributing to Issa's campaigns in 2008 and has given him at least $12,500.
Levinthal, of the Center for Responsive Politics, said the Koch brothers "have a portfolio filled with ways to influence the government."
"The committee at the end of the day may be more reflective of the interests that the company and its executives espouse," he said.
The oversight committee has made headlines consistently since Issa took charge, holding several hearings and issuing its first subpoena almost two weeks ago. (2-16-11) It also released responses from industries on its website.
In a Feb. 9 report, oversight staff explained that the committee is "uniquely positioned" to examine "barriers that stand in the way of job growth and economic recovery," saying the point is to "get Americans back to work."
The report recommended "additional scrutiny" of certain regulations, including EPA standards. The industry associations that provided the staff with input included at least two that count Koch companies as members.
Last year, as ranking minority member of the oversight committee, Issa was one of many committee members to cosponsor legislation -- lobbied on by Koch Industries -- opposing a decision from the EPA that would greatly expand the agency's authority to regulate air pollution.
Other interests also intersect on the oversight committee.
For example, an oversight committee counsel, Kristina Moore worked in the same office as Shane Karr, an auto alliance executive whom oversight staff interviewed for its report.
Moore did not respond to an interview request. A spokesman for the auto alliance said Karr declined to be interviewed.
***
In February 2009, after Issa became the ranking Republican, he approved a trip to a Mercatus-funded retreat for his committee staff director, Larry Brady.
On his disclosure form, Brady, who did not respond to an interview request, cited the purpose of the trip: "Provide in-depth briefings on issues of relevance to oversight investigations."
That same month, the oversight committee brought on two alumni of the Mercatus Center as staffers -- including Moore, who returned to the committee after a brief stint at the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers. The committee later hired at least two more Mercatus alumni.
Based at George Mason University in Virginia, Mercatus' activities overlap with the commercial and ideological interests of Charles Koch.
Mercatus received at least $7.6 million from the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation between 2006 and 2008, according to the most recent tax filings available online. The foundation did not return phone calls.
Mercatus' research policy states that "Mercatus financial supporters have absolutely no influence or control" over its work, and Behan said the Koch executives on the board have no influence either.
Still, Issa asked the Mercatus Center for regulatory advice in his recent solicitation blitz. In response, Mercatus outlined ways government regulations can hurt the economy.
Between Feb. 9 and Feb. 17, four Mercatus scholars testified at oversight committee and subcommittee hearings, including Veronique de Rugy, who was scheduled to speak at an exclusive Koch Industries conference in Aspen in June.
Koch Industries hosted another exclusive conference last month in Palm Springs--a semi annual event to discuss "strategies for combating the multitude of public policies that threaten to destroy America as we know it."
Two Mercatus scholars, as well as FOX News' Glenn Beck and the Wall Street Journal's Stephen Moore, were on the agenda of speakers at the Aspen conference.
Tyler Grimm, a new oversight committee staffer, contributed to Beck's book "Arguing With Idiots," and was a research assistant for Moore, an economic columnist.
Grimm did not respond to interview requests. Beck's spokesman said he was not available for an interview.
Moore said Grimm was "a good economist" and a good fit for the oversight committee's staff. Moore also said he thought highly of Mercatus' work.
"I think they've got some of the best economists in the country and that they're fair and balanced," he said.
Last week, Secretary of the Interior issued a long-awaited decision on the fate of Drakes Bay Oyster Company, located within Point Reyes National Seashore. He ordered the oyster farm removed. The farm was, by all accounts, a model of sustainable agriculture. Meanwhile, National Park Service employees allegedly engaged in wrongdoing in their zeal to kick out the oyster farm. Dianne Feinstein favored the oyster farm. Sympathies lay with the sustainable oyster farmer. After Salazar ruled against the farm, op-eds were written calling for President Obama to reverse Salazar's decision.
It's a trap. You're being used by Darrell Issa and the Koch brothers.
As background, John F. Kennedy declared Point Reyes a National Seashore in 1962, permitting businesses onsite 50 years to leave. Congress passed a law in 1976 designating the coast as a marine wilderness once the oyster farm left. Kevin Lunny bought the oyster farm in 2004 and gambled on an extension. And he did everything right in winning the favor of powerful Bay Area folk, including Senator Feinstein. Feinstein placed a clause in a 2009 appropriations bill giving Salazar the option to choose to renew the lease, expiring November 30, 2012.
On November 29, Salazar decided against the oyster farm. The area will now become the United States' first marine wilderness.
Sure enough, Kevin Lunny sued. His counsel is Dan Epstein of Cause of Action. Who is Dan Epstein? Mother Jones explains:
a former GOP counsel on the House's Committee on Oversight and Government Reform under California Republican Darrell Issa. Epstein is also a veteran employee of billionaires Charles and David Koch; he used to work at the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation and for a Koch Industries lawyer.
Yes, the model of environmental sustainability is being represented by a scion of Darrell Issa and the Koch brothers. Not because Epstein likes oysters or environmental sustainability, but rather because fossil fueled Republicans really, really likes the idea of commercial businesses on wilderness land. Or, as he puts it: "'Cause of Action is committed to ensuring that federal agency decision-making that can affect economic prosperity in the United States is held to the scrutiny of public accountability,' his statement also read."
The East Bay Express explains the real reasons for Ken Salazar's decision: "It wasn't about the environmental impacts of Drakes Bay Oyster Company at Point Reyes National Seashore; it was about precedent." Once one commercial operation is allowed on what is supposed to be wilderness, untrammeled by humanity, then you allow others. And that's exactly what Epstein and his powerful friends want.
Salazar has made the correct decision here in weighing not only the environmental footprint of the Drakes Bay Oyster Company but also the precedent that would be set by allowing commercial operations in wilderness and wilderness study areas.
Point Reyes' oysters are only the appetizers on the menu of the Koch brothers and Darrell Issa. The main course is the shale gas of Theodore Roosevelt National Park and other wilderness atop fossil fuels.
April 26, 2012
It’s Time to Stop Letting Congress Stomp on Nonprofit
By Gary Bass and Mark Rosenman
Nonprofit organizations have fewer rights to speak out about important public-policy matters today than they did last year.
The latest assault on advocacy came in a spending bill Congress approved to provide money to education, health, and human-service groups.
These new restrictions on advocacy were passed as part of a coordinated campaign by conservatives to quash popular democracy. Unfortunately, as contrasted with past “defund the left” efforts, charity leaders didn’t find out about them in time to take action to prevent their passage.
The challenges to nonprofit advocacy began more than three decades ago when the Heritage Foundation started making new restrictions a priority. This attack was pushed by the Reagan White House in the early 1980s, took the form of major Republican congressional legislative efforts in the mid-1990s, and has arisen in various forms since then.
Some conservative lawmakers and Republican White House officials have tried to go so far as to limit what charities can do with private contributions; others have tried to restrict the types of activities that nonprofits can conduct with federal funds.
Most of their efforts were stopped by groups whose missions were to serve as watchdogs to protect charities’ rights and the coalitions they organized.
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Nevertheless, conservatives succeeded in several attempts to chip away at nonprofit advocacy rights.
For example, Congress voted to prohibit social-welfare organizations classified under Section 501(c)(4) from receiving federal grants if they lobby. Additionally, grantees of the Legal Services Corporation face greater restrictions on advocacy than do other federal grantees.
Many grant-making foundations were alarmed by these attacks.
Like much of society, they recognized that strong nonprofits help build a vibrant democracy. And they know that the only way to do that is to preserve the ability of nonprofits to speak out on public-policy issues, to challenge institutional power, and to encourage Americans to get more involved in democratic decision making.
A legacy of attacks on charities’ advocacy was that a small number of foundations provided support for nonprofit watchdogs to monitor attacks on advocacy and to help train nonprofits to influence public policy. While laudatory, those grants were too limited and episodic.
Strikingly, in the past few years, even limited foundation grants for protecting and promoting nonprofit advocacy rights have dropped to minimal levels.
Many organizations that used to serve in the watchdog role no longer have staff members dedicated to monitoring advocacy rules, and some nonprofits that devoted all of their work to this cause no longer can. Such losses make it all the more likely that nonprofits will not be prepared to fight future attacks on their rights to influence public policy.
The blueprint for what to expect can be seen in the newly enacted appropriations law, which expands the list of advocacy activities beyond lobbying that nonprofits are forbidden to conduct with federal money.
With the new law, groups that receive money under the appropriations measure cannot use federal grants for “any activity to advocate or promote” any “proposed, pending, or future” tax increase (at any level of government) or any “future requirement or restriction” on a “legal consumer product” (e.g., tobacco and alcohol products, junk foods and beverages, and guns).
None of those key terms is defined. Suppose a group received federal aid to fight cancer by decreasing tobacco use and wanted to educate the public about the health dangers of cigarette sales, especially to minors. Presumably, that wouldn’t be allowed under the law. Or say another nonprofit won a grant to curb obesity. It might want to suggest a surcharge on sodas and other sugary foods as a way to deter consumption, but it probably couldn’t promote that idea.
The new law also forbids nonprofits from using federal money to influence some regulatory and executive-branch actions. That means a charity that receives federal money to provide care and support to families with disabled children, for example, would no longer be allowed to use any of its government money to comment on proposed state regulations that govern residential treatment or in-home services.
To be sure, the new law is limited in scope at this point to programs paid for through a single appropriations bill, the one that covers the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, and several independent agencies. But close to one-third of nonprofit revenue comes from the federal government, so it is easy to see that more groups will be affected if this idea spreads to legislation that affects the arts, the environment, or so many other kinds of groups.
While charities are not permitted to use federal money to lobby, they certainly ought to educate both the public and policy makers and advocate on social problems if they receive government money to solve those issues. Policymakers need to receive information from independent, nonpartisan parties such as federally financed nonprofit groups. Their experience, research, and ideas are often vital to improving lives in our communities. But the new law makes this difficult in many cases and out of the question in others.
The new legislation is a case of the public interest losing out to private ones. Charities advocate on issues in which people’s voices are not adequately heard in the democratic process; they work to promote the common good. The additional restrictions on charities’ free-speech rights make that point clear; they demonstrate how monied interests impose their will on ordinary people and the groups that try to serve them.
The new law was drafted by Rep. Denny Rehberg, a Montana Republican, and supported by industry representatives, including the American Beverage Association.
Why would a trade association want new restrictions on nonprofit advocacy? Maybe because it wants to kill federal money to anti-obesity and other public-health programs that could affect how many sweetened drinks Americans buy. Knowing how hard that is, they go after the speech rights of health charities that get federal aid. And this appears part of a continuing conservative attack on nonprofit speech.
One of the leaders of the assault on nonprofits is Cause of Action, an organization established a few months before these restrictions were enacted, that is directed by Daniel Epstein, a former staff member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, led by Rep. Darrell Issa, a California Republican. Before that, he was a legal associate at the Koch Foundation, which promotes free-market and limited- government groups.
Cause of Action has written to at least 20 groups that receive federal money to fight obesity and promote tobacco-use warnings indicating to them that they may have engaged in illegal lobbying activities. The group said it was writing “only as a convenience” to tell the grantees they may be subject to civil penalties and private lawsuits imposing triple damages and lawyers’ fees.
This is reminiscent of other right-wing efforts, begun in the 1980s, to stifle charitable advocacy work by suing nonprofits. These assaults on charities earned their own acronym describing their effect: They were called SLAPP suits (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) and were often filed by corporations and other deep-pocket conservatives.
Democracy depends on the ability of ordinary people to have a voice in public-policy decisions. It is most often nonprofits that help people advocate for policies and programs that improve their lives. So attacks on nonprofit advocacy end up undermining our democracy. That is yet another reason for foundations to invest in protecting speech rights for nonprofits.
Gary Bass is executive director of the Bauman Foundation. Mark Rosenman, professor emeritus at the Union Institute and University, works on efforts to improve how nonprofits and foundations serve the public.