As of four months ago, I was like many BigGovernment.com readers, except that I had the pleasure of writing a few articles as a contributor to BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com over the past year as time permitted. But things changed in early August of this year when Andrew Breitbart and I stumbled upon what we both thought could not only be a huge story, but perhaps one of the most massive taxpayer frauds in the history of this country: the Pigford I and II settlements.
Since that date, I have been researching and writing the foundation of the report we present today. After sifting through thousands of news articles, archives, and web sites and hearing the stories of a dozen or so whistleblowers including an FBI agent, current and former USDA employees, and a black farmer who was discriminated against, we feel that our initial reaction was right: Pigford is a massive story that deserves national attention.
Obama and National Black Farmers Association Founder John Boyd
This past Tuesday, Nov 30th, the Democrat-controlled lame-duck House passed the $1.25 billion Black Farmer’s Settlement funding known as Pigford II by a vote of 256-152. The previous week, the bill had passed the Senate with conspicuous assurances of strict fraud-protection measures to shield taxpayers from blatant and rampant abuse; much of which we have uncovered in our months of research.
The bill is headed to President Obama for signature this Wednesday. As we document in our report, then-Senator Obama originally introduced the Pigford II legislation with no co-sponsors in 2007 to curry favor with rural black Southern voters, to which he was trailing significantly to then front-runner Hillary Clinton.
On top of the original billion-plus dollars previously doled out indiscriminately in Pigford I, the American taxpayer will now be on the hook for an additional $1.25 billion in payments to black “farmers,” whom did not have to provide proof of:
-Having ever farmed or having attempted to farm
-Having ever had a loan at the USDA
-Having ever filled out paperwork to attain a farm loan
-Having ever attempted to get a loan.
The only burden of proof required in Pigford I was a form stating the claimant had “attempted” to farm, and to have a family member vouch for that assertion.
The U.S. government would then send a check to these “farmers” for $50,000.
With both the USDA and black farmers advocacy group’s estimating a maximum of 1,000-4,000 farmers who had legitimate grievances at the time of the original action, President Barack Obama and the Democratic majorities in Congress have just approved payments covering up to 94,000 claimants, although no more than 33,000 black farmers ever existed at any period the suit covers.
While running for president in 2007, Barack Obama single-handedly ignored the checks and balances of our system of government and overturned the work of our judicial branch and introduced a bill to re-open the class action to more claimants for his personal political gain.
This Wednesday, criminals, fraudsters, trial attorneys, President Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid will win. To add injury to insult, these politicians stripped out numerous Republican attempts to add more stringent fraud safeguards to the legislation but voted to maximize the payday for the trial attorneys: at least $100 million in taxpayer money will go their way.
The American people and black farmers with legitimate grievances will lose. The following report shows that most of the $1.25 billion claims are likely fraudulent, and instead of buying justice, President Obama has just put a downpayment on his purchase of the 2012 rural Southern vote with American taxpayer funds.
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