The federal government is often involved in civil (as opposed to criminal) litigation, both as a plaintiff and a defendant. Most of these suits are settled. What people noticed once Obama entered office is that those settlements, sometimes in the millions or billions of dollars, didn’t go to wronged individuals if the government was a defendant or into the Treasury if it was a complainant. Instead, they went to leftist activist groups. It turns out that Kamala Harris’s brother-in-law, Tony West, was the one who created this sophisticated money laundering.
Several people sent me a link to a New York Post exposé describing how West figured out how to use civil litigation to hand out billions in unauthorized “grants” to leftist groups. I urge you to read the whole essay because the details are worth your time, but here’s the gist.
It used to be that if the government settled a case requiring a payout, Congress had to approve settlements over $100,000. That was because Congress has the power of the purse, meaning that it’s the steward of taxpayer monies. (Remember, the government is supposed to be our employee, not vice versa.)
Image: Tony West (cropped). YouTube screen grab.
However, by 1977, whether because of an explosion of cases or because Congress got lazy, Congress told the DOJ to take care of all settlements. Until 2009, the DOJ carried out that mandate honestly. Or at least, we assume it did because the feds keep a tight lock on information about how the “Judgment Fund” is used (including, we know, for payouts due to malfeasance by individual members of Congress).
This secrecy worked because the settlement payouts weren’t a big deal. You know how it goes…a million here, a million there, and no one really notices. What was also kept secret was the fees attorneys received for their work on these cases. I’m sure that many of these fees were legitimate.