‘It’s a Secret, a (4) Is a Secret’: Dark Money Powers $60 Million Bribery Scheme in Ohio

Last week, the FBI arrested Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and four associates in a bribery investigation over a law that sends $1 billion from ratepayers to bail out two nuclear power plants.

[readsludge.com]

{The scandal shows how effective dark money spending by “social welfare” nonprofit groups can be in securing legislative favors and breaking the existing safeguards on improper government actions. What’s more, the bribery charges illustrate how strengthening disclosure laws around the ultimate sources of election spending would have enabled Ohio voters and watchdog groups to uncover the corporate money sources earlier, while the bailout bill was being rushed through the state legislature by Republican leaders.}

That's only if you can get the media to actually conduct a real sense of journalism and expose this information. Let me fill you in on the real sense of what happened. As I posted this last week I told you the bill was initially shot down for lack of public support. Then a large propaganda campaign took action in spreading false information and attacking opposing views on the bill. Part of that 60 million went towards that campaign. Actually it's occasionally said it's 61 million. I guess rounding it off to 60 hurts less? My point is, is that the media didn't do their job in hunting down the right answers by asking the right questions. Those of us who were opposing the bill knew the information coming out of the media was false and that there was money coming from outside to influence that false information. The DOJ should have been on top of this right out of the gate looking for the transfer of money and fake corporations used to fund it.

This is the major misconception with citizens United. Anyone here on facebook follow RepresentUs? They are constantly bellowing out about citizens united. What happened in Ohio has nothing to do with citizens united. Citizens united is a small fraction of the problem in legislation. Yet all they do is distract their following while essentially ignoring the largest part of the problem. They are currently on a misinformation campaign glorifying mail in voting. Without exposing any information as I have attempted to bring to your attention in this group. Even NPR had a guy on last week that was speaking about the same issues I have brought to you from Greg Palast. Problem here is, approximately part of an hour coverage on this, and then they go back to establishment rhetoric for weeks at a time and the public loses their attention span. Or they've been so brainwashed already that the information being delivered to them doesn't register or they don't believe it. By night it's a lost thought.

{it was later revealed, it wired millions of dollars to dark money groups controlled by its statehouse allies.}

Remember what we learned from the VIPS at Consortium News during the false DNC hack which we now know was a leak? The NSA captures all electronic transfers! This isn't rocket science people. Company is asking for a 1 billion bailout from tax payers. Public shoots it down. Money and false information campaign starts with widespread public opposition. TV, radio, and newspaper adds, heightened public social media debates, ding ding ding. You might just think this would draw some attention from the DOJ and real journalist!?!

{FirstEnergy’s close relationship with the new speaker was no secret: Householder flew to President Donald Trump’s inauguration on the company’s plane.} ding ding ding more red flags in the wide open. No press picked up on this!?! fucking please!

{It also scaled back Ohio’s wind and solar energy goal from a maximum of 12.5% by 2027 to 8.5% by 2026, and would have eventually ended the requirements, even as renewable energy has become more widespread and affordable.}

We're getting fucked in more ways than 1. And DeWine still wants to run the bill through again in favor of!?!

{The group’s analysis found that in the previous two election cycles, FirstEnergy’s PAC and employees contributed over $1.2 million to legislative and statewide candidates, and gave the maximum to Householder’s campaign committee, with over $25,000.}

My case being made next.

{According to the federal investigation, over three years Generation Now received $60 million from what is officially called “Company A,” a reference to to FirstEnergy Solutions.}

Citizens united effect was a drop in the bucket compared to what the dark money measured up to. And remember also, it is now legal for foreign countries to do this also when they are attempting to play by paying. What happed here is that the politicians, their associates, and First Energy got caught being greedy by breaking laws using the money for personal gains and use, and use towards a false manufactured public campaign.

{In May 2019, Generation Now, which was formed with help from Householder’s adviser Jeff Longstreth, put $225,000 worth of ads on TV and radio in support of the bailout.}

{The Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling in Citizens United authorized corporations and outside groups to spend unlimited amounts on elections, as long as they weren’t in “coordination” with campaigns or political parties. What followed in Ohio, and was uncovered in the federal investigation, floored it into the territory of illegal coordination.}

The article goes into much of what I spoke on last week. The bailout hasn't actually went into effect yet. I think it does so after this year. But next is more reasons the DOJ should have seen the red flags.

{Immediately after HB 6’s passage, a repeal campaign was launched by a group called Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts, which was quickly undercut by more dark-money tactics. A new LLC called Ohioans for Energy Security popped up to spend $1 million on a campaign against the repeal effort, spending $644,000 on broadcast TV ads, $316,000 on cable, and $33,000 on radio.

“It was clear we had a dark money problem,” Turcer says. “There were these xenophobic ads that occurred during the referendum.”}

{“We raised the flag about Generation Now’s ads in September of last year, as petition gatherers were being intimidated, and we think that if the funders had been public at that time, they would have behaved differently,” Miller said.}

I'm no where near confident that disclosure will actually do any good either with the attention span of voters and the tribalism that comes with it. Unless we have a reliable 4th estate that functions properly to provide accurate information the narrative can always be controlled to suit each tribe continuing the divisional sense.