Okla-homey
9/30/2010, 06:55 AM
On September 24, Iowa Congressman Steve King (R-IA-5), a member of both the House Agriculture and the House Judiciary Committees, wrote Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack requesting a meeting this week to discuss allegations of major fraud in the disbursement of Pigford settlement money.
There is a growing firestorm over the allegations of massive fraud in the Pigford settlements[.] ... According to sworn testimony by John Boyd, President of the National Black Farmers Association, there are 18,000 black farmers. They could not all have been victims of discrimination. To date, there have been over 94,000 claims made. These numbers speak to massive fraud, meaning that American taxpayers are on the hook for what Pigford judge Paul Friedman called "forty acres and a mule." (Emphasis added.)
It is common practice for Secretaries of Agriculture to sit down with members of the Agriculture Committee. It is uncommon for the topic of conversation to be as urgent and expensive as Pigford, with a price tag of $2.3 billion. Secretary Vilsack has an obligation to the American taxpayers to cooperate with an investigation of Pigford fraud.
The Senate may be poised to pass the Obama administration's request for additional Pigford funding. Pigford payouts must be stopped until Congress and the USDA can conduct a thorough investigation.
Black politicians are quick to say that Pigford is not about reparations. If that is the case, the math needs a bit of explaining. Boyd testified that there are 18,000 black farmers on one hand and then supports billions in payouts in a program that has 94,000 people claiming they were injured? It is to be hoped that as a member of a new Republican majority, Congressman King can look at how the plaintiff's bar and black activists ballooned a small settlement into a billion-dollar boondoggle.
There is a growing firestorm over the allegations of massive fraud in the Pigford settlements[.] ... According to sworn testimony by John Boyd, President of the National Black Farmers Association, there are 18,000 black farmers. They could not all have been victims of discrimination. To date, there have been over 94,000 claims made. These numbers speak to massive fraud, meaning that American taxpayers are on the hook for what Pigford judge Paul Friedman called "forty acres and a mule." (Emphasis added.)
It is common practice for Secretaries of Agriculture to sit down with members of the Agriculture Committee. It is uncommon for the topic of conversation to be as urgent and expensive as Pigford, with a price tag of $2.3 billion. Secretary Vilsack has an obligation to the American taxpayers to cooperate with an investigation of Pigford fraud.
The Senate may be poised to pass the Obama administration's request for additional Pigford funding. Pigford payouts must be stopped until Congress and the USDA can conduct a thorough investigation.
Black politicians are quick to say that Pigford is not about reparations. If that is the case, the math needs a bit of explaining. Boyd testified that there are 18,000 black farmers on one hand and then supports billions in payouts in a program that has 94,000 people claiming they were injured? It is to be hoped that as a member of a new Republican majority, Congressman King can look at how the plaintiff's bar and black activists ballooned a small settlement into a billion-dollar boondoggle.