Citizen journalists, rejoice.
For three years, I’ve been investigating fraud in the Pigford black farmers settlement. In my long work on the story with Andrew Breitbart and others, I’ve exposed how easy it was to collect a $50,000 check if you filled out the paperwork right. But there were things we never knew the specifics on.
But just how greedy were people?
How many claims were so outrageous that they screamed for some kind of fraud investigation?
The public had no way of knowing and they gave billions of tax dollars to Pigford Claimants. We knew the outlines. We knew the big picture. We didn’t have the fine, minute details.
Until now.
This link is to a legal document that contains the list of 10s of thousands of ‘late filers’; the Pigford II plaintiffs that President Barack Obama sponsored.
Download the document. Look for yourself.
These two videos explain more. The first video explains the significance. The second video is a tutorial on navigating the document.
It might help to make this next video full screen.
Good work! Looking forward to more.
Strossel had a pretty good expose of this months ago in which he talked to lawyers, including one who initially helped people fill in the paperwork, and that lawyer admitted many of the people filing had never been involved in any aspect of farming. One man who received payment, when asked by Strossel why he took it when he had never been involved in farming, replied he felt he was due the money from the government for the things done to black people by white in the past.
I helped Stossel’s producers with that. I’m the one who initially found and interviewed the lawyer you mention, for example.
You should have been small white farmer and stuck in the middle. Just finished paying back after 16 yrs money owed to Farmers Home. 50,000 dollar crop loan approved two year s in a row, but did not get money until harvest time. That wont work. Interest piles up until you cant pay loans.Could have let them foreclose and offer farm to a minority farmer or get a private loan and pay it back.But if you were a big farmer you could go to the USDA office and get one after another 50,000 subsidy check handed to you.Go listen to The Speech by Regan and see what he said about the USDA.