Tom Davis let his campaign contributors rob Homeland Security. They paid Davis, his wife, and his PACs. The Washington Post, which endorsed all Republican incumbents for Congress in NoVA, held the story until after the election. It has no names of those contractor clients who pay his wife for lobbying.
The same writers told us in July of his wife's lobbying. Now they write of a secret report from March that says billions of tax dollars are wasted by opportunistic contractors in Iraq.
Tell us something we DON'T know! Such as Davis refusal to conduct oversight by his Reform Committee, and what are the links to Davis, ICG, and contractor's excesses. And what about Davis contributor / Iraq contractor / Presidential brother Marvin Bush? Answers below.
The Washington Post's article on lobbying firm ICG July 28 seemed just the tip of a scandal involving Tom Davis. According to rumor, WaPo editors and publishers were holding back more of the story.
In that first July article, Robert O'Harrow Jr. and Scott Higham exposed the scandal, in which Davis's wife was paid thousands a week at ICG to make a few phone calls for clients who wanted to avoid Congressional oversight, or assure the hearing was a sweet one.
The on-line discussion with the writers afterward was remarkable in that they said little, leaving some participants to believe more was coming. We had just hoped it would be timely.
Today's story about the contractor's waste in Iraq is here. It has been well-covered in another diary on DKos.
What is especially troubling is the Post's unwillingness to criticize the administration, and its apparent policy of holding this story and other follow up while appeasing Republicans, especially Tom Davis. Davis is known for his encyclopedic memory, and he stored a lot of information there when he was the bag man for Jack Abramoff and Tom DeLay (and Bob Ney and Willie Tan) when he was chair of the RNCC from 1998-2002. Other Post writers, not O'Harrow or Higham, quote Davis frequently as a substitute for their own research. He is to Post access journalism on NoVa and the RNCC as Bob Woodward is to access journalism nationally.
The Post neglects to say that this theft would not have been possible except for the refusal of Tom Davis to permit oversight by his Government Reform Committee. Democrats on his committee have repeatedly sought review of contracts by DHS, in Iraq, in the Gulf States, and specifically with Halliburton.
The Post has also been strangely silent on the relationship between Davis and his friend, constituent, donor, Presidential brother and fellow fundraiser Marvin Bush. Marvin shares Davis's love of baseball, was a presence with Davis on getting a local team to the area, and can offer Davis free skybox seats to baseball games anywhere in the USA. Davis is the only congressman Bush has contributed to. Davis reportedly came to the rescue of Bush when he was being questioned on security contracts. Bush was a principal in the company responsible for security at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. Bush also runs a company with $400 million in contracts in Iraq.
During a House Government Reform Committee hearing on Iraq contracts on March 11, 2004, some members of Congress tried to raise questions about private connections behind some of the contracts. However, committee Chairman Tom Davis, (R-Va), cut off the questions before the witnesses could answer. See also here and here.
Tom Davis won't reveal the names of clients who hired ICG, his wife's firm, so they can get a favorable hearing like the ones described by the Boston Globe, or so the money they paid to Davis might persuade the Congressman to allow them to avoid a hearing altogether. However, those ICG clients almost assuredly included DHS contractors. The ICG homepage included a prominent photograph of Davis with Homeland Security head Tom Ridge until the Ethics Committee issued a letter cautioning Davis about using his office for private gain in the matter.
Could Department of Homeland Security officials be so distraught with the forced contracts they were required to award that DHS hired its own auditor to report on the matter? According to the Post:
The assessment underscores complaints by department auditors and outside experts that procurement officials persistently neglected contracting responsibilities as they spent billions of dollars after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks -- much of it on security systems that do not work as planned."This strongly suggests that we're buying the wrong stuff, the wrong way, possibly from the wrong contractors, and failing to check before, during or after," said Charles Tiefer, an expert on government contracting who teaches at the University of Baltimore School of Law.
The confidential report, delivered to department officials in March, focused on spending in fiscal 2005 by the Office of Procurement Operations. During that period, nearly $17.5 billion was spent department-wide on contracts for a variety of goods and services, including security at airports and borders, radiation-detection monitors, and information technology consultants.
Tell the Post to tell the rest of the story. Tell them to list those ICG clients with business covered by the Government Reform Committee. A list of the likely Top 13 is here. The Post Ombudsman (please be polite) is at ombudsman@washpost.com.
Henry Waxman is the new Committee Chair and may beat the Post at any new revelations. Jim Webb is likely on the Armed Services Committee; hopefully he will uncover more waste and corruption that depends on Davis amd WaPo asleep at the switch.
Thinking about the Webb-Allen race, there was a dearth of digging about Allen's past. It took Ryan Lizza and the blogs to uncover material.
I was going to cancel my Post subscription the day after the election but my wife pointed out that our young children enjoy reading the comics -- that's how I learned to read also.
So I'm paying for the Post only because of the comics.
You have evolved into an excellent political reporter. You need a regular column. Any chance we can get Gerry Connoly to publish this in his column in the Fairfax Chronicle?
R
Speaking of killing a story, can you imagine a front page story on lack of oversight with NO MENTION of the Govt Reform Committee Chair (or its DHS subcommittee) in the whole article? Two weeks AFTER the election about a report 7 months before? I think Davis's friends in WaPo management edited Davis out from the story and still held it for a few months.
The other two papers in town are either owned by the Examiner and Davis contractor Quest Communication (vying for the Federal Telephone contract) or by the Moonies. We have to get papers from out of town interested. The Boston Globe and the Baltimore Chronicle have done good articles showing the true side of the VA Congressman. The Post won't act until it's embarrassed for getting beat in its own backyard again.
at least you are persistent. too bad none of it is credible.
election's over. move on.
So the Post let Marvin B. lie low although he's local and very newsworthy (he has ties to Kuwait, Iraq, World Trade Center security in 2001, and the foreign company that bid on port security). I Googled a single somewhat praising story about him in WaPo and that's it.
Apparently Davis met with Marvin Bush during the attempts to get a team here, even Bush's Texas Rangers. Davis must swoon at being having access to baseball, since he's famous for his love of the game. So as friendship or payback, Davis protected Marvin from Committee scrutiny on his contracts with WTC and Iraq, and the Post protects Davis from protecting Marvin.
If you look up Marvin Bush and his family on VPAP.org and FEC.gov, they almost never personally donate to candidates, but Marvin donated to Davis.
When you bring it up with some of the Reporters at the Post, they just laugh it off as some gossip or something and repeat the line,"But he's a moderate". It'll be fun to watch Davis flip-flop when he goes South of the James River on a Senatorial campaign.
The Dems really need to line up trackers to record him telling NoVAs how much he hates George Bush and George Allen, and telling RoVas how much he doesn't.
Or at least get him on film the next time he freaks out.