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2025-01-19 Government Corruption
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LA Mayor Karen Bass'' office hit with accusations of ''legalized corruption''
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[NYPOST] Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass got into office promoting diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and promising to tackle homelessness and pollution — but she never promised to drain the swamp.
Now she stands accused of adding to it, through ''legalized corruption'' and a number of eye opening scandals which have come to light after renewed scrutiny in the last two weeks following the revelation Bass and her cronies defunded the Los Angeles Fire Department by $17 million, contributing to them being underprepared to tackle the wildfires currently destroying the city.
These include:
- The deputy mayor raided by the FBI over an alleged bomb threat against City Hall.
- Endorsing a former councilor investigated over hush money payments for congress.
- Awarding fat cat salaries of $750k to a pal, double the predecessor's salary.
- Council members accused of embezzlement, perjury, racketeering, tax evasion and bribes.
DWP is controlled by the mayor and city council. Last year, Bass hired Janisse Quinones, a fellow progressive who opaquely stressed her mission would be “righting the wrongs that we’ve done in the past from an infrastructure perspective,” as CEO of the utility.
Bass pays her a $750,000 salary — almost double what her predecessor was making.
Quinones has been blamed by some members of the city’s fire department for failing to fix broken hydrants, many of which ran dry as the Palisades fire consumed homes in the Malibu and Pacific Palisades neighborhoods on Jan. 8.
Consumer Watchdog and the Los Angeles Times launched a lawsuit in federal court last year to unseal dozens of warrants in an extortion scheme involving the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office and the DWP.
The unsealed documents, some 1,400 pages, revealed the FBI believed Mike Feuer, the former City Attorney – the top lawyer to the city — had lied to investigators when he denied knowledge of a hush money payment to hide a litigation scandal in his office.
He called the claims “absurd” and was never prosecuted.
Feuer had run against Bass for mayor in 2022 but dropped out of the race and endorsed her. In turn, Bass endorsed Feuer, calling him “a longtime colleague and friend” who would “deliver for Los Angeles,” in a failed race for US Congress in 2023.
“We have a pay-to-play culture in Los Angeles,” said Susan Shelley, a member of the editorial board of the Southern California New Group, a columnist and vice president of communications for the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, a non-profit. “It’s legalized corruption.”
In Los Angeles, politicians can request “behested payments” or donations from individuals and companies who have business before the city. “This would be called ‘extortion’ elsewhere,” said Shelley, adding the Mayor’s Fund for Los Angeles has received some $1.8 million in behested payments from companies such as AT&T and Coca Cola, among others.
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Posted by Fred 2025-01-19 00:00||
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