by Lily
DF’s Ethically Challenged Business Ventures
Dianne Feinstein has profited for 26 years from ethically challenged deals that have netted her and her crony husband tens of millions of dollars, enriching themselves at the expense of the US taxpayers.
According to investopedia, she and her husband are worth somewhere around $94 million dollars. Her salary is under $200,000 a year.
Who Are America’s Seven Richest Senators? | Investopedia
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D)
California’s Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s estimated $94 million net worth makes her the second-wealthiest serving senator. Blum Capital, a private equity firm founded in 1975 by her husband. Richard Blum, is the source for most of that wealth. Feinstein’s financial disclosure statement for 2014 revealed that she had anywhere from $5 million to $25 million invested in a blind trust. She also had between $3.1 million to $7.3 million in various money market accounts.
Read more:
www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/041516/who-are-americas-7richest-senators.asp#ixzz5St2yuh3M
There’s more to this story than investment, however,
With special thanks to the folks at Roots Action for links to sources as well as this article:
Unacceptable! Senator Profits from War and Post Office
Shortly after San Francisco’s then-Mayor Dianne Feinstein married private equity financier Richard C. Blum in 1980, those who knew them called theirs “a marriage of the public and private sectors.”
Although Feinstein lost a gubernatorial bid to Republican Pete Wilson, she soon took his seat in the U.S. Senate. Working across the aisle, her power rapidly grew along with her husband’s diversified investments and their mutual wealth.1
act.rootsaction.org/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=7309
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Check is in the mail: Sen. Feinstein’s husband to cash in selling old post offices
Washington Guardian –
The real estate giant chaired by Richard Blum, the husband of California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, is cashing in on a new federal crisis.
Just a few years after the firm now known as CBRE Group collected more than $108 million from a contract to help the FDIC sell foreclosed properties, the company owned in part by Blum is selling off old post offices under an exclusive contract with the financially struggling U.S. Postal Service, records show.
Officials for the Postal Service, Feinstein’s office and Blum’s company say the contract signed in 2011 with CBRE involved no political influence and was awarded to CBRE after a competitive process that involved six other firms.
www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jun/12/firm-chaired-by-sen-feinsteins-husband-cashes-in-o/
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GOVERNMENT SAYS COMPANY PART-OWNED BY FEINSTEIN’S HUSBAND ABUSES POST OFFICE CONTRACT
David Dayen
May 5 2015, 12:32 p.m.
(This post is from our new blog: Unofficial Sources.)
CBRE, a giant real estate company partially owned by Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s husband, Richard Blum, is costing the U.S. Postal Service millions of dollars a year in lease overpayments, and its exclusive contract should be immediately canceled, the service’s inspector general has found.
Eyebrows rose when the USPS made the contract with CBRE in June 2011 for all real estate transactions. Blum chaired CBRE at the time; he stepped down last year, but remains a director and a major shareholder. Feinstein, D-Calif., has always denied involvement in the deal, which proved lucrative as the cash-strapped Postal Service looked to its excess real estate to finance operations.
The contract enables CBRE to market and sell properties, and conduct negotiations for leases of postal buildings. Prior to the contract, USPS negotiated leases directly with landlords. Now, CBRE often represents both the Postal Service and the landlord in negotiations, known as “dual agency transactions.”
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War brings business to Feinstein spouse / Blum’s firms win multimillion-dollar defense contracts in
SF Gate
When it comes to scoring mega-military-related contracts, Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s multimillionaire husband, Richard Blum, is right in the thick of things.
First up: a contract announced last week between the Army and URS Corp., the San Francisco planning and engineering company that specializes in defense work — and that happens to be partly owned by Blum’s investment firm.
The contract — which could grow to $600 million — is to help with troop mobilization, weapons systems training and anti-terrorism methods.
That’s on top of a $3.1 billion Army contract that URS snared back in February for weapons systems and homeland defense.
…
But it’s Blum’s ties to URS — in which he controls about a quarter of the stock — that are certain to raise the most questions.
In July, URS acquired defense contractor EG&G (the technical services branch that won the $600 million contract) from the Carlyle Group investment firm. That’s the outfit that boasts ex-President George H.W. Bush, former Secretary of State James Baker and ex-British Prime Minister John Major as advisers.
www.sfgate.com/bayarea/matier-ross/article/War-brings-business-to-Feinstein-spouse-Blum-s-2652085.php
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Senator Feinstein’s Iraq Conflict
As a member of the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee, Sen. Feinstein voted for appropriations worth billions to her husband’s firms
SF Gate
IN THE November 2006 election, the voters demanded congressional ethics reform. And so, the newly appointed chairman of the Senate Rules Committee, Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., is now duly in charge of regulating the ethical behavior of her colleagues. But for many years, Feinstein has been beset by her own ethical conflict of interest, say congressional ethics experts.
As chairperson and ranking member of the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee (MILCON) from 2001 through the end of 2005, Feinstein supervised the appropriation of billions of dollars a year for specific military construction projects. Two defense contractors whose interests were largely controlled by her husband, financier Richard C. Blum, benefited from decisions made by Feinstein as leader of this powerful subcommittee.
Each year, MILCON’s members decide which military construction projects will be funded from a roster proposed by the Department of Defense. Contracts to build these specific projects are subsequently awarded to such major defense contractors as Halliburton, Fluor, Parsons, Louis Berger, URS Corporation and Perini Corporation. From 1997 through the end of 2005, with Feinstein’s knowledge, Blum was a majority owner of both URS Corp. and Perini Corp.
www.metroactive.com/metro/01.24.07/dianne-feinstein-0704.html
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EXCLUSIVE: Senator’s husband’s firm cashes in on crisis
The Washington Times
On the day the new Congress convened this year, Sen. Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation to route $25 billion in taxpayer money to a government agency that had just awarded her husband’s real estate firm a lucrative contract to sell foreclosed properties at compensation rates higher than the industry norms.
Mrs. Feinstein’s intervention on behalf of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was unusual: the California Democrat isn’t a member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs with jurisdiction over FDIC; and the agency is supposed to operate from money it raises from bank-paid insurance payments – not direct federal dollars.
Documents reviewed by The Washington Times show Mrs. Feinstein first offered Oct. 30 to help the FDIC secure money for its effort to stem the rise of home foreclosures. Her letter was sent just days before the agency determined that CB Richard Ellis Group (CBRE) – the commercial real estate firm that her husband Richard Blum heads as board chairman – had won the competitive bidding for a contract to sell foreclosed properties that FDIC had inherited from failed banks.
www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/apr/21/senate-husbands-firm-cashes-in-on-crisis/
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Conflict of Interest for Vice Chair of the UC Regents, Richard C. Blum?
Sants Cruz Indymedia
Vice Chair of the UC Regents, Richard C. Blum, [husband of Diane Feinstein] also happens to be Vice Chair of the URS Corporation. URS Corporation describes itself as “… one of the largest engineering design services firms worldwide and a major U.S. federal government contractor. “ URS is indeed a major government contractor.
URS had $3.38 billion in revenues in 2004. It is the 36th largest military-industrial corporation in the United States with $803 million in contracts with the Department of Defense1. URS Corporation also does work for the Department of Energy. In July of 2000 URS was awarded a contract for “design and construction services at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.�?2 This five-year contract (with a five “option�? year extension) will enrich URS by $25 million per year. Given Mr. Blum’s position on the UC Board of Regents, the public body that manages the Laboratory, and his position as Vice Chair of the URS Corporation, a business that stands to profit from its work at the Laboratory, is this not a conflict of interests?
santacruz.indymedia.org/newswire/display/18037/index.php
Know of more shady Feinstein deals? Please add to the list. I am sure this is not the whole story.
Hopefully, with the spotlight on her dirty tricks and her Chinese spy in the office, the Senate and the Justice Department will move on shutting down her money machine.
THE GREAT GOLD HEIST
by Karen Bixman
On October 8, 1994 the biggest gold heist in history occurred, but this theft lacked the melodrama of a Jesse James holdup or the excitement of a Brink’s truck robbery. Nary a word was reported by the media even though this thievery was committed in the light of day. The citizens that were being robbed tried to cry out for help but the lawmen wouldn’t listen because unbeknownst to them they were helping the bandits gain their booty.
The 103rd Congress managed to accomplish more than a gang of train robbers could achieve in a lifetime when they approved the Desert Wilderness Protection Act. “Instead of voting on the Desert Wilderness Protection Act, Congress should be convening a criminal investigation,” said Donald Fife, spokesman for the National Association of Mining Districts. Fife was commenting on recent information that indicates tens of billions of dollars in gold deposits and huge real estate swindles may be the motivating factors behind the act.
Sponsored by Senator Diane Feinstein, the Desert Wilderness Protection Act and it’s companion bill known as the California Desert Protection Act create three new national parks and seventy-four new wilderness areas in the desert of California that would total 8 million acres (an area the size of Maryland). This will close this acreage to development, force out private owners within the protected area and close down mines and ranches. It would also expand the Death Valley and Joshua Tree national monuments and upgrade them to national parks. This is the largest wilderness land lockup since the 1980 Alaska Lands Act; largest ever in the lower 48 states. Senator Feinstein contends that the fragile ecosystem of the desert must be protected from development, but in reality the areas being placed into park and wilderness closures are not threatened.
In 1980, the California Desert Conservation Area Plan was enacted to protect the desert and it has been rigorously enforced by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. Furthermore, the designated acreage mentioned in this bill have largely been for sale at bargain prices for over 100 years with no takers because there is absolutely no water or any prospect of water for development. It seems that the real motivation for passage of this bill lies with the special interest groups that would benefit monetarily.
Through a complex series of land exchanges, Catellus Corp., a subsidiary of Santa Fe Pacific, would receive land that contains some of the richest gold deposits in the world. In exchange the public gets seventy-four widely scattered tracts of desert which have found no economic use in more than a century. These will have to be maintained at public expense, but Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbit says the National Park Service has the resources to accomplish this.
www.mega.nu/ampp/bixman.html
How Gun Grabber Feinstein Stole $100s Of Billions In Gold
Posted on December 31, 2012 by horse237
Diane Feinstein is Gun Grabber in Chief in the US Senate. We need to go on the offensive against her for her many acts of corruption. The alternative is unthinkable: We could go unarmed off that Fiscal Cliff into the Greatest Depression in 500 years with nationwide riots and martial law.
Senator Diane Feinstein: “The Modern Jesse James”
Congress should be convening a criminal investigation. On October 8, 1994, the biggest gold heist in history occurred, but this theft lacked the melodrama of a Jesse James’ holdup or the excitement of a Brink’s truck robbery. Nary a word was reported by the media even though this thievery was committed in the light of day. The citizens that were being robbed tried to cry out for help but the lawmen wouldn’t listen because unbeknownst to them, they were helping the bandits gain their booty.
The 103rd Congress managed to accommodate more than a gang of train robbers could achieve in a lifetime when they approved the Desert Wilderness Protection Act. “Instead of voting on the Desert Wilderness Protection Act, Congress should be convening a criminal investigation,” said Donald Fife, spokesman for the National Association of Mining Districts.
vidrebel.wordpress.com/2012/12/31/how-gun-grabber-feinstein-stole-100s-of-billions-in-gold/
Democratic Blood Money and Senator Feinstein’s War Profiteering
By Joshua Frank
April 4, 2007
Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein of California silently resigned from her post on the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee (MILCON) late last week as her ethical limbo with war contracts began to surface in the media, including an excellent investigative report written by Peter Byrne for Metro in January. MILCON has supervised the appropriations of billions of dollars in reconstruction contracts since the Bush wars began.
Feinstein, who served as chairperson and ranking member for the committee from 2001-2005, came under fire early last year in these pages for profiting by way of her husband Richard Blum who, until 2005, held large stakes in two defense contracting companies. Both businesses, URS and Perini, have scored lucrative contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan in the last four years, and Blum has personally pocketed tens of millions of dollars off the deals his wife, along with her colleagues, so graciously approved.
Here’s a brief rundown of the Feinstein family’s blatant war profiteering. In April 2003, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers gave $500 million to Perini to provide services for Iraq’s Central Command. A month earlier in March 2003, Perini was awarded $25 million to design and construct a facility to support the Afghan National Army near Kabul. And in March 2004, Perini was awarded a hefty contract worth up to $500 million for “electrical power distribution and transmission” in southern Iraq.
www.lewrockwell.com/2007/04/joshua-frank/sen-feinstein-as-a-merchant-of-death/
So they got her off the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee (MILCON) by allowiong her to resign instead of being tried and incarcerated for corruption?
California Democrats decline to endorse Dianne Feinstein
Fox News
Published on Feb 25, 2018
California’s Democratic Party chooses not to give endorsement to Senator Dianne Feinstein in re-election bid; Will Carr provides details.
Bad news is, she still holds a lead on the challenger, who is even further to the left than DF
New Details Emerge About Chinese Spy Who Worked For Sen. Feinstein
Says she was mortified to find out about it.
But don’t worry, he didn’t leak anything significant.