Andy Kroll

Reporter

Andy's work has appeared at the Wall Street Journal, the Detroit News, Le Monde Diplomatique, Salon, and TomDispatch.com, where he's an associate editor. He works in Mother Jones' DC Bureau, and can be reached at akroll (at) motherjones (dot) com.

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The $25 Billion Foreclosure Settlement: Breakthrough or Raw Deal?

—By Andy Kroll

| Thu Feb. 9, 2012 1:06 PM PST

respres/Flickr

On Thursday, after months of closed-door negotiations, plenty of hand wringing, and too many leaks to the media to count, 49 state attorneys general, the Justice Department, and five mega-banks announced they'd reached a legal settlement over fraud in the mortgage servicing and foreclosure processes.

The settlement is worth an estimated $25 billion, according to the Justice Department. The banks involved—Ally Financial, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, and JPMorgan Chase—agreed to reduce principal home loan debt for a million homeowners while paying $2,000 to 750,000 more households that had lost their home to foreclosure. Crucially, the settlement doesn't entirely absolve banks of alleged wrongdoing, leaving the door open for AGs like New York's Eric Schneiderman to proceed with foreclosure fraud lawsuits of their own. Depending on whom you ask, the terms of settlement are a key breakthrough, a first step toward righting the foreclosure abuses of the past decade, or a total sham.

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) called the deal "an important victory for homeowners and communities devastated by the housing crisis." Michael Calhoun, president of the Center for Responsible Lending, said in a statement that the deal "will help build a stronger housing market while keeping more people in their homes. But while a significant step toward fixing the foreclosure crisis, this settlement was never intended or able to provide a comprehensive remedy. Much more work is required."

Some experts and observers, however, were plainly dismissive of the deal. Yves Smith, who runs the blog Naked Capitalism, rattled off 12 reasons why "you should hate" the foreclosure settlement, including the deal's overall price tag, the paltry $2,000 payout for homeowners, and her belief that the deal papers over deeper problems with property titles and the foreclosure process itself. "As we've said before," she wrote, "this settlement is yet another raw demonstration of who wields power in America, and it isn't you and me."

Then again, the AGs' foreclosure settlement was never going to fully address the myriad problems with the foreclosure process. Consider MERS, the industry-backed electronic mortgage registry that greased the foreclosure pipeline and enabled many of the dubious practices that led to the housing crisis. MERS has been in use since 1995; it's an entrenched part of the housing market. It will take much more than a nationwide settlement to tackle the many problems MERS has wrought.

There's also the problem of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and their role in the foreclosure crisis. As myself and others have reported, the two government housing giants spawned foreclosure mills, the assembly-line-like law firms that skirted the law as they kicked people out of their homes. They also reportedly squashed a plan to write down the debt of homeowners who owed more than their houses were worth. There's no remedying the foreclosure crisis without reforming Fannie and Freddie.

The settlement, in other words, is far from a cure-all. Best-case scenario, consumer advocates say, the deal is just the beginning of a reckoning for the fraud and abuse that ran rampant. "Today’s announcement of the mortgage foreclosure settlement represents a step toward righting the wrongs committed by the banks," said Phil Angelides, the chair of the now-defunct Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, "but there are still miles to go. "

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Tuesday Primary Results: Rick Santorum Isn't Finished—Yet

Will Santorum's victories in Colorado, Minnesota, and Missouri bring him any closer to challenging Mitt Romney?

—By Andy Kroll

| Tue Feb. 7, 2012 8:12 PM PST

Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich, and Mitt Romney at the GOP debate in Jacksonville, FL in late January Dennis Van Tine/UPPA/ZUMA Press

This story has been updated to reflect the latest primary and caucus results.

Rick Santorum is not going away. Not yet.

The former Pennsylvania senator clinched three notable victories Tuesday night, in the Missouri primary and Colorado and Minnesota caucuses. CNN called Missouri for Santorum at 9:45 p.m. Eastern, NBC News called Minnesota for him half an hour later, and the Colorado GOP called that contest for him just after 1 a.m. Santorum led Romney 55 percent to 25 percent in Missouri with nearly all votes tallied. In Minnesota, Santorum led the pack with 45 percent of votes, with 85 percent of precincts reporting. And in Colorado, Tuesday's third and final election, Santorum led Romney by a single percentage point, 38 percent to 37 percent, with 83 percent of votes tallied.

The results of Tuesday night's caucuses and primary aren't binding, which means Santorum won't immediately add any new delegates to his paltry total of 10 so far. (Who gets those delegates will be decided by state party officials in meetings to be held later this spring.) Binding or not, Santorum's wins give him momentum and buzz at a time when he badly needs it. Apart from his belated, razor-thin win in Iowa's caucuses last month, Santorum did not clinch any other early battleground races and has failed to supplant Newt Gingrich as the clear number two in the fight for the Republican presidential nomination.

Speaking from St. Charles, Missouri Tuesday night, Santorum touted the day's results as proof that he's the best Republican to challenge President Obama. "I don't stand here as the conservative alternative to Mitt Romney," he said. "I stand here as conservative alternative to Barack Obama."

[Read the full article]

What Do the Coen Brothers, Jan Brewer, and Huggies Have in Common?

—By Andy Kroll

| Tue Feb. 7, 2012 9:47 AM PST

Forget The French Connection, Bullitt, or The Italian Job. The best chase scene in modern cinema—bring it on, boo boys—appears in Joel and Ethan Coen's bizarre, pitch-perfect 1987 classic, "Raising Arizona." (It also features the best chase scene one-liner. Mustachioed truck driver to Nicholas Cage with the cops hot on his trail: "Son, you got a pantie on yer head.") Behold:

Why the clip? One of the nation's largest labor unions has drawn on the Coen brothers oeuvre as it wages the latest battle over workers' rights in America.

In Arizona, Republican Gov. Jan Brewer and state GOP lawmakers have taken a cue from Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker by taking aim at the collective bargaining rights of public sector unions. Except Arizona's assault on workers' rights is more extreme than Wisconsin's. The bills introduced in the state senate there would eliminate all collective bargaining for public employees at the state, city, and county levels.

To fight back, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees launched "Razing Arizona." The new campaign rips Brewer and calls Arizona's anti-union legislation "the latest orchestrated attack from extreme right-wing lawmakers, think tanks, and their corporate cronies who are hell-bent on wiping out what’s left of the middle class." AFSCME also released an ad bashing Brewer in the style of VH1's Pop-Up Video:

The Brewer video has been viewed 2,100 times on YouTube. The Razing Arizona campaign has a thousand "likes" and counting on Facebook. And with the Arizona anti-union legislation still wending its way through the legislature, you can plenty more union counterattacks, film-inspired or no, are on their way.

Obama to Bankrollers: Go Supe Up My Super-PAC

—By Andy Kroll

| Tue Feb. 7, 2012 7:28 AM PST

Barack Obama. Matt Ortega/Flickr

President Obama has never liked super-PACs, the new breed of political outfit spawned in part by the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision. He'd probably wipe them off the map with a penstroke if he could. Yet on Monday night, Obama squared up to the reality that his re-election bid will need the heavy artillery of a super-PAC, if only to better fight the shadowy conservative groups lining up behind Mitt Romney, the likely GOP nominee.

Obama, the New York Times reports, has indicated to donors that he wants them to give to the pro-Obama super-PAC Priorities USA Action, which is run by former Obama White House aides Bill Burton and Sean Sweeney. Priorities has struggled since its launch last year, raking in just $4.4 million in 2011. By contrast, pro-Romney super-PAC Restore Our Future raised $30.2 million in 2011, and Rove's American Crossroads raised $18.4 million.

Here's more from the Times:

Aides said the president had signed off on a plan to dispatch cabinet officials, senior advisers at the White House and top campaign staff members to deliver speeches on behalf of Mr. Obama at fund-raising events for Priorities USA Action, the leading Democratic “super PAC,” whose fund-raising has been dwarfed by Republican groups. The new policy was presented to the campaign’s National Finance Committee in a call Monday evening and announced in an e-mail to supporters.

"We’re not going to fight this fight with one hand tied behind our back," Jim Messina, the manager of Mr. Obama’s re-election campaign, said in an interview. "With so much at stake, we can't allow for two sets of rules. Democrats can't be unilaterally disarmed."

Neither the president, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., nor their wives will attend fund-raising events or solicit donations for the Democratic group. A handful of officials from the administration and the campaign will appear on behalf of Mr. Obama, aides said, but will not directly ask for money.

Left- and right-wing groups bashed Obama for this decision. But there's some crucial context needed here. For starters, this clearly isn't a call Obama made lightly. In his 2010 State of the Union, he blasted the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision that helped usher in super-PACs, saying it would "open the floodgates for special interests, including foreign corporations, to spend without limit in our elections." And more recently, an Obama campaign staffer said the president was "flat-out opposed" to the pro-Obama Priorities USA Action super-PAC.

What's more, Obama and Congressional Democrats support reforms to eviscerate super-PACs and limit the ability of corporations and unions to spend general treasury money on elections. Those reforms included the DISCLOSE Act, a piece of legislation intended to counteract the effects of Citizens United which was killed by Senate Republicans in 2010. And as Obama campaign manager Jim Messina pointed out, the president continues to back not only new legislation casting more light on money in politics, but also a constitutional amendment to boost regulation of all that money sloshing around our elections.

Obama's no fan of super-PACs. But he and his lieutenants aren't going to "unilaterally disarm," as Messina and plenty other Democrats like to say. They're going to fight fire with fire.

Scott Walker and the Secret "John Doe" Investigation Explained (Updated)

Everything you need to know about the scandal embroiling Wisconsin's governor.

—By Andy Kroll

| Tue Feb. 7, 2012 3:00 AM PST

Scott Walker Glen Stubbe/Minneapolis Star Tribune/ZUMAPRESS.com

This explainer has been updated with new developments in the John Doe investigation, including a guilty plea by a former Walker aide. Click here to jump to those details. For background on the probe, keep reading.

A dark cloud hangs over Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.

A "John Doe" investigation launched in May 2010 has embroiled former Walker staffers and appointees from his time as Milwaukee County executive, his job before winning the governorship in November 2010. The investigation, led by Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm, has led to home raids targeting former staffers with close ties to Walker and numerous felony charges for election law violations, embezzlement, and misconduct in office.

Walker says he has "fully cooperated" and "will continue to cooperate" with the John Doe probe. The governor is confident he won't be implicated, he told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel last September, because he held himself to high standards learned from his parents. "Certainly, they got me to the rank of Eagle Scout, and I continue to have that kind of integrity," he told the paper.

[Read the full article]

How Will Mitt Romney Spin These Jobs Numbers?

—By Andy Kroll

| Fri Feb. 3, 2012 7:30 AM PST

A jobs rally sponsored by the AFL-CIO union. Randy Bayne/Flickr

Mitt Romney never misses a chance to hammer President Obama for supposedly tanking the US economy. He accuses Obama of heaping on job-killing regulations and jacking up taxes on businesses large and small. "Obama's economic failure," the Romney campaign calls it.

But Romney will need some fancy rhetorical footwork to spin away the jobs numbers released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday, which offer arguably the most optimistic snapshot of the American job market seen in four or five years.

The headline unemployment rate dropped for the third month in a row, to 8.3 percent. The private sector created 257,000 jobs, and although the government sector lost 14,000 jobs, that still meant a net gain of 243,000 jobs overall. To boot, the number of jobs added in December was revised up. The BLS now believes the economy added 203,000 jobs in December, 3,000 more than initially thought. November's jobs numbers were revised upwards, too, to 157,000—57,000 higher than the previous estimate. That means job market growth was stronger in those months than originally thought, and the recovery continues to gain momentum.

Not all the news was rosy. Long-term unemployment—those out of work for six months or more—held steady at 5.5 million people, or 43 percent of the unemployed. And the overall unemployment rate, including the underemployed and those who've stopped looking for work, dipped by just a tenth of a percentage point, to 15.1 percent.

Still, the reaction to the jobs numbers was cheery all around. Moody's Analytics economist Mark Zandi said, "This is unambiguous. Everything is good." Financial blogger Felix Salmon called January's report "positively glowing."

Back to the presidential race. Does Friday's job report significantly boost Obama's re-election chances? You bet, at least according to New York Times stats guru Nate Silver. Silver pegs Obama's "magic jobs number," the monthly net job creation total needed to win re-election, at about 150,000. The US economy netted nearly 100,000 more jobs than that last month.

In other words, Friday's numbers are not just good news for American workers but especially for Obama and his re-election chances. Mitt Romney has his work cut out for him trying to explain away these numbers.

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Romney's Super-PAC Attack Machine, Brought to You by Big Finance

—By Andy Kroll

| Wed Feb. 1, 2012 8:37 AM PST

Christopher Halloran / Shutterstock.com

Mitt Romney's thumping victory in Florida on Tuesday was due in part to the wave of negative ads barraging his opponent, Newt Gingrich, in the week before the primary. Sixty-eight percent of all Florida primary ads attacked Gingrich, and it was the pro-Romney super-PAC Restore Our Future leading the charge, spending $13.3 million to tear down Gingrich—more than all the other super-PACs combined.

Late Tuesday night, after Romney's win was in the bag, the public discovered the funders behind this anti-Newt assault. The key takeaway: FIRE.

FIRE is short for the "finance, insurance, and real estate" sector. According to a new disclosure filing with the Federal Election Commission, $11.7 million of the nearly $18 million raked in by Restore Our Future in the second half of 2011 came from the FIRE sector—financiers, investment bankers, Bain Capital directors, real estate developers, and more. That's 65 percent of all the money Restore Our Future raised. Put another way, 93 of the 199 donations to Restore Our Future came from members of the FIRE sector.

Who are these wealthy donors? They include hedge fund managers Paul Singer and Julian Robertson; Steven Roth, CEO of commercial real estate giant Vornado; GOP mega-donor and home-building magnate Bob Perry; and Kenneth Griffin, founder and CEO of the Citadel investment firm.

Even with the FIRE sector's backing, though, Restore Our Future's windfall and Romney's own haul of nearly $40 million in the second half of 2011 doesn't match President Obama's campaign war chest. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Obama and supporting super-PACs have raised $125 million for his re-election effort; for Romney, the figure is closer to $88 million.

Super-PAC Mania

Romney's haul, Obama's Hollywood bundle, Colbert's lolz: highlights from campaign spending central.

—By Andy Kroll, Tim Murphy, Tasneem Raja, and Asawin Suebsaeng

| Tue Jan. 31, 2012 10:47 AM PST

For data crunchers and political reporters on the money trail, today is something of a holiday. Call it Super-PAC Tuesday.

Below are the highlights from Super-PAC Tuesday, from Colbert's mystery donors and Jon Huntsman's daddy's money to Restore Our Future's top funders. Super-PAC disclosures span the second half of 2011, while traditional campaign disclosures cover the final three months of last year. We'll be updating this throughout the day. And if you have tips or questions, leave them in the comments section or email us at scoop (at) motherjones (dot) com.

Mitt Romney Crushes in Campaign Cash

Breaking down the balance sheets of GOP presidential hopefuls.

Average Income by Family, distributed by income group.

Newt Gingrich, By the Numbers

Raised $9.8 million and spent $8 million in the final three months of 2011. Had $2.1 million on hand at the end of the year. Carrying a debt of $1.19 million.

Obama's Bundlers

Breaking down the biggest rainmakers funding Obama's reelection effort.

Average Income by Family, distributed by income group.

Notable Obama bundlers:
Vogue editor Anna Wintour ($500,000 or more)
Actress Eva Longoria ($200,000 to $500,000)
Scandal-ridden financier Jon Corzine ($500,000 or more)
Dreamworks Animation CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg ($500,000 or more)
Hollywood producer and executive Harvey Weinstein ($500,000 or more)
Actor ("The Wire," "Treme") Wendell Pierce ($50,000-$100,000)

WHO'S BACKING OBAMA'S NOT-VERY-SUPER-PAC?

Here's a look at some of the folks throwing bucks at Priorities USA Action:

$150,000: William Little, Jr., chairman of George Little Management, LLC, a company specializing in high-profile trade shows and networking platforms.

$100,000: Steven Spielberg, co-principal at Dreamworks Animation and director of such films as Jaws, Schindler's List, Jurassic Park, and that godawful Indiana Jones installment with aliens and a nuclear-blast-proof refrigerator.

$100,000: John Law, managing director at Warland Investments, a real estate firm in Cypress, California.

$50,000: Lenny Mendonca, director at McKinsey & Company, a global management consulting firm. He also serves on the board of The New America Foundation and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

$15,000: Orin Kramer, a general partner at the New York-based Boston Provident who was dubbed the "King of the New York Obamasaurs" by The New York Observer in 2008.

$10,000: Joseph Falk, a public policy consultant for mega law firm Akerman Senterfitt in Miami. He is on the board of directors of the Victory Fund, a PAC dedicated to electing openly LGBT candidates to public office.

Golden Parachute

When Tim Pawlenty quit the race and endorsed Mitt Romney, the latter got an energetic, polished surrogate. The former got a fat check from Romney’s fundraising machine to pay off campaign debt.

Average Income by Family, distributed by income group.

Sorry, Santorum. Mitt's Our Man

$150,000: Amount donated by Consol Energy, a Pennsylvania-based giant whose board of directors includes on Rick Santorum, to pro-Romney super-PAC Restore our Future.

$0: Amount donated to the pro-Santorum super-PAC Red, White, and Blue Fund.

Who's Your Daddy, Jon Huntsman?

70 percent of the money raised by pro-Hunstman Our Destiny PAC came from one man—Jon Huntsman Sr.

Average Income by Family, distributed by income group.

We are the 30 Percent

Where’d the rest of Our Destiny PAC’s money come from? A quick sampling:

$250,000: Peter Arnott, chairman of the California investment management firm, Research Associates.

$150,000: The Walton family (WalMart).

$40,000: Craig Mckaw, Seattle telecom entrepreneur and cofounder of the Free Willy Foundation, which covered the living expenses and relocation costs of Keiko the Killer Whale. (His wife, Susan, chipped in another $40,000).

You Can't Buy Friends

Top strategist Ed Rollins left Michele Bachmann's presidential campaign in early September and proceeded to spend the next four months trashing it, famously telling reporters: "If I would have Googled her, I would have found out she had 6 chiefs of staff in 5 years." Which makes that payment in Bachmann's last quarterly filing sting that much more: $30,000 to one Edward J. Rollins of New York, New York. All told, Rollins was paid $120,000 by a campaign he helped sink, and which is currently $1,055,924 in the hole.

Who's Laughing Now?

Two fake presidential campaigns. One undisputed fundraising champion.

Average Income by Family, distributed by income group.

Colbert's "Heroes"

The famous, and not-so-famous, donors to Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow

Average Income by Family, distributed by income group.

$1: Harry Ballsagna 7190 Ridgegate Dr, Gladstone, Oregon 97027-1180

$25: Pat Magroin 9756 Prospect Ave Lakeside, California 92040-4114

$10: Ibin Yerkinoff P.O. Box 1315 Levittown, Pennsylvania 19058

$1: Frumunda Mabalz 5364 Ballyduff St. Fitchburg, Wisconsin 53711

Sources: All super-PAC data appear in Federal Election Commission disclosure forms filed by the committees. Obama bundler data was published by the Obama reelection campaign.

The Tea Party Plan to Save Scott Walker

Tea partiers are gung-ho to help the Wisconsin governor fend off a recall vote—and their fate may well be tied to his.

—By Andy Kroll

| Tue Jan. 31, 2012 3:00 AM PST

Tea party supporters of Gov. Scott Walker rally in Madison on April 16, 2011. Ann Althouse/Flickr

As soon as April, millions of Wisconsinites will vote on whether to oust Gov. Scott Walker—a rising Republican star and arguably the most polarizing governor in politics today—just two years into his first term in office. Walker's recall election is a referendum on his hardline conservative agenda, including curbing collective bargaining rights for state workers and slashing education funding. For Walker himself it's a pivotal moment in his young political career.

The recall fight is also a crucial test for the tea party, the populist movement that helped elect Walker in 2010, vigorously defended him during last winter's protests over his anti-union "budget repair" bill, and has been organizing to prevent his ouster. The movement's support is flagging, its clout dwindling, its buzz mostly gone. But now, tea partiers at the state and national levels are rallying around Walker's recall defense, hoping a victory could bolster the movement in a critical election year. A defeat, on the other hand, would give ammo to liberals and conservatives alike who say the tea party is all but dead.

In recent months, the Tea Party Express, a national organization, and the Campaign to Defeat Barack Obama, a tea party-linked political action committee, have waded into the recall fight, blasting out more than a dozen emails to supporters and launching a $100,000 "money bomb" fundraiser to help defend Walker. They argue that the outcome has national implications for the 2012 presidential election; a Tea Party Express email to supporters in January announced that Wisconsin is "Ground Zero for the Battle Against Obama's Liberal Agenda."

[Read the full article]

Romney Forces Crush Gingrich in Florida Ad Wars

—By Andy Kroll

| Mon Jan. 30, 2012 11:13 AM PST

Newt Gingrich. Gage Skidmore/Flickr

Despite banking another $5 million from billionaire casino tycoon Sheldon Adelson—OK, technically Adelson's wife—Winning Our Future, the pro-Newt Gingrich super-PAC, is getting trounced by Mitt Romney forces in the ad wars leading up to Florida's primary on Tuesday.

Quoting a "source monitoring the Sunshine State ad war," Politico reports that the Romney campaign and pro-Romney super-PAC Restore Our Future spent $15.3 million on television ads in Florida. That's 450 percent more than Gingrich's campaign and super-PAC Winning Our Future spent on TV ads. And that doesn't include money spent on direct mail sent to voters, get-out-the-vote efforts, and other non-TV campaigning.

In other words, just as Gingrich clinched a double-digit victory in South Carolina after blitzing the airwaves there with ads attacking Romney, Romney and his allies are doing the same in Florida. And boy is it paying off: Romney now leads Gingrich by 12 percentage points, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released Sunday. A separate Miami Herald poll showed Romney trouncing Gingrich among Florida Hispanic voters, 52 percent to 28 percent.

Restore Our Future is already laying the groundwork for Romney wins in other key primary states. According to ProPublica, the deep-pocketed super-PAC has already spent $52,000 attacking Gingrich in Nevada (Feb. 4 caucus), $120,000 attacking him in Arizona (Feb. 28 primary), and $168,000 attacking him in Michigan (Feb. 28 primary). You can bet those sums will increase dramatically in the coming weeks—unless, that is, Gingrich bows out, in which case Restore Our Future and its political guru, Carl Forti, will have done their job.