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The Wall Street Journal reports today that payday lenders are increasingly incorporating not in states with lax lending laws, but with American Indian tribes:

Because of the sovereign immunity granted to tribes by the U.S. government, they are shielded from interest-rate caps and other payday-loan regulations. Tribal lenders can even lend in the 12 U.S. states where lawmakers have kicked out the rest of the payday-loan industry.

….All it takes to make a deal are a willing tribe and an eager payday lender. The lender usually incorporates on tribal land, agreeing to pay the chief a salary of a few thousand dollars a month, according to people familiar with the agreements. Such payments can balloon if the tribe has relationships with more than one lender, a common practice.

Most payday lenders have no physical presence on tribal land. To go into business with a tribe, they typically start making loans in the tribe’s name from the lender’s existing call center, according to industry consultants.

In October, Peg Calvird of Suffolk, Va., got a payday loan for $600 from American Web Loan Inc….The loan’s interest rate was 300%, far above Virginia’s legal limit of 36%.

For now, I’ll assume that credit card companies can’t do this, since if they could they already would have. Let’s just hope that the financial reform law didn’t accidentally open up a loophole that makes it possible.

But here’s a serious question: if you take out a payday loan from one of these guys, and then fail to pay it back, what can they do to you? I suppose they can still wreck your credit rating, but what else? Aside from harassment, what enforcement mechanism is available to them to get their money back?

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That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

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Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

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