Uncloaking the Fed’s Bailout

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In a major victory for the business press and anyone who longs for more transparency at the Federal Reserve, a federal judge in New York ruled on Tuesday that the Fed must fork over  financial rescue records to two Bloomberg journalists. The reporters, Mark Pittman and Craig Torres, had sued the Fed’s board of governors after it refused to hand over bailout-related documents. What’s more, the Fed had refused to search for certain information relating to its actions in early 2008—namely, when the Fed’s New York branch loaned JPMorgan Chase nearly $13 billion to buy Bear Stearns. (JPMorgan and Bear Stearns ended up paying back the $13 billion loan plus $4 million in interest.)

The Fed’s bailout manuevers have come under criticism from members of Congress (especially Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.)) and the media, including our own Nomi Prins. Like when the Fed let Goldman Sachs use investment-bank risk models even after it had converted into a bank holding company in order to qualify for bailout funds, allowing Goldman to make big-time, risky bets with taxpayers’ money.

Needless to say, this is an important victory for the press covering the bailout, and for shedding some light on the incredibly opaque actions the Fed has taken to rescue the financial system.  The decision’s timing couldn’t be better. It comes right after Fed chairman Ben Bernanke was nominated for a second term, so closer scrutiny of his decisions when the economy was near rock-bottom will be in the spotlight. The decision also comes as the Treasury Dept. weighs letting the Fed play a larger role in financial regulation by monitoring those “too big to fail” banks in our system—an idea I and others strongly oppose. I’ll be curious to see what those two crusading Bloomberg reporters turn up.

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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.

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