“Recall that Alan Mollohan (D-WV) is a former chair of the House Ethics Committee. That’s the same Mollohan under federal investigation after the National Legal and Policy Center filed a complaint with the department regarding a bizarre increase in Mollohan’s net worth. For 2005, Mollohan and his wife reported assets worth $6.8 million to $25.7 million, up from $116,000 to $315,000 in 1999. His financial disclosure restatements came only after the group’s complaint.”
–Doug Ross, Draining the Swamp

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NOTE: If at any time, the reader is a resident of West Virginia’s 1st Congressional District and feels moved to contact Alan Mollohan’s office for the Congressman’s take on the information presented in this article, contact information is provided throughout this piece.

Further Note: While there is the “appearance of impropriety”, Congressman Alan Mollohan is not under indictment and has not been charged with any crime.

MOLLOHAN’S OFFICE
PHONE: 202-225-4172
FAX: 202-225-7564

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EARMARKS For FRIENDS, FORMER AIDE in THOSE WV HILLS

[ABOVE: Alan Mollohan, former chairman of the House Ethics Committee, forced to step down in 2006 over questions about his ethics.]

Congressman Named Among Most Corrupt

Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-WV), dubbed “the overnight millionaire,” is in the news again. He received his nickname because in 2000 Mollohan had no portfolio to speak of while making less than $80K a year. By 2004, he reported having at least $6.3 million in assets that generated income of somewhere around $700K annually. Earlier this week, it was reported that a non-profit funded by Mollohan (with the taxpayers’ money, of course) had provided his family with $75,000 in free rent and services.
–Above the Law: A Handy Guide to Democrat Corruption

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MOLLOHAN’S OFFICE
PHONE: 202-225-4172
FAX: 202-225-7564

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WHO DOES ALAN MOLLOHAN REPRESENT?

West Virginia’s 1st Congressional District

Congressman Alan Mollohan has certainly made a name for himself. Some might even say that Mollohan is famous. Others might use the term “infamous”.

Google the terms “Alan Mollohan” and “corruption” and the search engine returns 8600+ results.

So, who would keep sending such a representative to Washington, DC to look after their interests? The people of northern West Virginia, that’s who.

Congressman Alan Mollohan represents the 1st Congressional District in West Virginia. The district is comprised of 20 counties in West Virginia’s northern section. A lot of Mollohan’s constituents come from blue-collar, socially-conservative, working class backgrounds.

The area’s voters are mostly registered Democrats, but the 1st Congressional District went for John McCain in 2008. In fact, no Democrat since Bill Clinton has carried the 1st District in a presidential election.

So, the voters of the 1st District don’t mindlessly pull the lever for all Democrats. But they have chosen Alan Mollohan every two years since his initial election in 1982.

Since then, Mollohan has had several benefits that keep him in Washington: few strong contenders–in fact, few contenders at all; a nearly 2-1 margin in registered Democrat-to-Republicans in his district; and, a district that’s been used to voting for a Mollohan for decades. Before Alan there was Robert Mollohan, his father, who represented the 1st Congressional District 1952-58 and again from 1968-82.

So you might say that WV’s 1st Congressional District has been “in the family” for the Mollohan family for the better part of 50 years.

West Virginians, like most voters, like earmark money when it benefits their districts. But some of Alan Mollohan’s earmarks seem to benefit some West Virginians more than others. In particular, Mollohan has been accused, among other things, of earmarking money for companies that, coincidentally, donate large sums of money to Alan Mollohan.

It’s been alleged that companies the benefit from Alan Mollohan’s earmarks are companies that benefit Alan Mollohan in some way.

In the meantime, WV Route 2, the main north-south highway in the very northern part of WV-1 remains a mostly two-lane affair. The fastest way for travelers and commercial vehicles to get make the 77-mile trip from Wheeling to Parkersburg is to head west across the Ohio River and travel through the Buckeye State via Interstates 70 and 77.

The fastest route from Wheeling to north-central WV cities Fairmont or Morgantown, is to go east into Pennsylvania via Interstates 70 and 79. US 250, the shortest way between these two areas, is a two-lane rambling roller-coaster of a road that is anathema to experienced commercial drivers.

For all of the millions flowing into West Virginia via Mollohan’s earmarks, US Rt 250 and WV 2 remain less-than-ideal ways to get around Mollohan’s 1st Congressional District.

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“…West Virginia Democratic Congressman Alan Mollohan, who spent the better part of the decade earmarking himself from rags to riches.”
–What About the Democrats’ ‘Culture of Corruption?’

Where did it all start to go wrong for Alan Mollohan?

It all started in 2006, when the “National Legal and Policy Center filed a 500-page ethics complaint against Mollohan, alleging that the congressman misrepresented his assets on financial disclosure forms.”

That caused the congressman to file amendments to past financial disclosure forms and to explain his now-claimed personal wealth.

Mollohan has defended his meteor-like rise in wealth by pointing to his wife’s hard work over the last 10 years and her astute real estate savvy.

“For more than a decade, my wife Barbara has marketed and managed our real estate investments. That is her full-time job; it’s been her career for 10 years. She has worked hard at it and she has been successful,” Mollohan said. “Rather than simply recognizing the long hours Barbara has put into her career, NLPC has made sinister allegations about our investments.”

“The group also has ignored that we received a sizable inheritance, took on considerable financial risks, and had the good fortune to be investing in a rising real estate market. It is those factors that are responsible for the increase of our assets.”

More on Mollohan’s “good fortune” later.

But tough times in the real estate market can hit even the savvy: Mollohan Scandal Property Goes to Foreclosure.

More on this particular point–also later.

FROM Wikipedia:

When his father, Bob, retired in 1982 after 16 years in Congress spread out over two stints, he endorsed his son as his successor. Alan was elected that November in a very competitive contest. He faced another close race in 1984, but was unopposed for a third term in 1986. He has not faced serious opposition in a general election since, running unopposed in 1992, 1996, 2002 and 2008. In 1998 and 2000, no Republican candidate ran against Mollohan. In both of those years he was opposed by a Libertarian Richard Kerr, but Mollohan won handily.

In 2010, WV State Sen. Clark Barnes will challenge Mollohan for his 1st Congressional seat.

Barnes has connections throughout West Virginia’s 1st Congressional District that could prove beneficial to him. Mollohan, D-W.Va., is currently serving his 14th term in Congress.

Barnes’ residence in Beverly, W.Va., is located within West Virginia’s 2nd District represented by U.S. Rep. Shelly Moore Capito, R-W.Va.

The rules for running for Congress are established by the U.S. Constitution, and require only that a candidate live within the state he or she would represent.
–Clark Barnes Will Seek Seat in 2010

As can be guessed from a long-term Congressman who has done so well for himself, Mollohan should have quite a war chest, come campaign time.

According to Open Secrets, Mollohan has a net worth that went “From $-2,381,981 to $21,345,993 and Ranks 33rd among all members of the House”.

His campaign finance disclosures show that he only has $30,118 cash on hand as of September 30, 2009. However, Mollohan’s financial disclosures have had to be amended many times over the last several years due to “inadvertent errors” on Mollohan’s part.

The last time Mollohan had Republican opposition, he raised over $1.6 million for the 2006 race.

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ALAN MOLLOHAN: Defender of ACORN

In mid-September 2009, the (Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now) ACORN scandal broke across America. The IRS and Census Bureau cut ties to ACORN and its affiliates. The House of Representatives moved quickly to cut off funding. Only 75 Representatives voted to continue funding ACORN, already under investigation in 10 states for voter fraud.

Alan Mollohan was one of those 75 representatives.

The House of Representatives just voted overwhelmingly to de-fund ACORN, 345-75. The vote came on a Republican motion to recommit the educational loan bill. As a result, the anti-ACORN provision made it into the House-passed bill.

Below are the names of all 75 congressmen who voted to preserve ACORN’s stream of funding. The biggest surprises on the list: Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., and the two Democrats from West Virginia, Alan Mollohan and Nick Rahall.

–House votes to cut off funding, but 75 stand by ACORN

For several days, Mollohan was unavailable for comment on his vote. He finally attempted a defense of his vote at an event in Weirton, WV.

Mollohan acknowledged there have been “accusations of irregularities” pertaining to new voter registration accrued by ACORN. And in a video coming to light this week, two ACORN employees are seen apparently advising a couple posing as a prostitute and her pimp to lie about her profession and launder her earnings.

“There has been one outrageous accusation – that an ACORN-managed facility indicated willingness to rent an apartment when obviously nefarious conduct was intended,” Mollohan said.

“No one is accusing every ACORN organization of misconduct, and (Republicans) are painting with a broad brush. They are indicting a whole organization based on the conduct of a few. It seems fundamentally wrong to do that.”
–Mollohan Defends ACORN Vote

IN his defense of his ACORN vote, Mollohan implied that the the ACORN videos were ‘made-up’.

“A reporter with the New York Times made up stories and won awards for them,” he (Mollohan) commented. “And they were not real. They were factually made up. But that doesn’t indict the New York Times or all printed press. The printed press shouldn’t be indicted because of the conduct of a few. . . .”

In case the reader is one of the few who haven’t seen the string of videos made at ACORN offices across America (where the two actors who portrayed a pimp and a prostitute received help on how to set up a child sex slave prostitution business), the first video is below.

DBKP called Mollohan’s office to see if the congressman’s take on ACORN had changed since he addressed the woman’s club outing in Weirton last month.

Our phone call was not returned.

ACORN is just part of what Alan Mollohan voted to continue funding with US taxpayers’ dollars. But it’s an especially outrageous part.

The above video is one of a series that Mollohan tries to explain away by implying they were “factually made up”.

In Mollohan’s defense, only the first couple of ACORN sting videos were released at the time he voted to continue funneling US tax dollars to the organization.

Is this good judgment? The reader will have to decide that question. There are no ACORN offices in Mollohan’s district, so it’s not sure exactly what Mollohan’s political calculus was.

Why not call Congressman Mollohan’s office and ask?

MOLLOHAN’S OFFICE
PHONE: 202-225-4172
FAX: 202-225-7564

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ALAN MOLLOHAN MAKES NATIONAL NEWS

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A federal jury convicted former Congressman William Jefferson, D-New Orleans, of 11 counts of being one big crook…Let his conviction strike fear in the hearts of Democrats Jack Murtha, Alan Mollohan, Peter Visclosky and the rest of the Earmarks Inc. Let it strike fear in the hearts of Republicans.
–Democrat William Jefferson — convicted

Don Surber is an editorial writer for the Charleston Daily Mail. He’s often quoted around the country. Is his inclusion of Mollohan in the list with the other members of Earmarks Inc accurate?

Why not contact the Congressman and ask?

MOLLOHAN’S OFFICE
PHONE: 202-225-4172
FAX: 202-225-7564

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[ABOVE: Who did Nancy Pelosi find after draining the Congressional swamp?

"Recall that Alan Mollohan (D-WV) is a former chair of the House Ethics Committee. That's the same Mollohan under federal investigation after the National Legal and Policy Center filed a complaint with the department regarding a bizarre increase in Mollohan's net worth. For 2005, Mollohan and his wife reported assets worth $6.8 million to $25.7 million, up from $116,000 to $315,000 in 1999. His financial disclosure restatements came only after the group's complaint."
--Doug Ross, Draining the Swamp

Mollohan has said such reports as the one above are made by "national political operatives who are desperate to unseat me because I refused to let the House Republican leadership gut the House ethics process last year.” [Wikipedia]

The Republican leadership didn’t “gut the House ethics process”, but apparently Democrat Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, did. Mollohan was forced to step down from his ethics committee chair after more “desperate reports”.

Pelosi now faces the challenge of whether to let West Virginia Democratic Congressman Alan Mollohan [that's his modest beach house ... can you say Duke Cunningham?] head the Appropriations subcommittee, which oversees the FBI, an organization which plans to spend part of the money Mollohan lets them have investigating Mollohan! Formerly the ranking Democrat on the House ethics committee — until his scandals forced him to step down — Mollohan has increased his assets from less than $500,000 in 2000 to more than $6.3 million in 2004. His investments, which generated less than $80,000 in 2000, reaped between $200,000 and $1.2 million in 2004.

How did he do it? He got federal funding earmarked for certain companies that his friends either owned or worked for, then got his buddies to pick up half the tab for joint real estate investments with him and his family. For example, he got FMW Composite Systems $4.4 million in earmarks and then teamed up with its CEO to buy a $900,000 farm, which the Mollohans and FMW’s chief split 50-50. The congressman told The New York Times that the thought that the deal might represent a conflict of interest “did not occur to me” when he — literally — bought the farm.
–Another Dem Scandal

Did Speaker Pelosi “gut the House ethics process” by forcing Mollohan from his House Ethics Committee chair?

Readers are invited to call the Congressman’s office and find out for themselves.

MOLLOHAN’S OFFICE
PHONE: 202-225-4172
FAX: 202-225-7564

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The Alan Mollohan Way

How did Alan Mollohan acquire the millions now listed on his financial disclosure forms? Mollohan said it was his inheritance and his wife’s business savvy.

Others point to “The Mollohan Way”.

Starting in the 1990s, Rep. Alan B. Mollohan (D-W.Va.) chose an unusual way to funnel federal funds into his poverty-ridden district. He set up a network of nonprofit organizations to administer the millions of dollars he directed to such public endeavors as high-tech research and historic preservation.

Over the same period, Mollohan’s personal fortunes soared. From 2000 to 2004, his assets grew from no more than $565,000 to at least $6.3 million. The partners in his rapidly expanding real estate empire included the head of one of these nonprofit groups and the owner of a local company for which he arranged substantial federal aid.

Mollohan used his seat on the House Appropriations Committee to secure more than $150 million for five nonprofit groups. One of the groups is headed by a former aide with whom Mollohan bought $2 million worth of property on Bald Head Island, N.C.
–West Virginia Democrat is Scrutinized

As stated earlier, Mollohan now reports his personal net worth as being in excess of $21 million.

Questions in Washington have been raised about why millions of dollars of federal money have been steered toward non-profit groups supportive of U.S. Rep. Alan Mollohan. But voters in the 12-term Democrat’s West Virginia district don’t seem to care too much.
–TIME: Campaign ‘06: Pork Trumps Scandal in West Virginia

But at least one of Mollohan’s real estate deals have not turned out to his liking.

A North Carolina county court has begun a foreclosure on coastal property owned by Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.) due to “default in the payment of the indebtedness” on the property.

Mollohan had been criticized for purchasing several lots on Bald Head Island, a North Carolina beach resort, with Laura Kuhns, a former Mollohan staffer who now runs a West Virginia nonprofit that has received millions of dollars in earmarks from the Congressman.

On his most recent financial disclosure form, Mollohan listed his 50 percent share of the Bald Head Island lot as being worth $250,000 to $500,000, with a mortgage worth $100,000 to $250,000. Mollohan reports a minimum net worth of about $4.1 million.
–Mollohan Property Faces Foreclosure

How did Alan Mollohan come to own the beachfront property?

The lot was one of five properties co-owned by the Mollohans and Kuhnses that have been part of a controversy that prompted an on-going Justice Department investigation, and Mollohan’s resignation as Ranking Member on the House Ethics Committee in 2006.

Kuhns is President and CEO of Vandalia Heritage Foundation, one of five nonprofits to which Mollohan has earmarked well over $100 million. The cozy relationships between Mollohan and his earmark recipients, against the backdrop of a rapid increase in Mollohan’s net worth, created the appearance that Mollohan is benefitting personally from the earmarks.
–Mollohan Scandal Property Goes to Foreclosure

Does everything look as it should involving these transactions?

Why not call the Congressman’s office and see what he thinks?

MOLLOHAN’S OFFICE
PHONE: 202-225-4172
FAX: 202-225-7564

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How goes it today with Rep. Mollohan?

FROM The 15 Most Corrupt:

First-timers on the 2009 list are Senators Roland Burris and John Ensign, as well as Congressmen Nathan Deal, Jesse Jackson, Jr. and Pete Visclosky. Twelve of the 15 are under investigation of some kind: Vern Buchanan, Burris, Ken Calvert, Ensign, Jackson, Jerry Lewis, Alan Mollohan, John Murtha, Charlie Rangel, Laura Richardson, Visclosky and Don Young. Calvert, Lewis, Mollohan and Murtha made the CREW list for the fourth year in a row.

–15 Most Corrupt Members of Congress

In case readers may think that the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (who publishes the Most Corrupt list) is a “right wing attack group”, seven of the 15 Most Corrupt are Republicans; eight are Democrats.

If Alan Mollohan has so many questionable associations and money ties, why hasn’t he been indicted or charged?

But Ken Boehm, chairman of the NLPC, told the Sunday News-Register that he isn’t concerned there have been no announcements from either agency pertaining to Mollohan.

He noted that the federal case against former Democratic Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich took more than five years before charges were announced. The case was expedited when Blagojevich, who was to appoint the successor to President Obama’s former Senate seat, allegedly was found to be offering the seat for financial profit to himself.
–Mollohan Under Fire

Oh.

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But Congressman Mollohan remains philosophical about the charges.

“I would have done things differently,” he said as he drove through West Virginia’s northern panhandle. “It puts you in a position where people could say there’s something untoward going on.”
–Alan Mollohan, from West Virginia Democrat is Scrutinized

As mentioned above, Mollohan was named one “The 15 most corrupt members of Congress” by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW).

Over the past ten plus years, Rep. Mollohan has earmarked $369 million in federal grants to his district for 254 separate programs. Between 1997 and 2006, $250 million of that total was directed to five nonprofit organizations that were created by Rep. Mollohan and staffed by his friends. During the same period, top-paid employees, board members and contractors of these organizations gave at least $397,122 to Rep. Mollohan’s campaign and political action committees.
CREW Report on Alan Mollohan–

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ALAN MOLLOHAN: VICTIM?

Is Alan Mollohan, whose personal wealth has skyrocketed over the last several years, a victim?

That’s how the Congressman has tried to portray his mounting legal defense fees: it was not his own actions which brought about his legal troubles, it was the “claims of a right-wing group” that there “were irregularities”.

Through a spokesman, Rep. Mollohan gave us the following statement: “The legal expenses were incurred in responding to the claims of a right-wing group in Washington that there were irregularities in my financial disclosure documents. That resulted in the preparation and public release of an extensive financial disclosure report and analysis last June. That work debunked the claims and the accompanying innuendos.”
–Under FBI Scrutiny, Mollohan Runs up $160K Legal Bill

Debunked?

Today, Alan Mollohan remains “under investigation”.

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“Democratic Congressman Alan Mollohan and Nick Joe Rahall of West Virginia are both in favor of Obamacare.”
–Obamacare lacks the votes

Is the reader a resident of Mollohan’s 1st Congressional District? If the answer is “yes” and is in favor of ObamaCare, then let the Congressman know.

If the reader is a resident and the answer is “no”, then perhaps the Congressman would like to know about that too.

MOLLOHAN’S OFFICE
PHONE: 202-225-4172
FAX: 202-225-7564

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Here it is: almost at the end of 2009. For the last four years, Alan Mollohan has been named one of the Most Corrupt politicians in Washington. His net worth has skyrocketed during the last decade: some would say by corrupt practices; Mollohan would assert that it’s because he married a girl with a knack for real estate.

As was mentioned, most of the residents of West Virginia’s 1st Congressional District are working class people: some with families, all with the daily challenges of life pressing upon them. It’s likely that most don’t know everything that their Congressman has been up to in Washington.

This article would hope to help them out by providing some information that’s freely available. Perhaps this article will pique the curiosity of some of those voters into doing a bit of research for themselves about their representative, Alan Bowlby Mollohan.

In a little over a year, the Congressman will face a contested election: one of the few he’s had in his thus far fortunate political career.

The people who vote in Mollohan’s district will have to decide what’s more important to them in that 2010 contest.

A congressman they’ve grown accustomed to or a newcomer whose wife probably doesn’t know nearly as much about investing in real estate as Mrs. Mollohan.

Was TIME magazine correct in their 2006 assessment referred to earlier?

In West Virginia’s 1st Congressional District, does ‘pork trump scandal’?

UPDATE @ 1455 10-28-09: A change: Don Surber is an editorial writer with the Charleston Daily Mail….once upon a time he was a reporter. Even though Don’s been editorializing for awhile now, this writer was still stuck in the past. That’s EVIL–as Don would score it.

by Mondo Frazier
images:
* swamp: Doug Ross
* pimp: http://www.babble.com
* WV1: en.wikipedia.org
* most corrupt, under investigation: http://www.crewsmostcorrupt.org

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