Greenpeace Calls for Congressional Investigation of Koch's Illegal Practices

This week, Bloomberg published a detailed expose: Koch Brothers Flout Law Getting Richer With Secret Iran Sales, revealing a startling array of allegations about Koch Industries bribing government officials around the world and doing business with Iran. The Koch Brothers' contempt for the communities and workers impacted by their reckless and polluting corporation has been well documented. But this new investigation reveals a blatant disregard for our laws, so today Greenpeace has called for a full Congressional investigation of Koch Industries and the illegal practices detailed in the Bloomberg report.

Here's the letter I sent today to key members of Congress:

Senator Lieberman and Congressman Issa:

In light of the recent Bloomberg Markets Magazine investigative report on Koch Industries' secretive business dealings with Iran, corruption and illicit payments in obtaining contracts, falsifying documents on air pollution and other questionable business operations, we call on you to launch a full congressional investigation into the practices exposed in the report.

The allegations reported by Bloomberg about Koch's business deals with Iran, run through a German subsidiary, are similar to the arrangements discovered between Halliburton and Iran, which were conducted through overseas subsidiaries, in a manner designed to skirt the letter of the law and thereby undermine U.S. foreign policy objectives.

Corporations like Koch Industries are granted the right to operate as a business under U.S. law. When corporations choose to routinely circumvent or break the law, our government has the duty to penalize that illegal activity with appropriate sanctions. When the corporation's illegal activities demonstrate a broad pattern of deliberate continued violations despite repeated sanctions and penalties -- it becomes incumbent upon the government to take more aggressive action, such as revoking the corporate charter that allows them to continue to operate as a business.

We are calling for a full investigation into Koch Industries' alleged activities, such that our representatives, government officials and the citizens of the United States have full knowledge of their illicit business practices and can decide on the appropriate course of action.

Sincerely,

Phillip Radford
Executive Director
Greenpeace USA

CC: Rep. Henry Waxman, Senator John Kerry, Senator Chuck Grassley, Senator Carl Levin, Senator Patrick Leahy

 

Follow Philip Radford on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Phil_Radford

Comments

[ANGEL53545]

05:42 PM on 10/05/2011

where's the proof? only allegations.

[pixeloid]

12:08 AM on 10/06/2011

That's why there's a call for an investigation: to find proof.

[gabriel72]

11:35 AM on 10/11/2011

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koch_Industries#Environmental_and_safety_record

[LA is Great]

03:22 PM on 10/05/2011

Hey Greenpeace what about going after GE! GE exports US jobs and aggressively sucks at the taxpayer teat. How’s it doing on our economic and national security? Not so good. GE recently inked a deal with a Chinese government-owned aviation company that will transfer advanced GE knowhow to the Chinese communist party and Chinese military – yes, the folks with nukes pointed at our cities. As the NY Times reports it: This is a REAL concern!

http://www.toughloveforamerica.com/government-control-vs-freedom/big-government-dc-scam/obamas-guy-immelt-exports-us-jobs-as-ge-gives-tech-secrets-to-chinese-government/

[alvdh1]

01:36 PM on 10/05/2011

Revoking a coporate charter for illegal activities and gross polluting does not go far enough. Getting hard time for wrongful activites is long over due. Jail time for the Koch brothers would send an important message to the white collar world about their illegal activities.

http://archives.cbc.ca/environment/pollution/clips/14409/ Great Video

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/eu-seeks-power-to-jail-polluters-under-new-environmental-laws-435483.html

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1999-08-17/news/9908170279_1_sentence-bay-drum-plea

http://www.wcel.org/resources/environmental-law-alert/fines-jail-time-and-polluters

[Ginzu Mawa]

01:27 PM on 10/05/2011

Given the civil damages they settled, one might expect a criminal investigation is warrented - unless that was part of some deal.

WHen is green peace coming out with a shopping app for cell phones? If my cell phone had a bar code scanner hooked up to a greenpeace wiki page - i could find out the ecological impact of each product as part of my purchase decision.