Buck McKeon's Long Record Of Corruption Is Finally Coming Home To Roost-- Caught Taking Massive Bribes From Countrywide

For career criminal Darrell Issa to set loose the hounds of hell on a senior Republican colleague-- in this case, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon-- the preponderance of evidence of criminal wrongdoing had to be absolutely overwhelming. DWT has been reporting on McKeon's startlingly brazen corruption for years, but suddenly the Wall Street Journal and the Associated Press are sniffing around to see where the ghastly stink in the House is coming from. And, worse for him, so are the local newspapers in his district.

U.S. Reps. Howard “Buck” McKeon, R-Santa Clarita, and Elton Gallegly, R-Simi Valley, received discounted mortgage loans from the now-defunct Countrywide Financial Corp. under a VIP program, a congressional official said Friday.

The congressional official, who spoke with the Associated Press, was not authorized to speak publicly about the loans and requested anonymity. The loans were first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has been investigating whether members of Congress received discounts from a Countrywide VIP program with some of the favored customers known as “Friends of Angelo”-- a reference to chief executive Angelo Mozilo.

The Associated Press reported previously that four House members had received the discounts. One of the four remains unidentified publicly.

Records show that Rep. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., also received discounts. Towns told the AP previously that he was not aware of receiving any discounts.

McKeon and Gallegly told the Journal that they also were not aware of receiving discounted loans and did not know their mortgages were processed by the VIP unit.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the oversight committee, informed both lawmakers that documents received from Bank of America-- it bought Countrywide-- showed they went through the special unit.

Issa has sent the information to the House Ethics Committee, which determines whether House members violated standards of conduct. A discounted loan could be considered a gift. Gifts are virtually banned under House rules.

None of the lawmakers has been accused by the ethics panel of any wrongdoing, and may never be if they convince investigators they had no knowledge of the discounts.

“When Buck heard this (from Issa) he was shocked,” McKeon Communications Director Alissa McCurley told The Signal. “(McKeon) did not know of a VIP loan program. He has never met Angelo; he has never spoken with Angelo.”

The Journal said the 1998 loan to McKeon, who is chairman of the Armed Services Committee, totaled $315,000. Gallegly’s 2005 loan totaled $77,000 in 2005.

“He’s trying to get to the bottom of this,” McCurley said about McKeon after he learned from Issa that his loan went through the special unit at Countrywide. “He’s really angry about this.”

Countrywide was the nation’s largest mortgage company and played a major role in the U.S. financial crisis by issuing subprime loans.

Countrywide’s Mozilo in 2010 agreed to more than $67 million in penalties in a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

This may help to explain why Gallegly announced his retirement last week. But it'll be up to the voters in the newly redrawn 25th CD to retire McKeon. He's not going anywhere voluntarily. The new district would have elected Obama narrowly over McCain in 2008. It did give an edge to Whitman over Brown in the gubernatorial race, though, so it really is a bit of a swing district. Dr. Lee Rogers is the Democratic opponent, and he's giving McKeon a very rough time already. You can help his grassroots campaign against one of the last of Los Angeles' radical right holdovers here at the DownWithTyranny ActBlue page. Dr. Rogers announced today that “We’re calling on Representative McKeon to release his mortgage documents so that the public can see the terms and determine for themselves if they believe McKeon when he says he ‘had no inkling’ he was receiving preferential treatment.” He also sent a letter to the House Ethics committee asking for an investigation. The letter points out that McKeon also received over $12,000 in campaign contributions from Countrywide and Bank of America PACs since his 1998 loan. “How can we trust our legislators who are supposed to be watching out for their constituents when they’re taking financial favors and turning a blind eye to egregious predatory lending by some in the financial services industry?" he asked.

By the way, this Countrywide Mortgage scam is far from the only blemish on McKeon's record, to put in mildly. We've mostly concentrated on his bribe-taking from corporations doing business before his committee, student lenders before, war industries now. But there's a whole other financial scandal that's brewing as well, one that involves the way he's trying to force his equally corrupt, if clueless, wife down the throats of voters and into the state Assembly. I guess someone should send the Really Patricia website along to the House Ethics Committee-- and to Issa. It's as shocking and detailed an account of McKeon's out-of-control corruption as I've seen.