Blue Dog leader in sweetheart real estate deal with Pharma campaign contributor

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Arkansas Rep. Mike Ross (D) – woo pig sooie! – is the leader of the Blue Dog Coalition of conservative (not "centrist") Democrats. He has been caught feeding at the trough of sweetheart real estate deals with a Pharma campaign contributor.

Now, these sweetheart real estate deals are hardly new nor limited to Blue Dog Democrats. This kind of thing has been going on in Washington forever. There have been other sweetheart real estate deals in the news in recent years. It is symptomatic of the corrupting influence of corporate lobbyist money in politics, something an activist U.S. Supreme Court is about to make worse by a hundred-fold (I will address this topic in a later post).

Marcus Stern of ProPublica reports in Politico Mike Ross raises eyebrows with healthy haul:

Arkansas Rep. Mike Ross — a Blue Dog Democrat playing a key role in the health care debate — sold a piece of commercial property in 2007 for substantially more than a county assessment and an independent appraisal say it was worth.

The buyer: an Arkansas-based pharmacy chain with a keen interest in how the debate plays out.

Ross sold Holly’s Health Mart in Prescott, Ark., to USA Drug for $420,000 — an eye-popping price for real estate in a tiny train and lumber town about 100 miles southwest of Little Rock.

“You can buy half the town for $420,000,” said Adam Guthrie, chairman of the county Board of Equalization and the only licensed real estate appraiser in Prescott.

But the $420,000 that USA Drug paid for the pharmacy’s building and land was just the beginning of what Ross and his wife, Holly, made from the sale of Holly’s Health Mart. USA Drug owner Stephen L. LaFrance Sr. also paid the Rosses $500,000 to $1 million for the pharmacy’s assets and paid Holly Ross an additional $100,000 to $250,000 for signing a noncompete agreement. Those numbers, which Mike Ross listed on the financial disclosure reports he files as a member of Congress, bring the total value of the transaction to between $1 million and $1.67 million.

And that’s not counting the $2,300 campaign contribution Ross received from LaFrance two weeks after the sale closed.

Health-related interests have donated $342,475 to Ross since 2007, according to federal campaign data maintained by the nonprofit Center for Responsive Politics. No other business sector has given Ross as much.

Rep. Ross issued a statement in response to the ProPublica report, which can be read in its entirety here Ross responds. Paul Steiger, editor-in-chief of ProPublica, responded to the congressman's statement:

“The issue here is not whether Rep. Ross filed the proper disclosure forms. Nor is it whether Rep. Ross earned a large or small return on his initial investment in the building. The issue is whether the Congressman received more on the sale of his building than someone without his power and influence would have received for selling this building. As we read his statement, Rep. Ross does not deny that he received significantly more than an arms-length fair-market price for the building—on top of the very considerable sums he and his wife received for selling and continuing to run the business.”

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Rep. Ross declined numerous requests for interviews over a two-month period to discuss the transaction in question. He still has not disclosed whether he has discussed the pending health care reform legislation with the buyer, who owns a large chain of drug stores and has a clear and pointed interest in the outcome of the health care legislation.

The Rachel Maddow Show does a full take down of Rep. Mike Ross in this segment. Transcript 'The Rachel Maddow Show' for Tuesday, September 22.