Have The Kochs Earned The Right To Pollute With Impunity?

Charles and David Koch’s interest in criminal justice reform began in the 1990s, when they were caught polluting at a Texas refinery. Bridge Project’s report on the Kochs criminal justice reform PR sham gets into the details, but, the main takeaway, is that the Kochs’ push for reform has always been about helping themselves.

The latest evidence comes in the form of a new GOP bill in the House of Representatives which, according to the Huffington Post, “would decriminalize a broad swath of corporate malfeasance, a move that injects white-collar crime issues into the thus-far bipartisan agenda on criminal justice reform.”

More specifically, the legislation would actually go so far as to “eliminate a host of white-collar crimes where the damaging acts are merely reckless, negligent or grossly negligent. If enacted, it would make it more difficult for federal authorities to pursue executive wrongdoing, from financial fraud to environmental pollution.”

In other words, it protects corporate executives — yes, like Charles and David — who commit all variety of white-collar “damaging acts,” “from financial fraud to environmental pollution” — the latter of which got the two brothers into some hot water in the 90s, remember.

The push for expanded protections for high level corporate executives is nothing new for the Kochs. The Huffington Post reports, “some influential conservative voices, including the billionaire Koch brothers and the Heritage Foundation, have quietly advocated for curbing prosecution of corporate offenses as well.”

Because if anyone’s disadvantaged and needs more protection from legal abuse its the Koch brothers and their billionaire network of political influence-buyers.

Charles and David no doubt cannot wait to get back to polluting in peace.