Jeb! and the Bush Crime Family

The Inside Story of an American Dynasty

Roger Stone, Saint John Hunt

• Publisher: Skyhorse
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781510706750
• Topic: Política y relaciones internacionales
• Subtopic: Gobierno estadounidense

"This book is very tough." - President Donald Trump Jeb and the Bush Crime Family is the book that smashes through the layers of lies and secrecy that has surrounded and protected our country's very own political dynasty. New York Times bestselling author and legendary political insider, Roger Stone lashes out with a blistering indictment that exposes the true history and monumental hypocrisy of the Bushes. In his usual "go for the jugular" style, Stone collaborates with Saint John Hunt—author, musician, and son of legendary CIA operative E. Howard Hunt—to make this a "no-holds-barred" history of the Bush family.The authors reveal Jeb to be a smug, entitled autocrat who both uses and hides behind his famous name as he mingles with international drug peddlers. They show how Jeb: Received a $4 million taxpayer bailout when his daddy was Vice President
Used his insider status to make millions from Obamacare
Avoided criminal prosecution on a fraudulent Federal loan
Hypocritically supports the War on Drugs, despite his own shocking drug historyAfter detailing the vast litany of Jeb's misdeeds, Stone travels back to Samuel, Prescott, George H. W., and George W. Bush to weave an epic story of privilege, greed, corruption, drug profiteering, assassination, and lies. Jeb and the Bush Crime Family will have you asking, "Why aren't these people in prison?"

PART 1

JOHN ELLIS BUSH (AKA “JEB”)

CHAPTER 1

JEB, THE LATEST CONTENDER

My dad is the greatest man alive. If anyone disagrees, we’ll go outside.

—Jeb on his father, former president George H. W. Bush.i

Jeb Bush aims to make the Bushes the first family ever to produce three presidents. Perhaps most alarming would be the proximity with which the three men would serve their terms. If Jeb Bush were to be elected in 2016, there will have been more Bush than non-Bush presidents (Clinton and Obama) since George H. W. Bush’s election in 1988. Even more frightening is that some are already discussing the path to the White House for Jeb’s son, George P. Bush, who was elected Texas land commissioner in January 2015.2 It’s a scary prospect that eerily resembles the political system that our country’s founders were fighting to escape.

Of all the Bush gang, John Ellis (or just plain ol’ “Jeb,” as he’d prefer voters to think of him) is perhaps the worst, selling his family’s influence the most and serving the public the least. He is the Bush who personifies the lust for power and wealth the most. No matter how much money and influence Jeb gets, it’s never enough.

We all live with an understanding that the pampered elite will always have privileges, opportunities, and even exemption from punishment of misdeeds that most of us simply do not have. But most of these elite are not running for president of the United States. In the crowded field of Republican candidates for 2016, Jeb’s family history and establishment connections in the party and throughout the nation make him unique.

Americans abhor a hypocrite more than anything else in politics. Republicans think of their party as standing for law and order, equality of opportunity, equal justice, and preserving American culture. Jeb has lived his life following exactly the opposite of these ideals. Republican primary voters, and all voters, need to know about Jeb’s history of arrogant hypocrisy.

Oddly, Jeb the Republican presidential hopeful has said that the president he most admires is Lyndon B. Johnson.3 What does Jeb most admire about LBJ? Is it LBJ’s contempt for the rule of law or his constant efforts to expand the reach of the federal government? Jeb said, “He went and he cajoled, he begged, he threatened, he loved, he hugged, he did what leaders do, which is they personally get engaged to make something happen.” This vague description of LBJ’s deal-making abilities is troubling, because LBJ’s way of operating was famously unethical and led to a massive expansion of the U.S. as a welfare state, through the passage of the Great Society and War on Poverty legislation. Jeb admires LBJ for twisting enough arms to get massive government expansion through Congress. Republican primary voters should be very disturbed by Jeb’s admiration. But in the context of Jeb’s life and record, his admiration for the bully and government-expander LBJ makes perfect sense.

Like LBJ, Jeb is a Big Government man. Although his Florida backers assure us he governed as a conservative, Jeb’s actions and policies have actually warned us that, like his brother George W. Bush, he will spend like crazy and expand the government even further.

Jeb is a fan of higher taxes, too. His dad won over grassroots conservatives in 1988 with his famous “Read my lips–no new taxes” pledge only to break that pledge at the urging of White House Chief of Staff John Sununu and Jim Baker aide Dick Darman (who hated to be described that way.) A former aide to Elliot Richardson, Darman worked against the conservative agenda in the Reagan and Bush White Houses. Conservative author M. Stanton Evans correctly called the day Bush signed the tax increase “The end of Reaganism.” It planted the seeds of Bush’s defeat in 1992. Yet Jeb defended the tax increase as, “the right thing to do.” Together, Bush 41 and Bush 43 are responsible for 72 percent of our massive federal debt. Big Government man Jeb will continue the Bush spending spree if he gets to the Oval Office.

Jeb’s own record tells us he’s no fiscal conservative. During his eight years in the governor’s mansion in Florida, spending skyrocketed. The Cato Institute noted that Florida general fund spending “increased from $18.0 billion to $28.2 billion during those eight years, or 57%” and that “total state spending increased from $45.6 billion to $66.1 billion, or 45%.”4 There is no reason to think his appetite for big spending would be any different in the White House.

Although Peter Baker of the New York Times reported in a breathless page one story that “Jeb isn’t W,”5 he’d spend at least as much. In terms of personality type, Baker was correct. Jeb is his mother’s son—entitled, arrogant, and vindictive. As Michael Barbaro pointed out in the Times, Jeb masked his stridency and arrogance in his second bid for governor, but as S. V. Date showed in his classic book Jeb–America’s Next Bush,6 Jeb as governor was authoritarian, secretive, imperial, and skirted the law. But on policy, there is evidence that Jeb is W. Jeb never opposed expansion of the size and scope of government, wild spending, and mushrooming federal deficits. A hypocrite on social issues and a fiscal liberal, Jeb is gung-ho for the civil liberties–eroding Patriot Act and the failed War on Drugs.

The notion of Jeb as a successful, savvy businessman is absurd. Every dime he has was made by trading on family connections or the family name. He functioned as a de facto lobbyist for both the corrupt health care company IMC as well as housing builder Camilio Padrera, lobbying Cabinet members for administrative favors while carefully cloaking his compensation as “real estate fees.”7

Virtually every one of Jeb’s failed business enterprises is a carried interest in which he put up no cash but used his family name and connections to secure loans, financing, waivers, or other financially significant benefits. No less than five of Bush’s former partners in these endeavors are in jail.

Bush served on the board of Innovita, a Ponzi scheme run by Claudio Osorio. Osorio got a $10 million loan from the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) with the assistance of Bill and Hillary Clinton, whom he lavished with campaign contributions. At the same time, he paid Bush $460,000. When the entire phony enterprise collapsed, Bush grudgingly was forced to return $250,000.

Jeb Bush and his partner also got a $4 million federal bailout courtesy of the taxpayers when his father was vice president. When the S&L that loaned Bush $4.5 million failed, the office building that secured the loan was reappraised with a new value of $500,000, allowing Bush and his partner to walk out on a $4 million debt and keep the building.

Where Jeb has really made significant money is in “consulting” and big dollar honorariums for speeches. “Consulting” is a euphemism among political elites for “fixing.”

Whether it’s using drugs, connections to drug traffickers, or walking out on a $4.5 million loan, Jeb Bush pays no penalty and suffers no consequences. Jeb Bush says he is going to Washington to “fight the pampered elites.”8 The evidence shows he is the pampered elite.

Waiting for the Dough to Rise

In an interview on NBC’s Today show in April of 2013, Barbara Bush was asked how she felt about Jeb seeking the presidency in 2016. She replied, “We’ve had enough Bushes.”

She went on to say she thought there were many worthy candidates, telling anchor Matt Lauer, “There are people out there” who are qualified.9 But by February of 2015, Barbara reversed her opinion, telling the press, “I changed my mind.”10 By then, Jeb claimed to be exploring a run but was actually well into a tremendous fundraising effort that worried many campaign finance watchdogs.

By the time he officially declared his candidacy, which was a foregone conclusion, he had already raised millions, including some major support from Wall Street.11

Jeb Bush waited quite a long time—until June 2015—to declare his candidacy so that he could raise unlimited funds for his Right to Rise Super PAC as a non-candidate for as long as possible. As an actual candidate, Bush’s direct source of funds is limited to $2,700 per person per election.12

Everyone knew Jeb was going to run, despite his insistence that he was trying to decide from December 2014 until June. During those six months, he gave campaign-style speeches and visited Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina, courting the wealthiest donors and best political talent in the country, and resigning from several corporate boards that pose potential conflicts of interest. He raised tens of millions of dollars, but still failed to gain any traction in the polls.

Watchdog groups were dismayed. Jeb’s gaming of the system seemed to violate the spirit, if not the letter, of campaign finance law. “It’s one of the great charades of American politics,” said Fred Wertheimer of Washington-based Democracy 21. “It’s simply thumbing your nose at the American people and saying, ‘We’re shrewd, we’re going to circumvent these laws and you have to live by it.’”13

Paul S. Ryan of the Campaign Legal Center said: “The Supreme Court has recognized that a check above $2,700 directly to someone who admits they are a candidate could corrupt them and therefore can be limited. But we’re to believe that the corruptive potential is miraculously washed from a $100,000 contribution handed to Jeb Bush for his Super PAC. It’s absurd.”

Jeb’s advisers said he could have directly asked for money at the Super PAC events, but chose not to. That’s a ridiculous claim. Why would Jeb need to ask people who have already donated thousands of dollars for tickets to attend his event to give him money?

The website for Bush’s conventional Right to Rise PAC, ostensibly set up to help other Republican candidates and limited to $5,000 individual donations, featured Bush’s picture and his political message. The website didn’t mention Bush as a candidate at the time.14

Jeb’s family connections had already given him a distinct advantage over the other GOP candidates and could yet win him the presidency. His skirting of campaign finance law is just another example of Bush dynasty entitlement. Despite criticism, there were no consequences.

Ana Navarro—Quintessential Bushie

The Bushies—blind followers of the Bush dynasty—are everywhere. They populate the radio and TV airwaves as supposedly unbiased pundits. They write opinion pieces across all the major newspapers and websites. But now they even inhabit daytime television—Ana Navarro was recently named a paid contributor on The View.

Navarro has been a longtime public supporter of Jeb Bush’s presidential campaign. As a frequent pundit on the Sunday talk shows and CNN, Navarro has tried to rationalize Jeb’s early disappointing poll numbers and sinking campaign. She was one of the early public backers in 2014 of a Jeb candidacy and tried to wash away the notion that after the failed presidency of his brother W., the American electorate would not welcome another Bush.

Like Jeb, Navarro is consumed by pro-Latin racial politics. Born in Nicaragua, Navarro ties her culture into her political affairs. She served as the national co-chair of John McCain’s Hispanic Advisory Council where she was a national surrogate for the failed McCain 2008 campaign. She next worked as the national Hispanic co-chair for Gov. Jon Huntsman’s 2012 campaign. (Incidentally, Jeb Bush Jr. endorsed Huntsman in 2012.15)

Navarro is described as a “confidante” of Jeb Bush during her CNN appearances. The New York Times has explained that “her rollicking commentary and willingness to criticize Republicans on same-sex marriage and immigration issues make her a favorite of TV bookers.”16 She does the Democratic Party’s dirty work.

Navarro frequently spars with conservative pundits who support Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, and especially Donald Trump. Navarro scorns Trump so much that during the September 2015 CNN Reagan Library Debate, Navarro refused to attend a private dinner hosted by Wolf Blitzer because CNN contributor Jeffrey Lord, former Reagan political director and also a public supporter of Donald Trump’s candidacy, was attending.

In a September 2015 CNN column, Navarro declared that she would only vote Republican in 2016 as long as the “Republicans do not end up nominating someone I consider borderline insane or a total jerk(.)” Navarro next proclaimed that she hope...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword by Congressman John LeBoutillier
• Introduction by Roger Stone
• The Bush Family CV
• A Dynasty of Duplicity
• Part 1: John Ellis Bush (aka “Jeb”)
• Part 2: Samuel and Prescott Bush
• Part 3: George Herbert Walker Bush (aka “Poppy”)
• Part 4: George W. Bush (aka “Dubya”)
• Part 5: The Bush-Clinton Connection
• Epilogue
• Appendix
• Endnotes
• Bibliography
• Index
• Photo Insert