Franken Wins Bipartisan Support For Legislation Reining In KBR’s Treatment Of Rape
Franken Wins Bipartisan Support For Legislation Reining In KBR’s Treatment Of Rape
In 2005, Jamie Leigh Jones was gang-raped by her co-workers while she was working for Halliburton/KBR in Baghdad. She was detained in a shipping container for at least 24 hours without food, water, or a bed, and “warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she’d be out of a job.” (Jones was not an isolated case.) Jones was prevented from bringing charges in court against KBR because her employment contract stipulated that sexual assault allegations would only be heard in private arbitration.
Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) proposed an amendment to the 2010 Defense Appropriations bill that would withhold defense contracts from companies like KBR “if they restrict their employees from taking workplace sexual assault, battery and discrimination cases to court.” Speaking on the Senate floor yesterday, Franken said:
The constitution gives everybody the right to due process of law … And today, defense contractors are using fine print in their contracts do deny women like Jamie Leigh Jones their day in court. … The victims of rape and discrimination deserve their day in court [and] Congress plainly has the constitutional power to make that happen.
Watch Franken’s speech:
On the Senate floor, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) spoke against the amendment, calling it “a political attack directed at Halliburton.” Franken responded, “This amendment does not single out a single contractor. This amendment would defund any contractor that refuses to give a victim of rape their day in court.”
In the end, Franken won the debate. His amendment passed by a 68-30 vote, earning the support of 10 Republican senators including that of newly-minted Florida Sen. George LeMieux. “He did what a senator should do, which was he was working it,” LeMieux said in praise of Franken. “He was working for his amendment.”
Appearing with Franken after the vote, an elated Jones expressed her deep appreciation. “It means the world to me,” she said of the amendment’s passage. “It means that every tear shed to go public and repeat my story over and over again to make a difference for other women was worth it.”
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Soldiers Accuse KBR Of Knowingly Exposing Troops To Deadly Toxin In Iraq
Soldiers Accuse KBR Of Knowingly Exposing Troops To Deadly Toxin In Iraq
Controversial military contractor KBR has racked up quite a record of endangering the lives of U.S. soldiers serving in Iraq. Over the years, the former Halliburton subsidiary has been accused of everything from giving troops ice tainted with “traces of body fluids and putrefied remains” to ignoring warnings of unsafe wiring that led to troop deaths.
Earlier this month, attorneys for 16 members of the Indiana National Guard filed a lawsuit against the company, alleging that they “knowingly exposed the soldiers to a cancer-causing toxic chemical.” In a special report last night, CBS News revealed that KBR knew of the toxic exposure to hexavalent chromium long before it informed the guardsmen:
Now CBS News has obtained information that indicates KBR knew about the danger months before the soldiers were ever informed.
Depositions from KBR employees detailed concerns about the toxin in one part of the plant as early as May of 2003. And KBR minutes, from a later meeting state “that 60 percent of the people … exhibit symptoms of exposure,” including bloody noses and rashes.
Gentry says it wasn’t until the last day of August in 2003 – after four long months at the facility – that he was told the plant was contaminated.
Watch it:
After receiving a briefing on the case on Monday, Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN) told CBS that “KBR has a lot to answer for“:
“Look, I think the burden of proof at this point is on the company,” Bayh said. “To come forward and very forthrightly explain what happened, why we should trust them, and why the health and well-being of our soldiers should continue to be in their hands.”
In a statement to CBS, the company denied all charges, saying, “We deny the assertion that KBR harmed troops and was responsible for an unsafe condition.” According to CNN, “an estimated 275 American soldiers may have been exposed to the chemical” at the KBR water plant, “over a period of months through mid- to late-2003.”
Rice: No ‘American Money’ In Iraq Was Lost To Corruption
Rice: No ‘American Money’ In Iraq Was Lost To Corruption
In an AP interview yesterday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke highly of U.S. reconstruction efforts in Iraq, stating, “We’ve done a lot of work to get these [reconstruction] structures right, and I think they finally are” — a day after a scathing government report detailed massive waste and poor planning in U.S. reconstruction efforts. When asked about the abuse, Rice claimed that U.S. dollars have emerged unscathed:
Q: But the cost in terms of lives and in terms of the money and the abuse of money – (inaudible) was money wasted, there was money that was siphoned off, corruption and that kind of thing, you’re —
RICE: Not of American money. Not American money. I don’t think that you will find that anybody is arguing that there was corruption in the American programs.
Throughout the U.S. occupation of Iraq, billions in tax dollars have been lost due to corruption and incompetence. Some of the most egregious losses have been via “American programs”:
– The Coalition Provisional Authority delivered 363 tons of cash on an airplane, totaling $12 billion, to Iraq “without assurance the monies were properly used or accounted for.”
– The State Dept spent $36.4 million dollars on weapons and equipment that could not be accounted for because “invoices were vague and there was no backup documentation“.
– Top contractor KBR came under fire last year from government investigators for overpricing its contract by $2 billion, which, for example, included overstating labor costs by 51 percent.
– State Dept. employees testified in May 2008 that the U.S. “allowed corruption to fester at the highest levels of the Iraqi government,” resulting in the loss of billions in U.S. tax dollars.
The use of private contractors, a major source of the corruption, has skyrocketed under Bush. The government has spent $85 billion on contracts in Iraq and other countries in the first four years of the war. “Taxpayers have been bled dry with massive misuse of public dollars,” observed Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), who has spearheaded investigations into waste, fraud, and abuse in Iraq.
Thus far, some $50 billion in taxpayer dollars have been spent on the reconstruction of Iraq, which anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International listed as the third-most corrupt nation in the world.
KBR gave troops ice tainted with ‘traces of body fluids and putrefied remains.’
KBR gave troops ice tainted with ‘traces of body fluids and putrefied remains.’
A former technician who worked for contracting company KBR in Iraq has filed a class-action lawsuit saying the company “exposed everyone at Joint Base Balad in Iraq to unsafe water, food and hazardous fumes from the burn pit there.” Joshua Eller’s suit includes particularly disturbing charges about KBR’s indifference to proper sanatization and the disposal of human remains:
The lawsuit also accuses KBR of shipping ice in mortuary trucks that “still had traces of body fluids and putrefied remains in them when they were loaded with ice. This ice was served to U.S. forces.”
Eller also accuses KBR of failing to maintain a medical incinerator at Joint Base Balad, which has been confirmed by two surgeons in interviews with Military Times about the Balad burn pit. Instead, according to the lawsuit and the physicians, medical waste, such as needles, amputated body parts and bloody bandages were burned in the open-air pit.
“Wild dogs in the area raided the burn pit and carried off human remains,” the lawsuit states. “The wild dogs could be seen roaming the base with body parts in their mouths, to the great distress of the U.S. forces.”
Just yesterday, 16 Indiana National Guard soldiers sued the scandal-ridden company for knowingly allowing them to be exposed to a toxic chemical while serving in Iraq.
KBR lawsuit alleges ’slavery.’
KBR lawsuit alleges ’slavery.’
A Washington law firm filed a lawsuit yesterday against Iraq contractor KBR, “alleging that the company and its Jordanian subcontractor engaged in the human trafficking of Nepali workers,” the Washington Post reported today. The suit states that 13 Nepali men were recruited for kitchen work in Jordan only to have their passports seized upon arrival and “told they were being sent to a military facility in Iraq.” TPM Muckraker notes that the complaint calls these actions “slavery“:
160. Defendants’ actions as set forth above constitute the torts of trafficking in persons, involuntary servitude, forced labor, and slavery.
161. Trafficking in persons in a modern day form of slavery, and along with
involuntary servitude and forced labor constitutes a tort in violation of the law of nations and/or in violation of treaties of the United States.
Pentagon Attempted To Cover-Up KBR’s Negligence In Electrocution Of U.S. Soldier
Pentagon Attempted To Cover-Up KBR’s Negligence In Electrocution Of U.S. Soldier
On January 2, 2008, Army Staff Sergeant Ryan Maseth was electrocuted while taking a shower at the Legion Security Forces Building in Baghdad. Press reports have indicated that contractor KBR ignored repeated warnings about the unsafe wiring.
In memo to House Oversight Committee this week, Pentagon Inspector General Gordon Heddell claimed there was “no credible evidence” that either KBR or the DOD knew about the hazards beforehand. Information uncovered by the Committee, however, contradicts Heddell.
In a Committee hearing today, Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA) released a work order from July 8, 2007 –- months before Maseth’s death — in which Sergeant Justin Hummer, the previous occupant of the room, reported to KBR:
Pipes have voltage. Get shocked in shower.
Furthermore, in sworn testimony on June 6, 2008, Hummer said he was shocked at least four times in the shower between June and October 2007. In each case, KBR personnel tried to fix the hazard. Today, the Pentagon IG admitted he was wrong to claim KBR was not aware of the electrical danger:
WAXMAN: This seems to be credible evidence that KBR was aware of this hazard last July.
HEDDELL: I do agree with you, Mr. Chairman.
Watch it:
Waxman showed Heddell another document of “task orders” from the Pentagon “warning that Sgt. Hummer gets shocked in the shower.” Heddell quickly admitted that he was also wrong to exonerate the DOD:
WAXMAN: This document seems to be credible evidence that the Defense Department was aware of the problem as well. Do you agree?
HEDDELL: It would appear so, sir.
The majority staff report also notes that KBR official Thomas Bruni may have lied under oath. In prepared testimony, he claimed, “Though we cannot be certain who installed the water pump [that killed Maseth] we do know that KBR did not do so.” But a KBR work order from July 9, 2007 stated, “Replace pressure switch & water pump.”
“We have absolved no one,” Heddell said. “We never have, and not at this moment.”
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