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| SEIU's Dave Kieffer |
A top SEIU official who was involved in SEIU's cover-up of
the Tyrone Freeman corruption
scandal has been ousted from his job, according to two sources.
The official, David
Kieffer, was removed from his position as the Executive Director of the
SEIU California State Council, a
lobbying group that spends tens of millions of dollars of SEIU members' money
on political efforts.
The removal of Kieffer comes as a jury in a federal
courtroom deliberates on whether to convict Freeman on more than a dozen felony
counts, including embezzlement and theft of union assets. SEIU hasn't offered
an explanation for Kieffer's removal. One source says it's a result of turf
battles between SEIU-UHW's Dave Regan
and other SEIU officials in the Golden State. They say Kieffer's firing will be
publicly described as a "resignation."
How is Kieffer linked to the Freeman scandal?
Back in 2001, Kieffer was a high-level official inside
SEIU's Washington, DC headquarters when a second SEIU official -- Jim Philliou -- discovered widespread
corruption by Freeman. At the time, Philliou was responsible for reviewing and
co-signing checks written by Freeman. That's how Phillou discovered that
Freeman was funneling large amounts of money to his relatives through fake contracts.
Philliou then informed top SEIU officials such as Eliseo Medina, Tom Woodruff... and Dave
Kieffer, according to Phillou's sworn
testimony. Here's an excerpt from Philliou's testimony. (Here are 14 pages from Philliou’s testimony.)
Attorney: Did you have conversations with anybody else who was working with SEIU International staff about those concerns?Philliou: David Kieffer, K-i-e-f-f-e-r.Attorney: When we talked earlier about your having given information to Sheila Velasco in 2001 -- April, May of 2001 concerning your discomfort about continuing to sign or cosign checks on the 6434 account, you also said that you spoke with Dave Kieffer. In what month did you speak with Dave Kieffer?Philliou: I recall to be in the summer.Attorney: Summer 2001?Philliou: Correct.
And that’s not all. Kieffer was apparently involved in the
cover-up that SEIU officials launched in 2001 to hide Freeman's embezzlement
from SEIU's members and the public. According to Philliou, Kieffer spread reports
about a so-called SEIU "audit" that concluded that Freeman was
somehow "clean." Of course, we know that's impossible -- the precise
acts of embezzlement that Philliou discovered in 2001 are the ones at the
center of SEIU's corruption scandal. Here's more of Philliou's testimony about
Kieffer and the cover-up:
Attorney: Do you know whether that audit took place?Philliou: I don't know firsthand.Attorney: You don't know?Philliou: I don't have any firsthand knowledge.Attorney: Did anybody tell you the audit had been conducted?Philliou: David Kieffer.Attorney: And what, if anything, did Dave Kieffer say to you in response to your concerns when you first approached him about what was going on at 6434?Philliou: He told me later that there had been some type of audit and the expenditures were, quote, "questionable but legal," end quote.
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| SEIU's Rickman Jackson |
As Tasty noted earlier, it’s unclear whether Kieffer was
offed because of his links to the Freeman scandal. However, the timing of Kieffer’s
firing raises interesting questions. If Freeman is convicted, will SEIU feel
more responsibility to launch a full-scale investigation into all of the SEIU
officials who aided and abetted Freeman for so many years?
For example, Freeman’s Chief of Staff -- Rickman
Jackson -- was neck-deep in the corruption and even admitted to
stealing more than $30,000 from SEIU’s members. Nonetheless, SEIU President
Mary Kay Henry gave him a fatcat position inside the Purple Palace where he
earns a six-figure salary. He's still on SEIU's payroll today.
And SEIU’s Steve Trossman
reportedly played a pivotal role in SEIU’s cover-up operation by waging an
effort to suppress any word of the scandal from leaking out to the public and
law-enforcement authorities. At the time, Trossman served as the Director of
Communications in SEIU's DC headquarters. In 2009, SEIU paid Trossman
$120,000 in suspected “hush
money” apparently disguised as “consulting fees” in federal records.
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| SEIU's Steve Trossman |
Will SEIU attempt to actually clean its corruption-stained
house? Or are SEIU’s top officials -- including SEIU’s President Mary Kay Henry, President Emeritus Andy Stern and Secretary-Treasurer Eliseo Medina -- so deeply involved in
the corruption scandal that an investigation would jeopardize their jobs?
