Mike from Iowa notices that California Congressman Devin Nunes is suing Hearst Magazines and reporter Ryan Lizza for $75 million. Last month, Esquire published Lizza’s report on Rep. Nunes’s family’s big family milk-and-manure factory in Sibley, Iowa. Lizza says the Nunes family has tried to keep the California Congressman’s association with Iowa quiet. Lizza notes that in 2009, the family asked Iowa dairy reporter Jerry Nelson not to mention the Congressman in his Dairy Star story about about the Nuneses’ NuStar dairy:
He was upfront and clear about why Representative Nunes wasn’t included in the Dairy Star profile of the Nunes family and the move to Iowa: The family asked him not to mention Devin. “They said, ‘Our brother’s involved in politics and we’re not going to talk about it and that’s that,’ ” Nelson told me. “And I said, ‘Okay, we’re here to talk about dairy farms’” [Ryan Lizza, “Devin Nunes’s Family Farm Is Hiding a Politically Explosive Secret,” Esquire, 2019.09.30].
Lizza attempted to interview the Nuneses at the dairy but was immediately told to leave and threatened with legal action. Lizza attributed that hostility to the well-documented prevalence of undocumented laborers milking Midwestern cows and shoveling Midwestern manure:
Other dairy farmers in the area helped me understand why the Nunes family might be so secretive about the farm: Midwestern dairies tend to run on undocumented labor. The northwest-Iowa dairy community is small. Most of the farmers know one another, and most belong to a regional trade group called the Western Iowa Dairy Alliance (though WIDA told me NuStar is not a member). One dairy farmer said that the threat of raids from ICE is so acute that WIDA members have discussed forming a NATO-like pact that would treat a raid on one dairy as a raid on all of them. The other pact members would provide labor to the raided dairy until it got back on its feet.
In every conversation I had with dairy farmers and industry insiders in northwest Iowa, it was taken as a fact that the local dairies are wholly dependent on undocumented labor. The low unemployment rate (it’s 2 percent in Osceola County), the low profit margins in the dairy business, and the global glut of milk that keeps prices low make hiring outside of the readily available pool of immigrants from Mexico and Guatemala unthinkable.
“Eighty percent of the Latino population out here in northwest Iowa is undocumented,” estimated one dairy farmer in the area who knows the Nunes family and often sees them while buying hay in nearby Rock Valley. “It would be great if we had enough unemployed Americans in northwest Iowa to milk the cows. But there’s just not. We have a very tight labor pool around here.” This person said the system was broken, leaving dairy farmers no choice. “I would love it if all my guys could be legal” [Lizza, 2019.09.30].
Lizza reports being followed while in Sibley. He also reports word spreading around town to deter any residents from talking with him about the Nunes dairy or the immigrant labor force on which the dairy industry depends.
I had a particularly sensitive interview that afternoon with a source who I knew would be taking a risk by talking to me about immigration and labor at NuStar. When I arrived, we talked for a few minutes before the source’s cell phone suddenly rang. The conversation seemed strained. “Sí, aquí está,” the source said. I learned that on the other end of the phone was a man named Flavio, who worked at NuStar. Somehow Flavio knew exactly where I was and whom I was talking to. He warned my source to end the conversation. Not only was I being followed, but I was also being watched, and my sources were being contacted by NuStar [Lizza, 2019.09.30].
Rep. Nunes now claims Lizza’s reporting constitutes politically motivated defamation and common law conspiracy against him:
The congressman claims the article was an attempt to target him ahead of the 2018 Congressional election, to retaliate against him for “exposing corruption, including the DNC/Clinton campaign’s role in funding the salacious ‘Steele dossier,’” and to “interfere with his official duties as Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election.”
“The Lizza Hit Piece ascribes and imputes to Plaintiff conduct, characteristics and conditions, including dishonesty, deception, lying, conspiracy, corruption, bias, lack of integrity and ethics, that would adversely affect his fitness to be a United States Congressman and/or businessperson,” the 25-page complaint states. “The strong defamatory gist and false implication from the Lizza Hit Piece is that Plaintiff was involved in, covered-up, used his office to cover up, conspired with others to conceal, or was aware of criminal wrongdoing.”
Nunes is also suing Lizza and Hearst, which publishes Esquire, for common law conspiracy. He claims Lizza conspired with members of the media, including his girlfriend Olivia Nuzzi – who is New York Magazine’s Washington correspondent – to promote and republish the article on Twitter and elsewhere.
“In furtherance of the conspiracy and preconceived plan, Lizza engaged in a joint scheme with others the unlawful purpose of which was to injure Plaintiff’s personal and professional reputations, advance the left-wing goals of Nuzzi and Hearst, interfere with Plaintiff’s duties as a United States Congressman, and influence the outcome of the 2018 Congressional election,” the complaint states [Kelsey Jukam, “Devin Nunes Sues Reporter, Hearst for Article About Family’s Iowa Dairy,” Courthouse Service News, 2019.09.30].
The California Congressman appears to be on an anti-First Amendment lawsuit bender:
Nunes has filed several lawsuits this year, targeting publishing company McClatchy, the owner of The Fresno Bee, the largest paper in his congressional district, claiming he was defamed in a 2018 news story about a winery he co-owns that hosted a fundraising cruise on a yacht. The story, citing a lawsuit filed by a server aboard the cruise, stated that cocaine was used, investors solicited underage prostitutes and the server feared for her safety. Nunes, who was not aboard the cruise, labeled the story “character assassination” and filed a lawsuit, which the paper said it would contest.
He also sued Twitter and two online accounts that use satire to attack him — one known as Devin Nunes’ Cow, the other Devin Nunes’ Mom — as well as Liz Mair, a veteran Republican political adviser who has been critical of him, seeking $250 million. The lawsuit states that Nunes suffered “an orchestrated defamation campaign of stunning breadth and scope, one that no human should ever have to bear and suffer in their whole life” [Tom Lawrence, “Nunes Suing Journalist over Sibley Story,” NWestIowa.com, 2019.10.05].
I can assure Rep. Nunes that my blockquotes here and my highlighting of his and his Iowa dairy family’s apparent aversion to freedom of the press are not part of any orchestrated defamation campaign. My writing here arises from my own loathing of powerful politicians who seek to quash the free press.
Perhaps if the fascist Nunes sues, it will propel Dakota Free Press to viraldom.
When I was a journalist, I was one of the people sent to legal workshops on libel by the newspaper so that it was current on legal precedents to avoid committing it. Later as a teacher of journalism, I also kept abreast of developments. I read the Lizza article when it was published and noted that Lizza was very careful to document the information he was given so that it would fall under the main defense against libel, truth. However, Nunes is using a legal tactic of forcing an elaborate set of charges that is so expensive to defend against that defendants often accept settlements which are kept secret and do not produce any legal determinations about the validity of the libel case. When the Covington high school student’s parents sued the Washington Post for $250 million on 33 counts of libel, the judge dismissed the case because the Post comments were protected by the First Amendment. Nunes would have to prove the factual statements in Lizza’s account are false and uttered with malicious intent. But if judges of the kind appointed by Trump are involved, truth may not matter. https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/judge-dismisses-libel-suit-against-washington-post-brought-by-covington-catholic-high-school-student/2019/07/26/d02fd6ce-afd3-11e9-8e77-03b30bc29f64_story.html
This is happening all over America. I know of dairy farms in South Dakota that have Mexican workers (could be Latino or Guatamalan) I can’t say for certain. But I have seen them on the grounds. Are they legal? I also remember the story (and this was made public so I can say) the situation in Oacoma, SD where migrants were held “hostage” at a motel for labor and were undocumented. These instances are on a small scale here in this state. But think about all throughout America. It is a disgrace that Washington talks of a “wall” and congressman/women use undocumented laborers talking and preaching out of both sides of their mouths. It is hypocrisy. Shameful. Rep. Nunes should be called out.
This story interests me because my relatives farmed in the Sibley, IA, area. We still hold family reunions in one of the city parks. My brother and I inherited some of that land from my mother and sold it to one of my uncles. My uncles are too old now to do the work, so they rent out their land. It’s an area settled by many related German and Dutch families who chain migrated into the area in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The Mexicans and Guatemalans who work in the dairies are doing what the Germans and Dutch did, except they have little hope of reaching for the American dream. Farmland is more and more being bought up by a landed aristocracy, and the immigrants will probably remain little more than modern slaves unable to afford to buy a stake in a small dairy or farm.
The article researched and written by Lizza is a great piece of journalism. Read it. The Nunes’ paranoia and that of other dairies using illegal immigrant labor is matched by that of the migrants themselves. They are all in a horrible situation because of racism and Trump. If they could find Steve King’s “white folks” to work their grueling hours, they would have to pay them better and treat them better. The landed gentry wouldn’t get as rich, not that dairies right now are making much money.
The white farmers in the article seem protective of the migrant workforce, even though some harbor racist views, because they depend on them to exist. It must have been that way with black enslavement. I wonder with time whether that transactional need might break down the racism.
I know the politics of that area a bit. It is conservative, especially on social issues, but farm policy and ethanol are very important, so I expect that 70 percent support for Trump to erode. If Trump decides to get tough on Nunes’ dairy for harboring illegal immigrants, he might lose a lot more of his support.
You have to wonder if this is what Trump has over Nunes to make him do his bidding in Congress. I always wondered why Nunes was such a toady, running back to the White House in his attempt to fake up some fake news. The fact that Nunes is running a crocked dairy that depends on illegal labor, and Trump can dangle an ICE raid that would ruin his enterprise has to have had some affect on corrupting Nunes.
Easiest way to prove Lizza wrong would be to open the town to reporters, investigators, ICE, etc. I doubt there is any substance to Nunes’ allegations and truth will most likely never see the light of day. MAGA, my butt!
Exactly Loren, open the town to reporters questions. Then do the same in South Dakota as we have plenty of undocumented workers on the dairy’s here. The undocumented should be made documented as the reward for shoveling crap that provides us with dairy products. That would encourage the workers and solve a major issue of immigration.
i do not fault immigrants for taking jobs even most farm raised kids wouldn’t sign up for. Dairy operators should take steps to help workers get legal status so there are no questions about status and no raids from ICE.
Nextly, hypocrites like Numbnuts and Noem, need to be taken to task for supporting these bigly operations knowing full well they need immigrant labor to stay in operation. I haven’t noticed any tech school programs dealing with CAFO employees, so it must not be a priority.
This is what wingnut dearth of planning ahead gets you.
Along the lines of Donald Pay’s comment, that NUnes farm uses immigrant labor has to be the worst kept secret in the world. Makes me wonder why ICE hasn’t kept a force of agents in this area to combat the illegalities.
Must be some connection to lack of raids to Numbnuts the wingnut and Drumpf the dumber wingnut.
Slavery is slavery, it’s time we embrace it or change it. The idea that these dairy farmers have a pact to provide cover for raided farms is not really any different than the slavery of the South with Blacks that led to the Civil War.
This appeared in my e-mail …
This guy who feeds me is a crook. He uses undocumented, juvenile labor to do his yard work, snow shoveling, and drive him around like a mob boss. Someone stop him. These children just want to see their parents.
– grudznick’s cat
David, thanks for that educated assessment of Lizza’s article. It’s good to know that your sharp eye finds Lizza practicing good journalism. Do you have any guess of how much Hearst would have to spend to beat back Nunes’s attack in court, without settling?
Nunes makes a big deal of the article targeting him in his reëlection bid. Even if that was Esquire‘s intent, how can that constitute defamation? Donald Trump has been targeting candidates right and left for years. He’s not guilty of defamation in those cases; he’s doing what we all do, encouraging the election or ouster of certain public figures.
Interesting point about the different opportunities immigrants have now compared to the European who invaded 150 years ago. Darn near every German or Dutch or Norwegian family could get its own 160 acres and farm independently. Now our agribusiness model demands lots of wage workers for an elite few landowners.
The Nunes family immigrated from Portugal. They have their wealth and land. They are unlikely to pass that wealth on the the new immigrants making their foruntes possible.
Indeed, Loren, sending family members out to spy on reporters and scare all their neighbors away from talking to the press only makes them look worse. The Nunes family is entitled to privacy; they are welcome to put up No Trespassing signs at their business and not bother to take reporters calls. They are not obliged to prove innocence. But having their powerful brother file lawsuits against the press for doing its job doesn’t help their case.
“imputes to Plaintiff conduct, characteristics and conditions, including dishonesty, deception, lying, conspiracy, corruption, bias, lack of integrity and ethics.”
That’s Nunes’ complaint? I’d say he’s SOL because the imputation is dead on accurate.
If Hearst has in-house counsel to deal with libel, the cost for defense would not be a burden. But if Nunes has hired counsel, they could be expected to charge 20-25% of the damages asked. As many print publications have pared down staff in all departments, Hearst might have to hire counsel, which, given the complexity of Nunes’ charges, would be $8-10 million.
However, as with the Washington Post case, I can’t find any merits to the charges. Nunes would have to prove that the facts presented are false, and Lizza is careful to mention other people involved in the inter-actions he had with them. I find it hard to believe that any knowledgeable libel attorneys worked on this case. It seems as unsound as the Covington case against the Post.
After his treacherous antics heading the House committee on Russia investigation (walking secret information to the WH which was under investigation), why is Numbnuts loose? He should be in prison for bungling that whole side of the investigation in an effort to aid Drumpf.
Nunes’s court filings end up publicizing what’s going on to a much larger crowd than if he’d ignored it. You’d think he would have learned that lesson when he sued “Devin Nunes’s Cow” on Twitter and gained thousands of followers for the parody site. This court filing about his dairy is reaching way more readers, those uninterested in the dairy business, than would have heard about it otherwise.
Hearst should counter sue to the tune of 75 M for Nunes bringing a frivolous lawsuit that causes them pain!
Too much money in the hands of too few people!
How many small dairy farms have been put out of business by these mega dairies using undocumented “slave” labor coming from countries south of the border. Counties that WE have made into “failed states”.
This really erk’s me! Is anyone even reading this anymore?
This is modern farming! This is what the powers that be want food production to be and the people they want in charge of it.
Every farmer I know of has told their children to get a good paying job in town. If they stayed out on the farm they would have to work for what these illegal’s are getting payed!
My son’s best friend was doing contract work for these big dairies while trying to run a small family owned dairy on the side. The contract work that he was doing for them finally made him so mad that he quit doing it.
There needs to be a national dialog on how the citizens of this country really want their food produced! If this is what they want then every farmer needs to quit right now and turn everything over to the one percent.
I agree Clyde. This is a very good idea: “There needs to be a national dialog on how the citizens of this country really want their food produced! If this is what they want then every farmer needs to quit right now and turn everything over to the one percent.”
The immigrants and refugees who come here are desperate to put food on the table for their families without the risk of being shot, as is the case for some. There are too many among the 1% who don’t care if long time American farmers and laborers feel they’re in the same boat.
Here’s another example of NoMa’am stifling farmers’ opportunities:
“HempWood” is 20 percent harder than oak, and grows 100 times as fast. It’s a sustainable alternative for hardwood furniture, flooring and more.
The owner of the new start up company Fibonacci, Greg Wilson, was a pioneer in the bamboo flooring industry before hemp became legal.
The company uses technology popularized by China’s strand-woven bamboo industry, in addition to technology developed at Wilson’s other company SmartOak, which creates engineered wood products using logs that would otherwise be converted to wood chips.
HempWood will be used to make blocks, boards, flooring, cutting boards and skateboards, all at prices far cheaper than oak, the company said.
The company will be headquartered in Kentucky, where more than 40,000 acres of hemp are already being cultivated.
___________________
I can’t get a link for this, but I imagine if you Google search you’ll find more. Just think, factories, skilled labor, construction, taxes, transportation, markets, finished product, creating value . . . .
All that dribbling away due to an ignorant governor and spineless GOP lege that won’t override her veto. That whooshing sound you hear South Dakota? That’s hope for your future passing you by.
Clyde’s comment refers to certain farm workers as “these illegals.” I have more than once expressed my own views on this blog about labeling someone an “illegal,” but it seems clear that my comments haven’t quite made the impact I hoped for. Perhaps Brenden Layte can offer a more helpful explanation about what it means to label people “illegals.”
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/opinion-illegal-language-immigrant_n_5bb2bd41e4b00fe9f4f9b033
bcb, Slavery would be a better term for our brothers and sisters that are treated like outcast commodities while feeding and clothing us. Call it what it is, SLAVERY, that the state legislature and the governor support completely. South Dakota, Iowa, Minnesota and all states that run plantation CAFO’s are no different than the old south with the same racial prejudice. What’s the difference? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcJ6Wxdcj-E
If labor laws are not enforced (both parties are guilty of this) then illegal workers are essentially quasi-legal these dairies (and other employers) are being forced to hire them in this environment to compete and stay in business. It’s pushed upon them. If laws were enforced industry would adapt to a new level playing field, they would pay more, automate, etc. Prices would probably go up at least short term but that’s how markets work we’ll never be able to stop competitive forces even if the outcome gives us angst, but not having confidence in the level playing field is cutting people short they can’t strive in the face of new challenges. They can but we have to stop illegal labor practices.
Instead of labeling powerless immigrants with the slur “illegal workers” why not label potentially wealthy employers that violate the law by hiring undocumented immigrants “llegal employers?”
And instead of using the term “illegal labor practices” why not be more precise and use the term “illegal hiring and employment practices?”
After all, federal law provides:
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1324a
Putting the focus where it actually belongs might help “level the playing field.”
Oh lord BCB, illegal worker is not a slur. But I entirely agree, as I said, employers have to stop hiring illegal workers and my logic is sound. If the government basically gives a green light to the employer to hire illegal workers, other employers will do the same. Trump won in part because working-class Democrats got thrown under the bus by Hillary, so just keep saying what you’re sayin in the way you say it and they’ll vote for Trump again in 2020. Your lack of prioritizing your own fellow citizens, that means legal by the way, is exactly why they hate liberals but just keep up the virtue signaling if you want lose. Again.
Dairies have no control over the price they get for milk. Paying higher wages means dairies get even less of the miniscule profits they now make.
They aren’t forced to hire foreign workers to compete in the market, they hire them because whitey doesn’t want those jobs. Remember a few years back fruit growers in California offered a substantial pay raise to American citizens to pick fruit and they got almost no takers.
You are going to find there are numerous jobs that haughty Americans just refuse to do regardless of wages.
Happy, you speak as if you are stating as a fact that your phrase is not a slur. You are stating, however, an opinion and others have a different opinion:
https://www.colorlines.com/articles/tell-associated-press-drop-i-word
I agree with colorlines and hope that by following their advice I don’t demean, dehumanize nor make immigrants or anyone else feel worthless, unwanted, or less than human, nor encourage others to blindly inflict such harm.
In addition, if you happened to review the federal statute I quoted from and linked, you also would notice that particular statute deals with employment and outlaws employer conduct, not worker conduct. Indeed, even undocument individuals are protected by employment laws. See:
https://legalaidatwork.org/factsheet/undocumented-workers-employment-rights/
Meanwhile, I could be wrong, but I don’t believe I need to dehumanize others to gain votes against Trump. Anyone who would vote for Trump because I didn’t slur immigrants would likely vote for Trump no matter what language I use.
https://www.ucdavis.edu/news/california-farmers-have-raised-wages-still-unable-find-enough-workers/
Raising wages and benefits to appeal to US workers is not working. Farms are turning to less labor intensive crops, more automation and lobbying congress to allow more guest workers to do the jobs Americans don’t want and can’t physically handle.
Immigrants who come to the US for work, documented or not, have never been the source of the problem. It’s the employers who recruit the immigrants and even facilitate evading applicable laws.
I’m not referring to the average US farmer. I’m talking about the owners of the big cheese plant who want to buy milk at rock bottom prices, regardless of the hardships that wreaks on dairy farmers, so they can pad their “executive compensation.”
I’m not talking about the local co-op ethanol plant. I’m talking about the guys in the C suite at Poet.
The problem is not Democrats v. GOP or Liberals v. Conservatives. It’s TOP v. BOTTOM.
Get that in your heads folks. Neither the average Lefty or Righty is the enemy of the average American. It’s the wealthy owners of the GOP like Kochs and gun manufacturers via their NRA. It’s the wealthy owners of some Democrats.
It’s TOP v BOTTOM.
It’s TOP v BOTTOM entirely.
The best analogy is Monopoly. If cheating is allowed everyone is gonna do it but if the rules are enforced then cheaters get turned in by non-cheaters because that higher standard has been accepted. If employers were regularly checked and received heavy fines illegal immigrants wouldn’t come. This was working for a while but big money won out (as Debbo said). For decades neither party did anything even after amnesty, they said they would enforce afterwards but didn’t. Try to see it from the side of a legal worker. The illegal worker is taking your job and lowering your hourly wage. These are not people like us who have time to hop on the computer and have theoretical arguments they are struggling to keep food on the table, so if some have misdirected anger and use words you don’t like try to understand their position. They’ve watched their jobs go overseas, their standard of living decline, then the Democratic Party embraced identity politics (which was an actual argument between Bill and Hillary), so they voted for Trump who told them what they wanted to hear. That’s tempting for all of us, isn’t it, but what choice did they have Hillary discarded them. Democrats should not make the same mistake twice.
It is interesting how folks that gain some sort of satisfaction from slurring undocumented immigrants often seem to also push myths long shown to be false. For example, there is the assertion:
Of course, this has been repeatedly debunked.
https://www.aclu.org/other/immigrants-and-economy
See also:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/making-sense/4-myths-about-how-immigrants-affect-the-u-s-economy
But I suppose propagating such myths somehow helps people feel a bit better about attaching pejorative labels to immigrants. It is difficult to conceive of any other benefit anyone might get by using language that they have been made aware has a tendency to hurt some portion of a group of relatively powerless people, especially children.
BCB, the simple question comes down to if you believe in the rule of law. Should our (your) country be able to control who is within its borders? Should it be able to control who is employable within those borders? You make the argument neither is positive or should be enforced. Keep going and give the election to Donald Trump that’s what you want to do, it seems.
HC, you made a point, BCB debunked it, and you swerved directly away to something else. I’d appreciate it if you’d stick with the point you tried to make and discuss it with BCB. What about the “taking jobs” meme you used?
Excellent debate since I last checked this thread.
Just wanted to say that for decades non mega dairy farmers have been telling their kids to get a good education and go do something else for a living.
The only reason these mega dairy’s can exist is because of undocumented slave labor and that is why milk is cheap and the little guy gets to continue to be pushed out of business. Vicious circle.
As I mentioned, there needs to be a national dialog. If dirt cheap food is all that american people want we might as well all quit and hand it to the 1%. They will make sure it is profitable for them as they do now in many other industries. What America eats then will be TOTALLY up to them.