Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, mortgage giants whose financial collapse prompted a government takeover earlier this fall, hired a who’s who of lobbyists to kill legislation that would impose more regulation. In 2006, Freddie Mac shelled out $11.7 million to lobbyists and consultants with ties to Republican lawmakers — including former Minnesota Rep. Vin Weber and Susan Hirschmann, the former Chief of Staff to Texas Rep. Tom DeLay — the most ferocious critics of the institutions. The organizations will be the topic of a congressional hearing tomorrow. (AP)
The government is gearing up in its case against the five Blackwater security guards charged with killing 17 Iraqi civilians in an unprovoked shooting in 2007. The guards, who face minimum 30-year prison sentences if convicted, will “surrender” in Utah, where one of them is from, in order, it appears, to have the trial take place in a gun-friendly environment. Meanwhile, the government is set to unveil the indictment today. A prosecutor in the case is also traveling to Baghdad this week to speak to people connected to the victims about the case. (AP/New York Times)
Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA), who faces trial next year on 16 counts of corruption, lost his seat in a heavily Democratic district this weekend to a little-known Republican attorney Anh “Joseph” Cao, who will be the first Vietnamese American in Congress. The upset underscored “the unwritten rule that indictments kill the political careers of even the safest-seeming incumbents,” reports The Hill. Jefferson achieved renown when federal investigators found nearly $100,000 in cash in his freezer, money allegedly taken from an FBI informant in a scheme to bribe a Nigerian official. (The Hill)
A congressional panel will ask for an investigation to determine whether the National Security Agency used an illegal wiretap to collect evidence against a Muslim scholar, Ali al-Timimi, later convicted on terrorism charges. The Bush administration is accused of concealing the wiretap during the 2005 trial. (New York Times)
Brush up on the case of David Safavian, a former Abramoff crony, whose retrial begins this week. Safavian, the former chief of staff for the General Services Administration, was the highest-ranking government official to be convicted in the lobbying scandal — as well as the only person to fight corruption charges in court. Safavian, who may be familiar to our readers as a golf lover, got his guilty verdict thrown out on appeal this summer. (AP)
The Supreme Court will hear the case against Ali al-Marri, a Qatari who has been held without charge for nearly five and a half years. He is the only enemy combatant being held on U.S. soil. Al-Marri, who is represented by the ACLU, had petitioned to have the case go directly to the Supreme Court. (AP)
New York GOP Rep. Vito Fossella, who was arrested for drunk driving in May 2008, will be sentenced today. He faces five days in jail. Fossella, whose arrest triggered revelations of an extra-marital affair, will retire from office in January. (AP)
