ADMINISTRATION
Alphonso Gets Evicted

This morning, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson announced he is stepping down effective April 18. While the White House has so far refused to give a reason for his departure, Jackson faces ongoing probes "by a federal grand jury, the Justice Department, the FBI and the HUD inspector general." Earlier this month, Sens. Patty Murray (D-WA) and Christopher Dodd (D-CT) sent a letter to President Bush "urging him to request Mr. Jackson's resignation, arguing that accusations of wrongdoing had made him ineffective." Their calls joined similar ones from Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), and Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) in 2006. Jackson was one of Bush's few remaining holdovers from Texas, after a parade of these loyalists -- including Karl Rove, Harriet Miers, and Dan Bartlett -- left the White House last year. Like so many of Bush's Texas friends, Jackson's legacy will be one of incompetence, corruption, and political cronyism. While he was busy awarding lucrative no-bid contracts to his golfing buddies and erecting giant photo homages to himself, the nation was spiraling into the worst housing crisis since the Great Depression.

A PHILADELPHIA STORY: One of the most recent scandals to come to light focuses on Jackson's willingness to retaliate against employees unwilling to participate in his cronyism. In 2006, Jackson allegedly demanded that the Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA) "transfer a $2 million public property" at a "substantial discount" to Kenny Gamble, a developer, former soul-music songwriter, and friend of Jackson's. When PHA director Carl Greene refused, Jackson and his aides called Philadelphia's mayor and "followed up with 'menacing' threats about the property and other housing programs in at least a dozen letters and phone calls over an 11-month period." For example, Orlando Cabrera, then-assistant secretary at HUD, suggested in an e-mail that the agency "make his [Green's] life less happy." Kim Kendrick, an assistant secretary who oversaw accessible housing, proposed that they "[t]ake away all of his Federal dollars." According to Green, Jackson's politically motivated plan to remove federal funds from Philadelphia "could raise rents for most of its 84,000 low-income tenants and force the layoffs of 250 people." "This kind of stuff undermines public confidence in our officials," Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) said to Jackson during a recent congressional hearing.

LOYAL BUSHIES ONLY: In May 2007, Jackson testified to Congress, "I don't touch contracts." In retrospect, that statement appears to have been at best a gross inaccuracy, and at worst, an outright lie. In 2006, Jackson told a group of business leaders in Texas that he refuses to award contracts to people who disagree with the President. During this controversial speech on April 28, 2006, Jackson recounted a conversation he had with a prospective contractor who had a "heck of a proposal." This contractor, however, told Jackson, "I don't like President Bush." Jackson said that he thought to himself, "Brother, you have a disconnect -- the president is elected, I was selected." Jackson subsequently refused to award the man the contract, despite the merits of the proposal. A former HUD assistant secretary also confirmed that Jackson told agency employees to "consider presidential supporters when you are considering the selected candidates for discretionary contracts." He also said that he "did not want contracts" awarded to certain "political groups," which included "Democrats." Jackson's actions appeared to violate the Federal Aquisition Reguations (48 CFR 3.101-1), which states, "Government business shall be conducted in a manner above reproach and...with complete impartiality and with preferential treatment for none."

CRONYISM OVER COMPETENCE: In Oct. 2007, federal investigators looked into whether, after Hurricane Katrina, Jackson lined up an emergency "no-bid contract" at the HUD-controlled Housing Authority of New Orleans for "golfing buddy" and friend William Hairston. According to HUD, the emergency contract paid Hairston $392,000 over a year and a half; Hairston's partner companies also received "direct contracts" with HUD. One of the companies which received a contract in New Orleans, Columbia Residential, had "significant financial ties to Jackson." Jackson's wife also had "ties to two companies that did business with the New Orleans authority." Atlanta lawyer Michael Hollis, another Jackson friend, "appears to have been paid approximately $1 million for managing the troubled Virgin Islands Housing Authority," despite having "no experience in running a public housing agency." A "top Jackson aide" reportedly made it clear to officials within HUD that "Jackson wanted Hollis" for the job. Curiously, Hollis received more than four times the salary of his predecessor.

Under the Radar

GORE LAUNCHES $300 MILLION CLIMATE CHANGE CAMPAIGN: Today, former Vice President Al Gore and his organization, the Alliance for Climate Protection, launch a bipartisan, $300 million, three-year campaign to push for climate change legislation. A press release heralded the campaign as "unprecedented in scale for a public policy issue," and the Washington Post reports that the group "aims to enlist 10 million volunteers through a combination of network and cable commercials, display ads...and online social networks." Gore said he and his wife Tipper had donated all the profits from his documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, to this new campaign -- called the "We" campaign -- along with his Nobel Peace Prize money. The campaign will launch TV ads later this week that "will team up offbeat celebrity couples who may not have much in common but share a belief that it is important to address climate change." The first such ad features Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and former Republican Speaker Newt Gingrich, and others will pair up Al Sharpton and Pat Robertson, and the Dixie Chicks and Toby Keith. Sign up for the campaign here, and watch its debut ad here.

CIVIL LIBERTIES -- BUSH'S WARRANTLESS WIRETAPPING IMMEDIATELY RAISED RED FLAGS WITHIN ADMINISTRATION: In December 2005, the New York Times disclosed that shortly after 9/11, the Bush administration began listening to the international phone calls of U.S. persons who were suspected terrorists -- without a court order. In a new book, Eric Lichtblau, co-author of the December 2005 Times story, writes that officials said the "National Security Agency's [N.S.A.] eavesdropping program sparked heated legal concerns and silent protests inside the Bush administration within hours of its adoption in October 2001." Inside the FBI, "technicians stumbled onto the N.S.A.'s program accidentally within 12 hours of its inception, setting off what officials described as a brief firestorm of anxiety among senior officials. ... 'What's going on here? Is this legal?' one FBI official asked after learning of the NSA operation on American soil." Moreover, then-deputy attorney general Larry Thompson "refused to sign off on any of the secret wiretapping requests that grew out of the program because of the secrecy and legal uncertainties surrounding it" and then-attorney general John Ashcroft "complained to associates at the time that the White House, in getting his signature for the surveillance program, 'just shoved it in front of me and told me to sign it.'"

ENERGY -- TRUCKERS PLAN TO PROTEST FUEL PRICES: In response to rising gas prices over the last month, some truckers across the country are "making plans to protest this week by parking their semis or clogging traffic by driving slowly. ... The truckers say average diesel gas prices, which AAA reported had risen over the past month from $3.38 to $3.91 a gallon nationally as of Friday, are forcing some drivers out of business." Some analysts are predicting that crude oil prices may hit $120 a barrel within the next six months. One trucker said that his fuel costs "more than doubled from $1,255 a week at the beginning of January to $2,684 last week." "As fuel prices go up, so do delivery costs," said the driver, Bob Kuzniar. "That gets passed on to the consumer."

Think Fast

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson -- who has come under widespread criticism for cronyism and corruption within his department -- "is expected to announce his resignation Monday." "The exact reasons for Mr. Jackson's decision couldn't be learned."

Former Housing and Urban Development secretary and current Senator Mel Martinez (R-FL) told CNN yesterday that he'd give John McCain an "incomplete" for saying that it's "not the duty of government to bail out and reward those who act irresponsibly whether they're big banks or small borrowers."

After days of violence in oil-rich Basra, Iraqi lawmakers said that "Iranian officials helped broker a cease-fire agreement Sunday between Iraq's government and radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr." Despite the truce, violence continued in Baghdad today as the city's fortified Green Zone came under mortar and rocket attack.

Washington Post ombudsman Deborah Howell said the paper erred in not reporting the sexual orientation of fallen soldier Maj. Alan Rogers, who died in Iraq on March 14. The Post did not report Rogers was gay in its story last week. Howell said the Post's story "would have been richer" had the paper reported Rogers's feelings about "don't ask, don't tell," which he opposed.

Campaign reform advocates are questioning why Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) has "retreated from his longtime commitment to public financing of campaigns." After supporting full public financing, he now opposes the idea at the federal level. David Donnelly of the Public Campaign Action Fund said, "It's a legitimate question to ask the reformer, John McCain, why hasn't he made public financing the policy he will pursue if he becomes president?"

"Average gasoline prices hit another all-time high, according to a survey conducted for motorist organization AAA. The average price of regular rose to $3.287 a gallon, up from $3.286 the previous day, according to the AAA Web site. The price averaged $3.165 a month ago. A year ago, American drivers were paying $2.673."

"The number of Americans receiving food stamps is projected to reach 28 million in the coming year, the highest level since the aid program began in the 1960s." The economic slowdown caused the "recent rises in many states," say officials and experts. At the same time, after rising by 100,000 for the second month in a row, the number of Americans working part time jobs out of economic necessity reached the highest level since 1993.

And finally: Director Oliver Stone currently casting his next film, Bush: The Movie. "Word from Hollywood is that he's negotiating with Elizabeth Banks (the nutty sexaholic in The 40 Year-Old Virgin) for the role of Laura Bush. Josh Brolin (No Country for Old Men) will play the prez." And Robert Duvall is being rumored to play Dick Cheney.

Good News

"The first formal talks in the long process of drawing up a replacement for the Kyoto climate change pact opened in Thailand on Monday with appeals to a common human purpose to defeat global warming."

State Watch

NEW YORK: "Legislative leaders and the Paterson administration said Sunday night that it was possible they could complete the state budget close to Monday's midnight deadline."

RHODE ISLAND: Food stamp usage climbed by 18 percent over the last two years, the highest total in the last dozen years or more.

ECONOMY: "State budgets have been hit hard by a worsening national economy, including rising costs for energy and health care."

Blog Watch

THINK PROGRESS: President Bush gives out the wrong phone number for homeowner help hotline.

WONK ROOM: Explaining the Sadr surge.

INFORMED COMMENT: The brokered ceasefire in Iraq reduced President Bush to "irrelevancy" in the country.

PANDAGON: Missouri state Rep. Jane Cunningham (R) forced LGBT youth activists to leave her office, saying she "would throw up if" she "looked at them any longer."

Daily Grill

"We must win this fight. The militias that we are fighting are backed by Iran."
-- Sen. Lindsey Graham, 3/30/08, on recent fighting in southern Iraq

VERSUS

"The notion that this is a fight by American allies against Iranian-inspired elements is not accurate."
-- Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), 3/30/08

Internships

The research team that brings you The Progress Report and ThinkProgress.org needs summer interns! Click here for more information.