“My family is the largest single contributor of soft money to the national Republican Party. I have decided to stop taking offense at the suggestion that we are buying influence. Now I simply concede the point. They are right.” Betsy DeVos
The election in Michigan ended with the Republicans regaining control of the State House in Lansing. The Democrats had won a trifecta after the 2022 election, but that will end beginning next year, as the GOP will now control the State House.
In response to the Republicans winning back the Michigan State House, Dick DeVos has shared his thoughts on the outcome of the election and what it means on his website dickdevos.com.
In a post from November 11th, Dick DeVos wrote an article entitled, Republican House majority means good things for Michigan. What I want to do is provide a little deconstruction of the article and correct some of the misinformation in the DeVos’ post.
One of the most glaring things about the post from Dick DeVos is that he never provides any sources or verification of the claims he makes. For instance, in the 2nd paragraph of the article, DeVos writes about what the Democratic-controlled State Legislation has done:
They’ve weakened small businesses, driven jobs and population out of the state, and made our neighborhoods less safe. They stripped workers’ rights by repealing Right-to-Work, raised taxes on Michigan families and small businesses amid record inflation, passed California-style energy mandates that increased costs while reducing reliability, handed billions to big corporations, and removed accountability and transparency in our schools, which rewarded their friends in the teacher’s union but hurt our kids.
Those with economic and political power rarely feel the need to substantiate claims they make, since this is one of the perks of being rich and powerful. The point about stripping workers’ rights by repealing the Right-to-Work policy is worth saying something about. If this policy was so anti-worker, then why did 10,000 workers show up to the State Capitol in 2012 to protest against the Right-to-Work policy that Governor Snyder put in place? In addition, it should be mentioned that Dick DeVos and his friends with the West Michigan Policy Forum were the main organization that pushed a Right-to-Work policy for Michigan beginning in 2010, when they brought in Rick Berman to speak at their annual policy conference. Lastly, it is worth noting that the Mackinac Center for Public Policy think tank was also working to craft a Right-to-Work policy for Michigan and one of their main funders has been the DeVos family.
Later in the article DeVos writes:
My family has called Michigan home our entire lives. We chose the state to build businesses, invest in our community, create jobs and raise our own families — and we want it to succeed.
First off, states to not succeed or fail, people do. There is no such things as a Michigan economy. There are only economies that are made up of people or entities like businesses. What Dick DeVos really means by wanting Michigan to succeed is that he wants to perpetuate Capitalism and economic policies that promote Capitalism. Capitalism has been very good to people like the DeVos family, which has tons of investments, owns multiple businesses and benefits from publicly funded projects in Grand Rapids. Second, while it is true that Michigan is the home base of the DeVos family, they own houses in other states, specifically in Florida, and have for decades.
Later in the article DeVos says he talked with Republicans who are, “nurses, business owners, law enforcement professionals and long-time community leaders.” This is not exactly a diverse list of people who live in Michigan, plus it is unlikely that Dick DeVos comes in contact with many working class residents from Michigan.
Near the end of the article, DeVos then makes this statement, “Electing a Republican majority in the state House is just the first step in getting Michigan back on track.” What Dick failed to mention is that his family was collectively the single largest contributor to the Republican Party and Republican candidates in the 2024 election, which GRIID documented on November 3rd. In fact, if you can look at how much money Dick DeVos personally contributed to Republican candidates in Michigan in 2024 ($296,175.50) at this link.
Lastly, I want to point out that this is not a partisan issue for me. I have not been very happy with what the Democratic Party has done in the past two years in Michigan, despite having control of the Governor’s office and the State House & Senate. In November of 2022, I wrote a three part series entitled, What Kind of Change Do We really want to see in Michigan, but most of what I included in those articles have not come to fruition.
Editors note: The source of the Betsy DeVos quote at the beginning of this article comes from a 2017 article in Politico. https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/01/betsy-dick-devos-family-amway-michigan-politics-religion-214631/
Rep. Scholten votes for an $895 billion US military budget, to suppress the death toll in Gaza, and to codify an anti-LGBTQ policy all at the same time
On Wednesday, December 11th, the House passed the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), 281 to 140, with 81 Democrats and nearly all Republicans voting yes.
Rep. Hillary Scholten was one of those 81 Democrats who voted with the Republicans to provide $895 billion for military spending in 2025. This US military spending bill is the largest in US history and demonstrates once again that when it comes to massive spending on the US military it has bi-partisan support.
Rep. Scholten once again proved to her constituents that she unconditionally supports the US military and makes sure that US military funding priorities are more important that meeting the needs of the millions of people in the US who don’t have adequate health care, safe housing, or a livable wage.
Rep. Scholten has made it a point to brag about the fact that she has brought $2.9 Million back to West Michigan for a variety of projects. What Rep. Scholten does not talk about, nor does she post this on her Facebook page, is the fact that the amount of federal taxes that have left the 3rd Congressional district, specifically for the US military, is $1.82 Billion.
Now, according to the National Priorities Project, the $1.82 Billion that leaves the 3rd Congressional District for US military spending could provide incredible resources to people in Rep. Scholten’s district if she valued their needs over military spending. For example, $1.8 Billion could be used for:
- 256,312 Public Housing Units for 1 Year, or
- 31,873 Scholarships for University Students for 4 Years, or
- 657,002 Children Receiving Low-Income Healthcare for 1 Year, or
- 5.96 million Households with Solar Electricity for 1 Year
In addition to making sure that US military spending is a priority, Rep. Scholten also voted for some additional provisions that were in the National Defense Authorization Act. One of those provisions, according to a recent article on The Intercepted, “would bar the Pentagon from publicly citing as “authoritative” casualty data from the Gaza Health Ministry, effectively concealing the full extent of the death toll in Gaza in the military’s public communications. The data from Palestinian authorities has been the only consistent and reliable count of the death toll out of Gaza over the last 14 months, with Israel consistently denying human rights workers access to the enclave and preventing foreign media journalists from entering.” This fits with Rep. Scholten’s unconditional support for Israel, especially in the past 14 months while Israel has been committing a genocide against the Palestinians.
A second provision that Rep. Scholten voted for would prohibit transgender children on military health insurance from receiving gender-affirming care. This provision was included by the Republican Party, which would codify explicitly anti-LGBTQ+ policy into federal law for the first time in decades.
In the end, Rep. Hillary Scholten decided to vote for the largest US military budget in history at $895 Billion, voted to prevent the Pentagon from citing casualty data from the Gaza Health Ministry, and to codify into federal law that US military personnel could not use health benefits for gender-affirming care for their transgender children. With her vote Rep, Scholten demonstrates that she fully supports US imperialism, wants to suppress information about Israel’s genocide, and her support for anti-trans policies.
Palestine Solidarity Information, Analysis, Local Actions and Events for the week of December 15th
It has been 14 months since the Israeli government began their most recent assault on Gaza and the West Bank. The retaliation for the October 7 Hamas attack in Israel, has escalated to what the international community has called genocide, therefore, GRIID will be providing weekly links to information and analysis that we think can better inform us of what is happening, along with the role that the US government is playing. We will also provide information on local events and actions that people can get involved in. All of this information is to provide people with the capacity of what Noam Chomsky refers to as, intellectual self-defense.
Information
The Tectonic Shift: The Gaza Genocide and the Limits of Israeli Hasbara
TRUMP’S PRO-ISRAEL DREAM TEAM: PATEL NOMINATION CAPS HAWKISH CABINET
Gaza Ministry Says 50 Killed in a Day as Israel Bombs Flour Line, Hospital, and Refugee Camps
Trump genuflects to Genocide Joe, pushes “hell” for Gaza
Trauma and Terror in the North of Gaza
Doctors in Gaza Say They Have No Doubt Israel Is Targeting Them
Genuine Solidarity Is Not Conditional: Gaza and Unity Around Palestine
Israel Is Also Waging an Economic War Against Palestinians
Analysis & History
A new report from B’Tselem, Unleashed: Abuse of Palestinians by Israeli Soldiers in the Center of Hebron
Image used in this post is from the B’Tselem Report.
New Report ranks Michigan amongst the worst in the country for utility performance
Do you ever wonder about the costs your utilities, especially gas and electric? Does your power go out regularly, especially during severe weather? Also, does it take a long time for you to get power back once you lost it?
These are all important questions, since most of us do not generate our own power and we rely on companies like Consumers Energy and DTE.
In a new report from Citizen’s Utility Board, Michigan ranks as one of the worst states in the country around utility performance. The 2024 edition of CUB’s annual Utility Performance Report is out now, and once again it uses federal data on key metrics for gas and electric utilities to compare the performance of Michigan utilities to those in all other states in the three categories of reliability, affordability and environmental impacts.
One major finding from the report is:
A recurring theme across different versions of this report, reinforced by the latest data, is that Michigan utilities have continually failed to improve their basic reliability performance, a weakness that is likely to be magnified during severe weather, which experts expect will be more common as the climate continues to warm.
Other important findings on Michigan utilities are:
- Average time to restore power following an outage: 49th (and last in the Midwest) Duration of outages per customer: 43rd (and last in the Midwest)
- Energy Expenditures per Household as % of Median Income: 38th (and last in the Midwest)
- Cost of Electricity in the Residential Sector: 41st (and last in the Midwest)
- Clean Generation as % of Total Generation: 34th
- CO2 Emissions Intensity (kilograms per megawatt-hour of electricity generated): 36th
To read the full report, go here.
Another excellent resource for people is The Electric Utility Toolkit: An Activist’s Guide to Changing the Power Grid, a resource developed by the Union of Concerned Scientists.
Another way to take action is by joining the Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition by heading to the Michigan Public Service Commission hearing on December 19th, 2024. MEJC staff and community members will be driving up together in one bus to attend the MPSC meeting, leave a comment and hand out energy democracy goodie bags! Please meet at the MEJC office, 2701 Bagley St, by 11:00am. We’ll head to Lansing and be at 7109 W. Saginaw Highway, Lansing, Michigan, 4891. We should be back at the office no later than 4:00pm. Lunch will be provided! You can register here.
Lastly, if you are interested in working on utility justice matters here in Grand Rapids, then contact the Urban Core Collective, specifically their Climate Justice team, which does work on utility costs and utility performance issues locally and at the state level. Contact the Climate Justice team members at this link.
Over $1 Billion in public money for recent projects and the Convention Arena Authority wants the public to pay for another hotel
Last Friday, MLive posted a story with the headline, Push for publicly financed convention hotel back under consideration in Grand Rapids.
On the heels of providing $565 million in tax incentives to the billionaire families of DeVos and Van Andel, this just seems like a slap in the public’s face. And of course they have been talking about it for some time, but always without the public being made aware of or consulted if they want their tax dollars to go towards the expansion of the convention center, plus another hotel for convention attendees.
Then there is the fact that the Convention Arena Authority (CAA) has already hired a consultant to tell them that they are “turning away a lot of business” because of a lack of space.
Rick Winn was also quoted in the saying, “We need to expand the (convention) center. We need to stay competitive.” At least the MLive reporter acknowledged that Winn, who is the chair of the CAA, but is also the president of Grand Rapids-based AHC Hospitality, which manages the Amway Grand Plaza, JW Marriott and other downtown hotels. The MLive reporter did fail to say that AHC Hospitality is owned by the DeVos family.
The estimated cost of the Convention Center hotel is estimated to be $282 million. However, the article provides no estimate for how much public funding would cover of the total cost.
I went back and looked at some of the more high profiled downtown Grand Rapids projects in recent years to see how much the public is funding and here is what I came up with:
- At least $100 million in public money for the Amphitheater.
- $318 Million for the 2 apartment buildings that will be next to the Amphitheater and the Soccer Stadium
- $100 million for Soccer Stadium
- $565 million in tax incentives/subsidies for the DeVos/Vandel 3 towers project on Fulton and Market.
This means that the total of just these projects comes to $1,083,000,000. This means that the public has provided over $1 Billion in funding for projects just in the last few years.
One question we should all be asking ourselves is, what has been, or will be, the public benefit of over $1 Billion in these publicly funded projects? How many jobs will be created that pay a living wage to people? And I’m not talking about construction jobs, since those are over once these projects are completed. Some might argue that we will attend concerts and soccer games. But how affordable will they be to the working class people who are already struggling to make ends meet? We know that the CAA just signed a 25 year contract with Live Nation to books shows at the amphitheater, despite the fact that Live Nation charges extremely high ticket fees because of the near monopoly ownership of Ticketmaster.
Another argument is that all of these venues will attract more tourists, which brings more money into the city. Well, how about we think about that for a second. Yes, tourists spend their money when they visit GR, but a large portion of what they spend is on hotels, parking, entertainment venues, restaurants and bars. Sure, the owners of those businesses will benefit, but most of those businesses are already doing well and they don’t tend to pay people a living wage. Tourist driven economics is simply another variation of trickle down economics and we all know that is essentially a lie. Trickle down economics is a lie, especially when you include the fact that over $1 Billion of public dollars will be going to cover the cost of just a few projects, which is not trickle up economics, but a river flow up to the business class that is already filthy rich.
At this point we really need to pay attention to any committee meetings that might happen, where they are discussing the expansion of the Convention Center and we need to pressure our City and County officials to make sure they are transparent and alerting the public when this matter is being discussed. If we are going to resist more public funding for projects that will benefit the Capitalist Class, then we need to be in the know and we need to be organized with clear demands. One of the demands should be, when are the City and the County going to commit to using $1 Billion for housing or other basic needs in this community.
Doug DeVos exposes his class privilege in video talking about “How to Help Everyone Thrive and Prosper”
In August, I wrote about the group called Thrive and Prosper, where I said the group is a concrete manifestation of West Michigan Nice. I went on to say:
Therefore, the label of West Michigan Nice could aptly be given to the recently created group known as Thrive and Prosper. Yes, Thrive and Prosper. Sounds like a get rich quick scheme or a cult or just simply the logical outcome of how Grand Rapids deals with everything.
More recently, in a conversation I was having with a local religious leader, they were saying that Thrive and Prosper was essentially a DeVos front group. This sentiment was confirmed when I had looked at Doug DeVos’ podcast page called I Believe. On the page it was promoting a mini-series of videos from the, “Believe in Our City” event that was organized by Thrive and Prosper in the summer.
There are a total of 7 episodes, with numerous speakers, but the 3rd episode features Doug DeVos speaking about, “How to Help Everyone Thrive and Prosper.”
The video with Doug DeVos is about 22 minutes long, which you can watch here, but I will provide you with some highlights so you don’t have to sift through the bullshit.
One theme that DeVos spoke about was what he called the Abundance mentality. For DeVos, abundance mentality means that we don’t have to stop something from happening when looking at what else is happening that is problematic.He said that just because there are problems in some parts of the city, doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t build up other parts of the city.
Of course this is hypocritical, since the DeVos family has primarily been about building up the downtown area of Grand Rapids, while other parts of the city are neglected. Doug DeVos has spent millions in the Boston Square neighborhood and then set up the AmplifyGR project to impose the DeVos family values on an entire neighborhood, which GRIID has written about since AmplifyGR went public in 2017.
DeVos then went on to talk about how as a city we are often unsettled. The Amway CEO explained what he meant by be unsettled, stating, “We saw that in our own community, about 4 years ago. We saw that here, very unsettled. We started experiencing some of the mob, some of the rioting and some of the lawlessness that don’t really comport with a civil society.”
These comments from DeVos clearly demonstrate his class privilege, since what happened with the uprising in 2020 was rooted not only in how the police murder and repress Black communities, but how there is deep seated structural injustice and exploitation that people like DeVos are removed from and responsible for. The DeVos family is the best example of the growing wealth gap in Grand Rapids, where a small number of people are benefiting from the labor and suffering of the majority of the population.
Doug DeVos further demonstrated his class privilege by saying of the 2020 uprising in Grand Rapids, “Certainly protests are fine, but peaceful.” It is instructive how those with political and economic power are always preaching that our outrage and our frustration with systemic oppression is only legitimate when it is peaceful. The irony of this is that when those with private power or the state use force against those protesting, it is always necessary and reasonable. Violence that flows down from the top is legitimate, but when violence flows from the bottom of society it is always condemned.
The billionaire DeVos continued to reflect on how you deal with being unsettled, by sharing a story from the 1990s. DeVos talked about the Plaza Towers, which were not constructed well and was deeply problematic. He said there were two options, tear it down or rebuild. Jay Van Andel was at a meeting where the fate of the Plaza Towers were being discussed where he said, “we don’t blow things up, we build things up.” DeVos was using this story to say when there is a problem, you don’t blow up the institution or throw it away, you reform it and work from within. Sage advice from billionaires.
Another theme that DeVos wanted to stress was the need to come up with a vision. In this case, the Amway executive talked about downtown Grand Rapids, turning it around took vision, a vision that was nurtured by Grand Action. Of course Doug DeVos would say this, since his family has been the primary beneficiaries of the downtown development projects.
There were also references to the Amway business model, but through a top down view, nothing remotely honest about the Amway business model being a pyramid scheme.
Amway business model, independent business owners – pyramid scheme, it’s your vision.
There were other fluffy statement and glittering generalities, but Doug DeVos then wrapped up his comments by asking, “What are you going to do? That is your homework? What are you going to make it better in this city?”
Such sentiment is of course code for – how can you build wealth and then expand your wealth over a lifetime? Once you have begun to build wealth, use some of that money to buy politicians who will push public policies that benefit the Capitalist Class while hurting everyone else. The next step is to start a foundation and give a small amount of your wealth to promote individual responsibility and assist people who are struggling because of the economic and political policies that you benefit from. Your charity wins you PR points and shields you from being scrutinized for helping to create the social and economic problems to begin with.
This is just one of the videos from the Thrive and Prosper gathering in the summer of 2024. GRIID will deconstruct others in the coming weeks.
Cosecha Michigan begins a hunger strike, while Democrats fail to keep promises and the Michigan Freedom Fund practices xenophobia
Earlier today, Movimiento Cosecha Michigan held a Press Conference in Lansing to announce the kick-off of a hunger strike at the Capitol. The Press Release reads:
Undocumented Michiganders need access to driver’s licenses now. Movimiento Cosecha Michigan has been leading direct actions to demand that state legislators pass the Licenses for All bills without further delay.
On Tuesday, December 10th, Movimiento Cosecha Michigan members and supporters will begin a HUNGER STRIKE until the Michigan Legislature approves the Drive S.A.F.E. bills.
Governor Whitmer and Democratic leadership have publicly expressed their support for these bills. However, their continued inaction in moving these bills out of committee and bringing them to a vote highlights why many Michiganders distrust the Democratic Party’s leadership.
Movimiento Cosecha Michigan will hold a press conference on the steps of the Capitol to announce the hunger strike and introduce the individuals who are putting their health and well-being on the line for justice. Undocumented Michiganders deserve the right to drive without fear, and it is time for elected officials to deliver on their promises
The Press Conference just happened, which you can watch here. As of right now, members of Movimiento Cosecha Michigan will be engaging in a hunger strike until the Democratic Party controlled State Legislature decides to pass the Drive S.A.F.E. bills. The Michigan Democrats have been promising for several years to pass the Drive S.A.F.E. bills, but after they lose control of the State Legislature in January, they will not be able to keep that promise, which is why Movimiento Cosecha Michigan wants them to pass these bills NOW!
Unfortunately, there are also organizations that are actively opposing the Drive S.A.F.E. bills, groups that are in no way allies to the immigrant community.
One example of a group opposing driver’s licenses for undocumented people is the DeVos-created, DeVos-funded organization known as the Michigan Freedom Fund. The Michigan Freedom Fund is essentially a GOP front group, which not only opposes undocumented people from having driver’s licenses, they have been using racist, xenophobic and anti-immigrant language in action alerts they are sending out to people telling them to not vote for the Drive S.A.F.E. bills. On the right is an action alert that the Michigan Freedom Fund has been sending out, where they specifically use xenophobic language, referring to undocumented immigrants as “illegal.”
Movimiento Cosecha Michigan needs your support to get the Drive S.A.F.E. bills passed. Contact you State Representative and State Senator immediately by going to this link to find out more details about the Drive S.A.F.E. bills and to find your State Representative and State Senator.
Last Friday, MLive reported that the Kent County Commission 10 – 7 in favor of a 25 year contract with Live Nation, the near monopoly live concert venue corporation.
The MLive story does provide an overview of how the vote went down, quote several of the commissioners, some who voted for and some who voted against. When it came to the cost of the 25 year contract, there was no clear response, other than there will be an annual fee and an incentive fee based on performance. However, when asked about the total cost of the 25 year contract, there was no transparency.
Another issue was how Live Nation became the company that was considered for the contract. Rick Winn, the Chair of the Convention Arena Authority (CAA), was quoted as saying, Live Nation has “been the major promoter of all acts in the arena for twenty something years.” The MLive article failed to mention that Winn is the President of AHC Hospitality, the DeVos owned company that runs several hotels and other hospitality venues.
However, the most problematic aspect of the MLive article was the fact that the only sources cited regarding the federal lawsuit against Live Nation was a lawyer with Dickinson Wright who works with the CAA and stated it may take 10 years for the federal lawsuit to be decided. The other source cited regarding the federal lawsuit was Live Nation itself, which is deeply problematic, since there are no sources cited that argues in the affirmative for the lawsuit.
If you want to read a summary of the lawsuit, just go to this link. The issues the lawsuit raises are worth listing, but it is worth noting that Live Nation also purchased Ticket Master, which is sort of at the root of the issue:
- Live Nation-Ticketmaster exploits its longtime relationship with Oak View Group, a potential competitor-turned-partner that has described itself as a “hammer” and “protect[or]” for Live Nation.
- Retaliating Against Potential Entrants
- Threatening and Retaliating Against Venues that Work with Rivals
- Locking Out Competition with Exclusionary Contracts
- Blocking Venues from Using Multiple Ticketers
- Restricting Artists’ Access to Venues
- Acquiring Competitors and Competitive Threats
In a 2022 article in The Nation, the writer provides some useful background information on the monopoly nature of Live Nation.
Today Ticketmaster controls even more of the music and entertainment industries than it did then. In 2010, the company merged with Live Nation, which owns concert venues and manages leading artists. This combination of ticketing and promotion enables a very specific kind of market abuse: Live Nation can retaliate against venues that don’t use Ticketmaster. The company can, as analysts from the American Economic Liberties Project described it, condition “the availability of its performers to independent venues on those venues using Ticketmaster’s ticketing services.”
When the merger was being approved, the Department of Justice understood the potential for abuse, and it required Live Nation to enter into a 10-year consent decree not to pressure venues in this manner. But the company, as many predicted, often ignored its own promises, and the DOJ extended the decree by five and a half more years. As it found in 2019, “Live Nation repeatedly and over the course of several years engaged in conduct that, in the Department’s view, violated” the prohibition on “retaliating against concert venues for using another ticketing company.”
That brings us to today. We know that one symptom of excessive market power is technological and innovative backwardness. There’s no reason to improve one’s products when you have the market locked down. It’s telling that as technology has revolutionized everything and brought down costs for services over the past decades, this corner of our economy has remained stagnant and far too profitable for owners. As the American Economic Liberties Project pointed out, “Tickets are expensive, and the added service charges can double the final price. Direct ticket sales for popular concerts are often sold out within minutes, but then they are somehow available secondhand for over 50 percent more than the original price. Simply put, Ticketmaster provides bad service at outrageous prices.”
One would think that MLive would have included some of these concerns and this analysis. Instead, MLive simply cited Live Nation’s dismissive comments about the lawsuit.
So what does this mean for the cost of tickets for events that will be held at the Amphitheater? It is somewhat early to tell, but given the monopolistic nature of Live Nation/Ticketmaster, people should expect prices to be high. This means despite the use of millions in public dollars subsidizing the Amphitheater, there will likely be lots of local residents who will not be able to afford the cost of most concerts. As many of us have been saying all along, the Amphitheater will make money for the already rich, while costing the public millions, which is exactly why Grand Action 2.0 made the Amphitheater a priority in the first place.
In one of his last acts as Grand Rapids City Commissioner, First Ward Commission Jon O’Connor has recommend that F. Douglas Mileski be added to the Grand Rapids Police Civilian Appeal Board.
According to his Linkedin page, Mileski states that he is an:
Experienced Owner with a demonstrated history of working in the real estate industry. Skilled in Arbitration, Real Property, Construction Law, Real Estate Transactions, and Corporate Law. Strong entrepreneurship professional with a Bachelor of Arts and a law degree (J.D.) from Michigan State University.
Like Commissioner O’Connor, Mileski is a bar/restaurant owner and a supporter of the GRPD. A post on Mileski’s Facebook page for June 16, 2020, when the Grand Rapids City Commission was getting lots of pressure from the community to reduce the funding of the GRPD, he wrote:
City Commission discussed defunding GRPD today. This commissioner lays out the goal. The office of Oversight and Accountability is a REAL problem. It is not like an Internal Affairs office. It is more like the PC police. Any commissioner or Mayor that supports a NINE MILLION DOLLAR budget cut to GRPD needs to be voted out of, or recalled from, office.
Another indication of where Mileski stands on critical issues has to do with he comment in May of 2020, while addressing the Stay at Home policy that Gov. Whitmer put in place. Here Mileski states:
The selfishness and submissiveness of those that virtue signal that the stay at home order has anything to do with science or concern for society is appalling. We are all grown ups capable of assessing risk. F*** the nanny state and stop being fascist in threatening our livelihoods when we disagree. Stay home if you feel safer but do not presume that it is ok to quarantine the healthy. In this country, you govern with the consent of the governed. You do not rule. Good night.
It is interesting to note, that just two days after Mileski wrote these comments, I attended a rally held in downtown Grand Rapids in defiance of the Stay at Home order, a rally held by the American Patriot Council. Several members of the American Patriot Council were involved in the January 6th, 2021 insurrection in DC.
Adding Mileski to the Grand Rapids Police Civilian Appeal Board is significant, especially when you consider the current composition of the board. The Grand Rapids Police Civilian Appeal Board is currently made up of 8 members (still 1 vacancy), with 4 white men, 1 white female, 1 multi-racial female, 1 African American female and 1 African American male.
With Mileski, there are now two overtly pro-cop members of the Grand Rapids Police Civilian Appeal Board, Mileski and Dean Pacific. Pacific received $12,500 from the GRPD union, while running for the First Ward Commissioner seat in the November Election and made it part of his strategy to attack his opponent because they supported defunding the GRPD. .
The fact that Commissioner O’Connor recommended Mileski comes as no surprise. O’Conner has endorse pro-GRPD policies every year he has sat on the City Commission, he sits on the Public Safety Committee, which allows him to use his pro-cop leverage, and he has received $7,000 from the Grand Rapids Police Officer’s Association during various campaigns for City Commission.
Corporate Crime vs Street Crime: How Grand Rapids news distorts and racializes crime
Last week, all four daily news agencies in Grand Rapids – MLive, WOODTV8, WZZM13 and WXMI 17 – reported on a story about a former CEO who was sentenced to prison and ordered to pay nearly $6 million in restitution to investors he defrauded.
However, in all four of the local daily news outlets, there wasn’t the same outrage over what the former CEO did as compared to those who engage in street level crime. This double standard is common in news reporting and has been for decades, both in terms of class and race.
There have been few stories of corporate or white collar crimes in the local news in 2024. Comparatively, street level crime inundates the local news coverage. On top of the frequency of street level crime, the local news agencies often use the images of suspects, with WOODTV8 being the leader in using images of crime suspects. In the above graphic is a collection of images from WOODTV8 crime coverage that I have collected for 2024. As you can see most of them are Black and Brown suspects. The same use of images does not apply to corporate crime, since there were no images of the ex-CEO in any of the 4 local news stories I monitored, despite the fact that he had defrauded investors $6 million.
On the matter of class difference between street and corporate crime, the local news is not only dominated by street crime coverage, they don’t use the same kind of narratives when reporting on street level crime as opposed to corporate crime.
In Marie Gottschalk’s book, “Race, Power, and Punishment: Crime in the Streets and Crime in the Suites”, she highlights several ways in which this double standard exists.
- Even when legal and extralegal variables are held constant, white-collar offenders tend to be less likely to be sentenced and receive shorter sentences than street crime offenders.
- Social status may have an impact on sentencing decisions, as white-collar offenders who commit crimes usually committed by the upper-class are less likely to be sentenced to prison than white-collar offenders who commit crimes usually committed by the lower-class.
- Scandals that expose the crimes of white-collar and the economic elite, such as Enron, result in higher sentences for white-collar offenders.
- Access to resources may help high-status white-collar offenders bypass criminal justice interventions such as the usage of legal loopholes.
These are also many of the same conclusions that the watchdog group, Corporate Crime Reporter has been documenting for several decades.
In terms of social cost, according to the FBI, corporate crime costs the US $300 billion a year.
The double standards I have pointed out not only have devastating social consequences, but psychological consequences as well. The news media’s constant use of Black and Brown crime suspect images perpetuates the belief that Black and Brown people engage in more crime, which is not accurate. When it comes to sentencing, Black and Brown people are disproportionately put in jail or prison for the reasons that Marie Gottschalk cites in her book mentioned above.
Lastly, what is considered criminal in US law also skews how we understand crime and violence. For instance, paying people poverty-level wages is not illegal, but like most of the corporate pollution that exists is not a crime. I would argue that these are forms of structural violence, which are unfortunately normalized in US society.
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 