Why indepedent investigative journalism matters. (The case for Pro Publica.)

Frankly, I'm scared. 

I'm scared that our frail and beleaguered "mainstream" press, already cowed into normalizing Trump & Co. and presenting both sides as equivalent in their awfulness, will fully collapse over the next few years. 

So let's equate Joe Biden's pardoning his son as the legal and moral equivalent of, say, Trump's pardoning a bunch of rightwing zealots who trashed the Capitol Building and beat up a bunch of cops. (Not to mention all the press real estate given over to hapless schmo Hunter Biden while virtually ignoring the far more insidious potential for a depraved Pete Hegseth or a maniacal Kash Patel to gain enormous power. These two make RFK, Jr. look like a just slightly madcap nominee.)

When the Trump DOJ puts Anthony Fauci, Mark Milley, Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, et. hundreds of als. on trial on trumped up charges of something or other - the word traitor is thrown around an awful lot these days - will anybody be surprised if the press just kinds of shrugs. What do you expect? The Democrats came after poor Rudy Guiliani.

Not that everyone in the press has fallen down on the job. It's just that the work of the exposers, the truth tellers, seems to get buried pretty darned fast.

Anyway, this post is really not about my gut-churning expectations for Trump 2.0. It's about the importance of a free press. And, in this case, an independent investigative press  like Pro Publica that takes on topics like the rightwing money flowing into the black robe pockets of our illustrious Supreme Court Justices. Or last year's exposé, also thanks to Pro Publica, of Home Vestors.

You've probably seen the ads. Mostly it's some pleasant, smiley local-ish folks talking about how Home Vestors of America are the country's Number 1 housesellers, they've been in business more than 20 years, and that they buy ugly - and unugly - houses for cash. Quickly. 

The pleasant, smiley local-ish franchisers aren't trying to raise your anxiety. On the contrary, they're pleasantly and smile-ily telling you that they'll buy you out without your having to repair the leaky roof, get rid of the rat infested junkpile out back, or do anything. Other than sign on the dotted line.

Although the pleasant, smiley localish We Buy Ugly House franchisees aren't trying to raise your anxiety, they know that you're plenty anxious. And they know you're desperate and need to get your hands on some cash. Quick. 

So what if the offer is lowball - 50-75 percent of market value - you get the cash quickly. 

And sometimes, just sometimes, those pleasant, smiley local-ish have been known - I know, you will find this hard to believe - to prey on the elderly.

In one case, Cory Evans, an LA-based franchisee, convinced an 82 year old widow suffering from dementia to accept a lowball offer on her house while she was on her way into assisted living. She'd seen the number on a TV ad and gave the Ugly House people a call. Evans quickly swept in and sussed out the situation. Nice little well-maintained home, in reasonably good shape, no mortgage - all the easier for someone to accept a lower-than-low ball offer since they have nothing to pay off. Casanova was sold.

But Casanova was incapable of engaging in a complex negotiation. Although she was once a skilled bookkeeper and president of the local women’s club, dementia now carved into her short-term memory: A recent neurological assessment had found the 82-year-old was unable to say what year it was or name the city she was in. She routinely mistook her adult son for his uncle. (Source: Pro Publica)

Casanova's son David quickly learned that his mother had entered into an agreement and called Evans to cancel the sale. Evans claimed that he'd seen no evidence of dementia and told David Casanova no way. The two duked it out, and, after a protracted battle, David beat the Goliath of Home Vestors. 

After the fight for Corrine Casanova’s house was over, David sold it for $510,000 — $235,000 more than Evans had tried to pay for it. David said he did none of the repairs Evans had insisted, under oath, were necessary.

And, of course, the more repairs Corrinne Casanova thought she was facing, the more eager she had been to sell.

Meanwhile, Corrinne didn't get all that long to enjoy her time in assisted living. She died just 19 days after Cory Evans screwed her out of her house. 

Of course, not all of the pleasant, smiley local-ish franchisee are corrupt and rotten to the core.

But a ProPublica investigation — based on court documents, property records, company training materials and interviews with 48 former franchise owners and dozens of homeowners who have sold to its franchises — found HomeVestors franchisees that used deception and targeted the elderly, infirm and those so close to poverty that they feared homelessness would be a consequence of selling.

One franchisee claimed that they were trained to lie. 

How effective is Pro Publica? Well, based on the exposé, Home Vestors has put in some reforms. Sellers now have a three-day change-of-heart escape clause, and some policies, practices, and training methods have changed. 

As for Cory Evans, he "pleaded guilty to two felony counts of attempted grand theft of real property." He didn't do any jail time, but was removed as an owner from his franchise. Alas, the franchise itself wasn't terminated, and Evans' brothers continue to own it. Home Vestors could have kicked the bums out entirely, but their franchise is one of their highest earners, so...

Anyway, yay, Pro Publica! (I just made a donation.)

And if you didn't think I was going to bring this back to Trump, I got news for you.

Hopefully, they don't fully succeed, but the new Project 2025 regime is itching to dismantle our country's regulatory apparatus. God knows all those regulations could use a trim, but these guys are absolutist free market gung ho-ers. So we can look for consumer protections to weaken across the boards. Which means we're going to need independent investigative journalists like the folks at Pro Publica around. I'm pretty certain that they're going to matter more than ever over the next few years.