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8.10.26 · Washington Post

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  Speaker 1: Good morning, everybody, and welcome to the reading of the
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  Speaker 1: Washington Post for this Monday, August tenth. As you know,
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  Speaker 1: RADIOI is a reading service intended for people who are
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  Speaker 1: blind or have other disabilities that make it difficult to
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  Speaker 1: read printed material. You read it for today's Rod Brotherton,
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  Speaker 1: and usually we don't. But since it's the middle of
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  Speaker 1: August and weather can get really hot and dangerous, let's
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: take a look at our weather for the week. Today
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  Speaker 1: it'll be partly sunny and humid with a high ninety two,
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  Speaker 1: but it'll feel like one hundred Tonight, a thunderstorm, late
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  Speaker 1: low seventy four. Tuesday is showering storm, but the highest
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  Speaker 1: still eighty nine and feels like ninety five. The lowest
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  Speaker 1: seventy three. Wednesday, high eighty eight, again feels like ninety
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  Speaker 1: five with a couple of thunderstorms. Thursday humid with thunderstorm,
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  Speaker 1: high eighty four, low seventy Friday a shower and another thunderstorm,
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  Speaker 1: high eighty three, low sixty nine. Saturday, high clouds and humid,
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  Speaker 1: high eighty five but it feels like ninety four and
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  Speaker 1: a low sixty nine. And next Sunday humid and a thunderstorm.
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  Speaker 1: Around in the morning high eighty five, low sixty eight.
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  Speaker 1: Looking at the almanac, yesterday's high low eighty nine and
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  Speaker 1: seventy one, normal eighty seven and sixty six. Last year
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  Speaker 1: was eighty nine and sixty seven. The record high nineteen
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  Speaker 1: forty one was ninety nine degrees. The record low nineteen
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  Speaker 1: eighty nine was forty nine degrees. There was a trace
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  Speaker 1: of precipitation on Saturday. Months to date we've had point
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  Speaker 1: eight eight normal one point one one. Year to date
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  Speaker 1: twenty nine point sixty six average and normal thirty two
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  Speaker 1: point five nine. Last year forty two point nine one,
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  Speaker 1: and the record for yesterday's date was one point four
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  Speaker 1: to five in nineteen ninety two. Bore the sun of
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  Speaker 1: the moon. Sun rose this morning at six forty nine.
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  Speaker 1: It'll set tonight at eight thirty eight. The moon came
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  Speaker 1: up at three point fifty eight this morning, and we'll
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  Speaker 1: set tonight at seven twenty nine. At our weather trivia
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  Speaker 1: for the day, was the sunniest place in the world.
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  Speaker 1: The Eastern Sahara Desert is sunny ninety seven percent of
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  Speaker 1: the time. All right, let's take a look now at
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  Speaker 1: what's happening in the world. From the Washington Post, and
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  Speaker 1: our story today is weather related. How a perfect storm
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  Speaker 1: spread fire, heat, and smoke across the Northern Hemisphere. A
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  Speaker 1: Post analysis shows that about twenty percent of the land
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  Speaker 1: area covering around seven and a half million square miles
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  Speaker 1: experienced moderate or greater concentrations of soot released by wildfires
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  Speaker 1: at some point during July. Chicago and New York choked
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  Speaker 1: under orange and white skies. Madrid and Bordeaux, France, and
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  Speaker 1: flames licking at their doorsteps. Vast forests, rural communities and
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  Speaker 1: rich lands, and full of livestock. In Canada and Oregon,
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  Speaker 1: it burned, and all in the month of July alone.
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  Speaker 1: Major wild and their massive, suffocating plumes of smoke blanketed
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  Speaker 1: swaths of North America and Europe, in some cases combining
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  Speaker 1: with intense heat waves that exacerbated flammable conditions and contributed
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  Speaker 1: to human misery. According to a wildfire smoke analysis by
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  Speaker 1: The Washington Post, about twenty percent of the Northern Hemisphere
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  Speaker 1: land area covering around seven point five million square miles
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  Speaker 1: experienced moderate or greater concentrations of black carbon, the soot
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  Speaker 1: particles released by wildfire at some point during July that
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  Speaker 1: include large swaths of North America stretching into the Arctic Circle,
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  Speaker 1: as well as western and southern Europe and parts of
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  Speaker 1: Russia against the backdrop of a change in climate. July
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  Speaker 1: has illuminated what it can look like when severe weather
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  Speaker 1: had heightened frequency and intensity combines to form a hellish
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  Speaker 1: landscape like twenty twenty three and twenty four. This summer
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  Speaker 1: is the latest chapter in the northern hemisph fears. Fiery
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  Speaker 1: era wildfires become more frequent and intense and oppressive heat
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  Speaker 1: and smoke harming the health of millions becoming increasingly normal.
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  Speaker 1: It was like the perfect storm of very hot conditions
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  Speaker 1: with strong winds that fanned those flings, said Dmitri Kalishnikov,
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  Speaker 1: a climate postdoctoral researcher at the University of California MERCID,
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  Speaker 1: referring to the flames esaw exploded in Minnesota and Ontario
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  Speaker 1: in mid July. Heavy smoke from those fires made it
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  Speaker 1: sway through the Midwest and the East Coast in subsequent weeks,
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  Speaker 1: temporarily making cities there among the most polluted in the world.
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  Speaker 1: That direct clear linkage a big heat wave, lots of
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  Speaker 1: fire and then lots of smoke impacts was kind of
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  Speaker 1: a wow moment for me, Kalishnikov said. In some cases,
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  Speaker 1: the sprawl smoke lingered over densely populated cities for days,
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  Speaker 1: causing poor air quality that spread toxins and increased the
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  Speaker 1: risks of asthma, heart disease and strokes. There is no
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  Speaker 1: safe level of exposure to wildfire smokes. At Zeeva Gelidolf,
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  Speaker 1: a forest ecology expert at the University of guliph in Ontario,
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  Speaker 1: we just need to expect that this is the new normal.
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  Speaker 1: Cities such as Denver, Cleveland, Detroit, Milwaukee, New York, and
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  Speaker 1: Philadelphia all experienced at least four days with moderate or
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  Speaker 1: higher smoke concentrations during July. In Baltimore, Minneapolis, and Portland, Oregon.
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  Speaker 1: Italy was three moderately smoky days, while DC and Boston
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  Speaker 1: each had two. In Canada, Calgary, Edmonton, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto
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  Speaker 1: and Winnipeg all experienced three to five smoky days, while
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  Speaker 1: Spain's Madrid had three, in France's Border had four, and
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  Speaker 1: across many of these cities, Fire and smoke were not
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  Speaker 1: only the summer scourge. Many of the fires occurred in
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  Speaker 1: areas that have recently experienced record breaking temperatures from towering
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  Speaker 1: heat domes. The heat and dryness that spike has result
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  Speaker 1: of these powerful areas of high pressure can drive wildfire risks.
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  Speaker 1: A recent study by Kalishnikov and other researchers at uc
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  Speaker 1: MERCID found that from twenty one to twenty twenty four,
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  Speaker 1: more than forty percent of the area torched by flames
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  Speaker 1: in the Western United States had burned during or in
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  Speaker 1: the immediate aftermath of a heat wave. The conspicuous overlap
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  Speaker 1: between record breaking warmth, dryness, and or low snowpack and
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  Speaker 1: these fires is simply not a coincidence. Scientific evidence linking
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  Speaker 1: increasing extreme fire weather, as well as increasingly extreme wildfire themselves,
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  Speaker 1: to climate warming, is clear, wrote climate scientist Daniel Swayin
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  Speaker 1: in a series of posts on social media about the
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  Speaker 1: conditions across the hemisphere. Several factors could be behind this
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  Speaker 1: summer's many heat domes, changing jet stream wind patterns partly
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  Speaker 1: linked to El Nino, and a marine heat wave in
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  Speaker 1: the Pacific maybe playing a role, as could an unusual
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  Speaker 1: cold blob of water in the North Atlantic. The jet
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  Speaker 1: stream has been arcing up and over the United States
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  Speaker 1: and western Europe, with heat domes bubbling underneath. But heat
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  Speaker 1: dome doesn't make wildfire. There will not always be extreme
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  Speaker 1: wildfire outbreaks when exceptional heat and dryness occur. That is true,
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  Speaker 1: Swain added in one of his posts. But such conditions
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  Speaker 1: greatly raise the ceiling on what is possible in a
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  Speaker 1: warming world, and sometimes, as is happening now, that increased
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  Speaker 1: potential will be realized. In recent days, firefighters have made
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  Speaker 1: progress in containing blazes across the two continents and the
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  Speaker 1: region around Bordeaux. Authorities now allowed nearly one hundred and
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  Speaker 1: fifty thousand people back to their homes were orders reported
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  Speaker 1: to begin a recovery. Considering the damage to the ecosystem
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  Speaker 1: and the livelihoods, communities affected are going to need support
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  Speaker 1: from authorities for a very long time, said Maria Alcazar Castilla,
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  Speaker 1: the deputy regional director from the Red Cross in Europe.
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  Speaker 1: There are people that need to build their homes and
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  Speaker 1: recover livelihoods. All that in economic terms is extremely expensive.
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  Speaker 1: Some parts of the world have always been vulnerable to fire.
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  Speaker 1: Canada has enormous ranges of dense burreal forests roughly the
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  Speaker 1: size of the United States west of the Rocky Mountains,
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  Speaker 1: with few roadsdes and scant human population. That kind of
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  Speaker 1: forest has evolved to burn in order to rejuvenate, said
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  Speaker 1: Gen Beverly, a wildfire researcher at the University of Alberta.
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  Speaker 1: What has now grown susceptible to more extreme fires. That
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  Speaker 1: forest don't change quickly enough to be able to reflect
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  Speaker 1: in the data like that, and that means it's the
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  Speaker 1: climate change, Beverly said. Around fourteen thy five hundred square
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  Speaker 1: miles of Canada have burned through July thirty first this season,
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  Speaker 1: already above the ten year average, although not on pace
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  Speaker 1: to match the extreme fire seasons of twenty twenty three
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  Speaker 1: and twenty five. The intense conditions generated by July's wildfires
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  Speaker 1: include the fire in Bordeaux that created its own thunderstorm.
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  Speaker 1: The phenomenon known as pyrocumulin nobus clouds occurs when the
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  Speaker 1: intense heat of a wildfire since a column of hot
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  Speaker 1: air and smoke high up up into the atmosphere, where
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  Speaker 1: it cools and then condenses it there a cloud, resulting
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  Speaker 1: thunderstorms with high winds and lightning strikes can further fan
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  Speaker 1: the flames. It might last for one to three or
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  Speaker 1: four hours, and all the while it's connected to that
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  Speaker 1: fire source. The same time, the fire is being altered
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  Speaker 1: and energized by the storm that is generated, said Mike From,
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  Speaker 1: a meteorologist at the US Naval Research Laboratory. So it's
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  Speaker 1: a feedback loop. Now the Western American area is bracing
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  Speaker 1: from war the same A fast moving wildfire driven by
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  Speaker 1: strong winds and high temperatures swept across northwest Spokane on Saturday,
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  Speaker 1: before jumping the Spokane River and prompting the evacuation of
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  Speaker 1: thousands of people in California, Arizona, and Nevada. A new
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  Speaker 1: heat dome that's settled over the region this weekend is
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  Speaker 1: expected to send temperatures to up to one hundred and
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  Speaker 1: fifteen degrees fahrenheit in cities like Phoenix, and another bout
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  Speaker 1: of extreme heat could expand across the country in the
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  Speaker 1: days that follow next how predatory trade schools drained three
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  Speaker 1: hundred million dollars from the GI Bill and cheated veterans.
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  Speaker 1: For profit trade schools that educate military veterans under the
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  Speaker 1: GI Bill have built the federal government out of more
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  Speaker 1: than three hundred million dollars, often by charging eye popping
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  Speaker 1: sums for basic classes that only last a few days
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  Speaker 1: or weeks. According to the Washington Post investigation, in New Hampshire,
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  Speaker 1: an organic lawn care institute taught veterans how to grow
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  Speaker 1: grass and a course that took at most five days.
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  Speaker 1: The school typically built the Department of Veterans Affairs the
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  Speaker 1: VA fourteen nine hundred dollars per student, more than triple
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  Speaker 1: what it charged civilians not covered by the GI bill.
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  Speaker 1: Federal government paid the school more than two million dollars
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  Speaker 1: before it came under investigation and closed records obtained under
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  Speaker 1: the Freedom of information at Show. Another GI bill trade
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  Speaker 1: school based in New Hampshire charged eighteen five hundred dollars
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  Speaker 1: intuition to teach veterans how to make fake rocks out
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  Speaker 1: of concrete Federal document show, and that course lasted eight days.
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  Speaker 1: The school owner, a convicted tax evader, exploited veterans as
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  Speaker 1: free labor on building projects, according to public records and interviews.
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  Speaker 1: Before officials forced it to shut down. The VIA paid
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  Speaker 1: that school seventeen point eight million dollars over nearly seven years.
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  Speaker 1: In Texas, a destitute high school dropout opened a boot
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  Speaker 1: camp that trained novices to become heating and air conditioning
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  Speaker 1: technicians in just six weeks. Tuition and fees ran around
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  Speaker 1: twenty thousand dollars. Within three years, the school had reaped
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  Speaker 1: seventy two million dollars from the GI Bill to enroll
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  Speaker 1: more than thirty five hundred veterans. The owner bought a Lamborghini,
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  Speaker 1: a Ferrari, and a Bentley and spent almost two hundred
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  Speaker 1: thousand dollars at strip clubs before being arrested and convicted
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  Speaker 1: of fraud. Court record show the owner's trial. Several veterans
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  Speaker 1: described the boot camp as a slap dash operation that
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  Speaker 1: duped them with the hollow promises of a good paying career.
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  Speaker 1: I feel bamboozled, testified Ryan DeFranco, a marine veteran, said
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  Speaker 1: the school's deficient training caused him to lose three jobs.
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  Speaker 1: It's a nightmare that lives in the back of my
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  Speaker 1: mind all the time. The GI Bill ranks as one
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  Speaker 1: of the most popular benefit programs in US history. Since
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  Speaker 1: its inception near the end of World War II, more
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  Speaker 1: than twenty five million veterans everylied on it to pay
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  Speaker 1: for college, job training, and other benefit Some economists greats
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  Speaker 1: the GI Bill with helping to expand America's middle class.
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  Speaker 1: Military recruiters touted as a critical incentive for volunteers to
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  Speaker 1: enlist in the armed forces. Last year, taxpayers spent more
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  Speaker 1: than eleven billion dollars to educate about six hundred and
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  Speaker 1: sixty six thousand people under the GI Bill. Over the
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  Speaker 1: past two decades, Congress has passed laws to make the
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  Speaker 1: GI Bill more generous and flexible. Veterans no longer must
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  Speaker 1: use their benefits within the few years of leaving the
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  Speaker 1: Armed forces, and they can transfer benefits to their spouses
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  Speaker 1: or children. But lacks government oversight has given rise to
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  Speaker 1: chicanery and fraud, allowing predatory, for profit trade schools to
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  Speaker 1: cheat thousands of veterans out of training intended to help
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  Speaker 1: them build new careers. The Posts have found part of
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  Speaker 1: the problem is a loophole that allows trade schools to
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  Speaker 1: charge exorbit prices for brief, often rudimentary classes. The GI
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  Speaker 1: Bill generally covers up to thirty six months of expenses
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  Speaker 1: for students enrolled in college or vocational school. The VA
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  Speaker 1: now pays a maximum of thirty thousand, nine hundred and
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  Speaker 1: eight dollars annually in tuition at most private and for
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  Speaker 1: profit schools. Lower limits apply to public institutions, while the
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  Speaker 1: annual cap is designed to prevent price gouging. VA has
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  Speaker 1: no standard for minimum course length. Because school builds VA
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  Speaker 1: directly for tuition, Veterans who enroll in expensive short term
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  Speaker 1: classes often don't pay close attention to how much they cost.
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  Speaker 1: Another fundamental problem a dearth of rules governing the quality
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  Speaker 1: of training at trade schools. Unlike other federal student aid programs,
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  Speaker 1: the GI bill does not require trade schools to obtain
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  Speaker 1: academic accreditation. Lawmakers carve out an exception to allow veterans
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  Speaker 1: to attend vocational schools that do not grant degrees, as
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  Speaker 1: well as work study programs and apprenticeships. The weak regulations
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  Speaker 1: are compounded by poor supervision VA as contractual agreements with
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  Speaker 1: state officials to help approve and monitor GI built schools,
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  Speaker 1: especially unaccredited ones, and to make sure they comply with
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  Speaker 1: a few quality of short standards that exist. Many state agencies,
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  Speaker 1: in turn, lack resources to the effective watchdogs. According to
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: veteran advocacy groups and the agencies themselves, trade schools have
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  Speaker 1: largely escaped scrutiny because lawmakers and VA officials have focused
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  Speaker 1: their attention for the past two decades on the rapid
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  Speaker 1: growth of online colleges. And universities that cater to veterans
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  Speaker 1: but have drawn complaints about quality. Trade schools which students
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  Speaker 1: are required to attend in person, are a faull far
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  Speaker 1: smaller group, but they account for an outside share of
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  Speaker 1: GI bill fraud, the Post found. The Post made multiple
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: requests to interview Kenneth Smith, the executive director of the
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: VA's Education Service, for this investigation, and the department declined
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  Speaker 1: in response to a written request of questions via press.
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  Speaker 1: Secretary Quinn Slaven said the Post's finding that more than
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: three hundred million dollars has been lost to fraud during
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: roughly the past decade represents less than three tenths of
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  Speaker 1: one percent of the VA's educational budget during that period,
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  Speaker 1: underscoring the fact that protecting veterans and taxpayers from fraud
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  Speaker 1: is a top VIA priority. At the same time, he
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  Speaker 1: blamed state governments for enabling fraud within the GI bill program.
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  Speaker 1: The problem is that many state level bureaucrats have looked
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  Speaker 1: the other way for years. It's fraudster's robbed government programs, blind,
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  Speaker 1: Slaven said. In an email statement. He said a White
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: House anti fraud task force, led by Vice President of
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: JD Vance is moving at unprecedented speed and ferocity to
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  Speaker 1: root out the ways to abuse and criminal exploitation of
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: government programs in these areas and others. To examine the
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  Speaker 1: scope of GI Bill fraud gain insight into house schools
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: cheated taxpayers and veterans. The Post sought financial and enrollment
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: databases from VA under the Freedom of an Information Act,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: as well as records from investigations conducted by the VA
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  Speaker 1: Office of the Inspector Generals since the first Trump administration.
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  Speaker 1: The government denied these requests, citing privacy exemptions, but Post
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: filed a lawsuit to compel and release the material, arguing
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  Speaker 1: the disclosure was in the public's interest, and after a
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  Speaker 1: year long battle, VA and its Inspector General's office released
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: some of the databases and more than an eight thousand
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  Speaker 1: pages of documents from twenty fraud investigations that resulted in
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  Speaker 1: criminal convictions or civil fines. The Post also reviewed more
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  Speaker 1: than ten thousand pages of federal court records and trial transcripts,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: and obtained about fifteen hundred pages of public records from
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  Speaker 1: state agencies in Texas, California, and New Hampshire, Georgia and
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: Florida that were responsible for monitoring most of the twenty
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: schools investigated for fraud. The total losses to the federal
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: government and those investigations exceeded three hundred million dollars. Fifteen
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: of the twenty cases involved unaccredited trade schools. The documents,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: combined with dozens of independent interviews with veterans and school officials,
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: lay bare the extent of the fraud for the first
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: time and underscores VA's failure to tackle the root causes.
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: Almost all the schools that were investigated and violated VA's
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  Speaker 1: rules for years before they were caught. Most packed their
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: courses with too many veterans and not enough civilians, or
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: else charged veterans more, which is against the law. Investigators
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: found that one barber college in Mississippi illegally charged ten
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: times more for veterans than other students. Some schools falsely
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: claim they have been in operation for years. At several
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: trade schools, the administrators had criminal records that went undiscovered
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: for years because VA and state agencies aren't required to
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: conduct background checks. Some veteran advocacy groups say that VA
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: does not have sufficient tools, expertise, or political will to
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: prevent or reign in fraud. In truth, the configuration of
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: the program is so fundamentally flawed that almost anything goes
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: at any price, and therein lies the problem, said Barmack Nasserian,
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: vice president of the Veterans' Education Success, Washington based nonprofit
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: that lobbies for GI Bill improvements. I always wondered why
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: the mobs stuck to drug dealing and organized crime get
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: into this racket. It's easier money. According to a post
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: analysis of VA data, unaccredited schools cost taxpayers more money
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  Speaker 1: on average than accredited ones. Tuition rates and unaccredited schools
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: were thirty percent higher. About fifty nine thousand people, Roughly
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  Speaker 1: six percent of all GI Bill students attended unaccredited institutions
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: in twenty twenty five. Veterans also file complaints with VA
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: about unaccredited programs at a rate nearly five times higher
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  Speaker 1: than that for accredited ones. Federal data shows the GI
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: bill rules designed to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse, have
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: been largely unchanged for decades. Two weeks after Allied forces
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: invaded Normandy on D Day, President Franklin Roosevelt signed the
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: Serviceman's READJUSTMAK, known as the GI Bill. It provided educational
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: benefits and other financial aid to returning veterans. Millions of
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: former gis took advantage, so did the trade school industry,
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  Speaker 1: and within five years, the number of four vocational schools
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  Speaker 1: in the United States tripled. Government record show a wave
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  Speaker 1: of fraud followed. Many trade schools embraced dodgy marketing tactics.
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: Some television repair programs, for example, offered free TV sets
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  Speaker 1: to get veterans in the door and then fleeced VA
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: for their tuition. In nineteen fifty two, about one hundred
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  Speaker 1: and forty schools were facing criminal fraud investigations, and the
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: House of Representatives report at the time concluded there was
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: no doubt that hundreds of millions of dollars have been
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: frittered away on worthless training during the Korean War. As
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: millions more veterans now became eligible for GI Bill benefits,
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: Congress imposed rules intended to ensure quality amid another influx
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  Speaker 1: of unaccredited for profit trade schools. First, lawmakers decreed that
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: veterans on the GI Bill can make up no more
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: than eighty five percent of the students in the course,
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: and the schools like had to charge the same tuition
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: for veterans and non veterans. Alike. Second, unaccredited trade schools
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: had to be in the business for at least two
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: years before they could enroll veterans under the GI Bill.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: Logic behind the rules that if at school had a
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: track record with at least some civilians willing to pay
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: full price, then it probably provided an inadequate education. In practice, however,
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: compliance hinged to a large degree on an honor system. Today,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: the government still allows schools to self report their enrollment
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: and tuition data. Auditors are supposed to visit schools to
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: conduct compliance surveys, but they must provide notice. State agencies
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: such as Veterans Commissions and educational departments, many of them
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: under Resource Approve, and provide direct oversight of gibilt schools
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: on VA's behalf. Under federal law, VA requires schools to
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: post course catalogs and calendars online and to provide evidence
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: to officials of financial soundness, but state regulators and VA
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: pay almost no attention to what's going on in the classroom,
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: said Nassarian. The vice president and Veterans' education success. As
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: long as the paperwork is right, the question of what
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: did you teach and how much is a non question,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: he said. The twenty eighteen audit by VA Inspector General's
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: Office found that neither of the states nor the federal
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: government had effective financial controls in the place. The audit
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: estimated the VA could make two point three billion dollars
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: in improper GI bill payments over the next five years.
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: They also found that the risk of problems was particularly
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: high for a profit schools. In a statement to the Post,
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: a slave in the Via Press, Secretary highlighted recent actions
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: the department had taken to prevent fraud. Earlier this year,
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: he said VA created a tool that as signs of
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: fraud risk score to schools. In addition, he said VA's
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: Education Service started a Compliance Investigations and Enforcement Division to
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: spot fraud risks and refer cases to the Inspector General's Office.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Lavin said risk factors for fraud at GI bills schools
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: include rapid increase and enrollment, rapid increases and tuition arising
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: volume of complaints, low course completion rates, and a predatory
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: advertising and recruiting practices. He also said VA performs targeted
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: risk based reviews at schools that generates serious complaints where
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: the data analysis indicates the serious risk of non compliance.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: VA is focused on protecting veterans and taxpayers from fraud
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: like never before, he added, between twenty twenty and twenty
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: twenty four, the VA Inspector General's Office opened sixty four
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: investigations into suspected education fraud and referred forty seven cases
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: to the Justice Department for prosecution or civil enforcement. According
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: to data that the office provided to the Post, most
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: of the investigations focused on unaccredited for profit trade schools
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: currently in Former VA officials, however, said they suspect those
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: cases represent only a tiny percentage of the fraud that
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: actually occurs. They said VA's Education division places a higher
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: priority on processing payments on behalf of veterans then on
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: preventing or detecting fraud. There's a lot of fraud in
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: the education program. Michael Missel, who headed the Inspector General's
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: Office from twenty sixteen to twenty five, said in an interview,
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: we found lots of issues. In an interview with the Post,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: the current VA Inspector General, Cheryl Mason, said fraudulent gi
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: bill schools are becoming more creative and tophisticated in their schemes.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: The VA is a whole pot of money. All the
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: fraudsters see that. She said, they want to go after
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: taxpayer dollars, and VA has been given to support of
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: veterans in their families. Mason added that unaccredited schools pose
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: a special problem because there is less independent vetting and
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: limited government oversight. Staying on top of them is a challenge.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: In May eighteen, a VA employee was startled to discover
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: that for three years the government had been paying in
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: Ti Organic lawn Care Institute, a trade school based in Amherst,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: New Hampshire, as much as fourteen nine hundred dollars in
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: tuition per student to show veterans how to grow grass.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Even more surprising, the course took only four or five
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: days to complete. That could be a supervisor is aware
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: of how this school operates and everything is above board.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: The VA employee said, who worked out had a payment
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: processing center in Oklahoma and email several colleagues at the time, however,
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: I felt this warranted your review. Another VA official agreed
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: in an email that the tuition was enormously expensive and
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: questioned whether a lawn care program should qualify as a
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: vocational school under the GI Bill. The discovery prompted the
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: VA's Inspector General's Office to open an investigation into the
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: unaccredited lawn care institute, which would run by a married
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: couple in their forties, Tom and Deborah Kelly. Tom had
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: been in the lawn care business for three decades and
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: previously owned a turf company called The Lawn Dog. Deborah
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: was in charge of signing up GI Bill students and
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: building the VA. According to court records and investigative files,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: investigators suspected that NTI Organic lawn Care Institute was breaking
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: VIA rules and tuition must cost the same for veterans
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: and civilians. They doubted any civilians to pay for TIS
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: teeny nine hundred dollars of their own money to learn
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: how to grow grass. Federal document show they set up
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: an undercover sting operation. In January of twenty nineteen, a
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: special agent with a VA Inspector General, posing as a
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: former soldier named Brendan called the school and secretly recorded
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: the conversation. Brendan said he was a one hundred percent
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: disabled veteran with post traumatic stress disorder and looking for
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: a new career. According to the investigators files, a school
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: employee told Brennan he had called the right place. The
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: institute was the only organic lawn care school and the
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: country certified under the GI Bill. His night twenty fourteen,
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: nine hundred dollars, an addition, would be fully covered by the VA.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: At the end of the course, he'd receive a free
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: paybacks prayer, backpack sprayer, and enough product to start his
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: own grass growing business. Deborah Kelly then got on the line.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: She told Brennan it was so easy to make money
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: organical lawn care. It was like shooting fish in a barrel.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: According to a partial transcript of the call, this is
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: perfect for you, she said. A few weeks later, another
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: undercover agent visited the school, posing as a divorced IT
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: salesman who had never served in the military. According to
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: the investigator files, the agent explained he was interested in
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: the course because he wanted to get out of the
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: IT business and work with a buddy outdoors. This time,
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: Tom Kelly gave the sales pitch. We do chemical lawn care,
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: we do organic lawn care, he said. We just invite
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: everybody to the party. As investigators suspected what happen, Tom
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: Kelly quoted the undercover agent much lower price to take
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: the course forty nine hundred dollars or ten thousand, less
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: what the school charged veterans. Separately, agents found and interviewed
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: three civilians who had attended the school without paying any tuition,
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: which investigators determined was done so the institute could inflate
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: the numbers of mon non veteran students. The file show
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: one student said the Kelly's paid him three hundred dollars
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: to attend because they needed a body for the training.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: In August of twenty nineteen, law enforcement officials raided the
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: school's office, seizing records and digital evidence. The school was
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: soon forced to shut down. By then, it had charged
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: the VA about two point one million dollars in tuition
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: to educate one hundred and fifty seven veterans, according to
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: the investigators files. Investigators presented their findings to federal prosecutors,
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: and after four years, the US Attorney's Office from New
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: Hampshire decided not to bring criminal charges. Instead of the
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: Justice Department file a civil complaint against Debora Kelly under
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: the False Claims Act, alleging she had frauded VA by
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: violating the eighty five percent rule. The company and Tom
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: Kelly were not named in the suit. In twenty twenty four,
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: Debor Kelly reached its settlement, agreeing to pay two hundred
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: thousand dollars to the government. Court record show neither she
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: nor Tom Kelly responded to interview questions or requests from
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: the Post. Kelly's divorced after the school closed, according to
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: federal court records, and before opening Stonemaker's Academy in twenty ten,
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: David Montoya had a multi state trail of bad debts
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: and tax lanes dating back to the eighties, according to
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: federal and state court records. In his home state of
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: New Mexico, he had spent four years in jail, a
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: record show, but in New Hampshire, Montoya opened a small
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: masonry school that taught other contractors proprietary rock building techniques.
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: He had developed. Montoya's quick drying mix of cement and
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: nano fibers could be molded into imitation rocks and boulders
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: for backyard patios, retaining walls, and decorative waterfalls, and a
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: federal court filing, his attorney described the product as revolutionary, magical,
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: citing glowing customer reviews. The Manchester based business hit pay
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: dirt two years later received approval to enroll veterans under
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: the GI Bill. Montoya and Stonemakers, selled agents marketed the
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: school on Facebook, YouTube and other websites, promising to teach
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: veterans a lucrative new trade in just eight days. The
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: school emphasized that VA would cover full tuition, according to
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: promotional brochures and videos. Courses were offered in New Hampshire
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: during the summer and in Florida during the winter. What
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: Stonemaker's Academy didn't advertise was the price sticker for veterans
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: eighteen thousand, five hundred dollars. Michael Nullion, an Army veteran
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: from Florida, then in his mid twenties, signed up for
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: a Stonemaker's class in Orlando in twenty sixteen. In an
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: interview with The Post, he said he paid no tuition
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: and paid no attention at the cost. Bud figured the
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: school must be legit because VA notified him it would
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: take care of the bill. Nullion said he in about
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: thirty other students spent the first day in a rented
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: conference room where Montoya taught the basics of molding cement.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: But Union added when Montoya tried to demonstrate the hardness
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: and durability of fake rock sample, it cracked into pieces.
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: After that Ullion said the students were divided into cruise
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: and spent the remainder of the eight day course assigned
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: to work at job sites as free labor. Ullion said
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: it struck out but returned home feeling disgusted. I was
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: wondering how VA could approve something like that, he said. Basically,
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: it was all a lie. He said that when he
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: filed a complaint with the VIA after but nobody got
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: back to me. The officials have said in public statements
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: that they review complaints and four ones they consider valid
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: the schools to resolve. The department also posts online the
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: number of complaints the school has generated in the past
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: twenty four months, but according to veterans' advocacy groups, VA
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: seldom investigates the validity of complaints that simply has no
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: mechanism to compel schools to correct problems. In July twenty seventeen,
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: VIA Inspector General opened the investigation. By then VA had
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: paid Stonemakers about fifteen million dollars to train nearly one
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: thousand veterans. Federal document show VA in the state of
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: New Hampshire had been aware from the outset the Stonemakers
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: charged hefty subs to train veterans how to make concrete
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: look like rocks, according to a memo written by a
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: VA official, But the investigation was triggered a VA employee
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: reported suspicions to the Inspector General's office that the school's
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: falsifying its accounting records. According to the case file, federal
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: agents soon found evidence of that and more. A whistleblower
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: who worked at Stonemaker's academy cold investigators the school served
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: as a gravy train from Montoya and that he used
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: students as free labour on his jobs. The whistleblower reported
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: that virtually all the students were veterans, in clear violation
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: VA rules, and that Stonemakers kept phony class rosters according
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: to its investigators notes. In an interview with The Post,
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: the whistleblower described Stonemakers as a boiler room type operation
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: that exploited to many veterans who were down on their luck,
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: including those suffering from combat injuries and drug or alcohol problems.
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: The whistleblower spoke to the Post on the condition of
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: anonymity because the person helped law enforcement as a confidential informant.
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: Federal agents asked whether the whistleblowers to secretly record phone
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: conversations with the vice president of Stonemaker's Academy, an attorney
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: named ron De Simpson, who was responsible for ensuring that
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: Stonemakers complied to the VA rules. Investigators file showed in
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: one of the recorded calls, she urged the whistleblower not
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: to cooperate with agents and to feign ignorance of the
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: VA mandate that no more than any five percent of
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: the students could be on the GI bill. You don't
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: have to pretend that you don't know what that rule
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: is all about, Simpson said. According to an excerpt from
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: the call transcript, Simpson and Montoya had been doctoring spreadsheets
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: and forging enrollment contracts that they submitted to the VA,
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: concealing how Stonemaker's Academy had been routinely violating the eighty
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: five percent rule and charging veterans far more than civilians.
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: Court record show Stonemakers Academy closed in twenty eighteen, but
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: it became clear the school was in legal jeopardy. In
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. Investigators presented their case to federal prosecutors in
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: New Hampshire, but the lead prosecutor retired and progress on
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: the case slowed. Investigators file showed in May of twenty
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: twenty four, Montoya and Simpson each pled guilty to conspiracy
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: to make false statements to federal officials. Prosecutors remitted that
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: both defendants received probationary sentences, arguing to the judge that
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: no fraud occurred at Stonemakers because the rock making courses,
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: dubious as they were, did take place as advertised. US
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: District Judge Paul Barbaradoro refused to accept the sentencing recommendations, however,
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: calling it extremely generous. Barbaradoo said it appeared that Montoya
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: and Simpson deliberately tried to trick the government so they
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: could receive millions of dollars in payments that they were
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: not entitled to receive. He also suggested that VIA was
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: stupid for having weak rules and failing to enforce them.
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: In the end, the judge gave both defendants home detention
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: for one year, followed by three years of probation, and
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: they were also each ordered to pay two hundred thousand
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: dollars in restitution to the VA. Neither Montoya nor Simpson
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: responded to interview requests for this article. In her sentencing
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: in June of twenty twenty five, Simpson apologized, I acknowledge
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: that things happened on my watch that should not have
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: and for that I am sorry. In Texas, the state
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: with most veterans, VA relies on a state agency, the
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: Texas Veterans Commission, to approve unaccredited schools under the GI
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: Bill and review the qualifications of applicants. Schools must show
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: that they have adequate classroom space and equipment, as well
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: as a written curriculum, qualified instructors, and an academic calendar.
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: They also need to prove that they've been in operation
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: for at least two years and they are financially stable.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: Even by those bare minimum standards, however, the state Commission
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: failed to detect obviously obvious red flags with retail Ready
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: career industry. The air conditioning repair school that yielded seventy
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: two million dollars in losses for the VIA. Based in
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: the city of Garland near Dallas, retail Ready was started
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: by Jonathan Dean Davis, a high school dropout with a
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: history of failed business ventures. When Davis applied to the
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: Texas Veterans Commission in twenty fourteen for permission to enroll
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: veterans under the GI Bill, the school existed in name only.
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: It was also in financial straits. Court record show he
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: owed about a million dollars to creditors and faced a
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: felony charge after bouncing a twenty five thousand dollars check.
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: Utilities in his apartment had been turned off and he
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: was brushing his teeth with melted ice. I really don't
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: have much left that I can pawn, he wrote in
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: an electronic journal that was later seized by authorities. More
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: days without money or ahead and begging for miracles. In
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: a desperate bid to tap into the GI bill, Davis
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: concealed his legal and financial distress from the Texas Veterans
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: Commission and falsely claimed he had sufficient cash to operate
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: the school for three months. According to his journal and
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: trial testimony, He also falsely stated that retail Ready had
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: been in existence for two years. Federal court record show
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: in July twenty fourteen, the Commission approved the school application
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: without conducting a criminal background check or an independent review
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: of Davis's finances. According to trial testimony and court findings,
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: the agency also approved retail Ready sky high tuition between
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: eighteen and twenty thousand dollars per students for a six
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: week course or ten times what many Texas community colleges
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: charged for an entire semester. Officials with the Texas Veterans
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: Commission declined the Post's requests for an interview, but provided
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: responses to written Requestions said the tuition fees must be
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: disclosed as students before they enroll, but the Commission added
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: there was no statutory authority that grants it the ability
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: to determine or regulate what constitutes a reasonable tuition or
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: fee rate. Retail Ready marketed the course to veterans around
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: the country, promising that the GI bill would also cover
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: their airfare and living expenses. In Texas soon was paying
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: the tuition more than one million dollars a month to
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: train scores of veterans. Davis then spent four hundred and
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: twenty eight thousand dollars on a Lamborghini, two hundred and
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: eighty two thousand dollars on a Ferrari, two hundred and
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: sixty thousand dollars on a Bentley Continental GT. Lesser sums on,
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: two Mercedes Benzes, and a Dodge Ram pickup. He also
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: bought a two point two million dollar Dallas mansion with
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: a grand piano, a home movie theater, and a gymnasium
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: court record show. In addition, Davis acknowledged spending under two
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars at strip clubs. In twenty seventeen, a
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: former retail Ready employee filed a complaint with the Texas
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: Veterans Commission, alleging financial misconduct by the school. Commission. Document
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: show commission staff showed up for a site visit. They
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: reviewed the school's books and found nothing wrong, according to
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: the documents. The complaint, however, also triggered a referral to
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: VA's Inspector General, which and its own investigation agents raided
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: the school. In Davis's house, they confiscated Davis's electronic journal,
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: in which he said he had lied on the school's
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: GI bill application about his finances and legal problems, public
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: records show. In twenty twenty, Davis was invited indicted on
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: charges including wire fraud and winny laundry. During his trial,
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: prosecutors portrayed the school's tuition rates as outrageous and emphasized
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: how Davis used the money to live the high life.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: A parade of veterans testified they received lousy training and
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: that their GI bill benefits were wasted. This case was
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: about three things, lies, greed, and the military veterans that
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: the defendant used to get rich, Douglas Brasher, the leading prosecutor,
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: told the jury. Other veterans who testified as witnesses for
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: the defense, said they were satisfied with the experience at
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: Retail Ready. Brandon Molding, a Marine veteran from North Carolina,
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: said it launched him on a successful career as a
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: service technician, making twenty two dollars an hour. I wouldn't
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: have gotten as far as I had without going through
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: that school. Defense attorneys also noted accurately that the tuition
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: rates were no secret. They had been approved by VA
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: and the Texas Veterans Commission, and were disclosed in each
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: student's contract with the school. In twenty twenty one, the
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: jury convicted Davis on eleven counts of wire fraud and
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: money laundering, finding that he had defrauded VA by lying
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: about the school's finances, falsely stating it had been in
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: operation for two years before it en roll veterans. US
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: District Judge Brantley Starr sentenced him to nearly twenty years
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: in prison and ordered him to pay sixty five million
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: dollars in restitution. In an interview with the Post from
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: a minimum security federal prison outside Dallas, David said he
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: was wrongly convicted. Prosecutors. He said, we're trying to show
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: that I'm living a lavish lifestyle and that the students
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: weren't getting the quality education because I was too busy
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: spending money on a Lamborghini and a mansion. You show
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: me a law the Senate's a crime to buy nice cars,
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: he added. On the surface, yes, twenty grand for six
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: weeks sounds absolutely absurd, David said at the school's tuition,
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: but he said it paid for a student's airfare to Dallas,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: six weeks of lodging and meals, plus a large placement
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: office that arranged jobs, interviews retail Ready, he said, was
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: hardly the only school to read million dollars from the
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: federal government. Every school is in existence for profit, he said. Harvard,
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: he noted, pays zero dollars in property taxes, and government
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: taxpayers still shoveled billions of dollars to them. Well, what
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: do people think happens with that money? Does anybody not
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: think that any of those school administrators drive a Ferrari
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: and that Pentagon presses defense firms to build weapons as
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: the Iran war has depleted stocks. The Pentagon is asking
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: the US defense industry to rapidly escalate the production and
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: delivery of weapons, including the munitions that are extreme shortage
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: due to the war of Iran. According to a Defense
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: Department memo obtained by The Washington Post, Deputy Defense Secretary
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: Steve Feinberg route to industry leaders on Wednesday, saying they
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: had no more than twenty one days to submit plans
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: to drive significantly faster, more aggressively, deliver schedules, and increase
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: production for critical capabilities. According to the memo, which has
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: previously been unreported, years long development cycles are not acceptable.
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: Feinberg wrote, we must dramatically accelerate our program schedules and
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: expand our production capacity now. The directive comes as the
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: weapon shortage has been a source of tension between President
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: Trump and the Defense Department. To people with the familiar
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: with the issue recently. The Post is also the latest
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: in a series of actions the Pentagon and the White
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: House have taken to address an issue that may largely
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: remain unresolved until the gridlock Congress releases additional defense spending.
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: According to industry experts. Trump on Thursday said the United
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: States says massive amounts of munitions posting on truth social
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: and large amounts are being manufactured and shipped to the
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: US as needed. Fineberg's note comes after efforts by the
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: White House to enlist the defense industry to unlock military funds.
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: In late July, legacy defensed contractors and Silicon Valley weapons
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: startups were someone to the White House to meet with
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: Trump's Chief of Staff Susie Wilds, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth,
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vote, and White
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: House Legislative Affairs Director James Braid. According to three people
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: familiar with the event, In the meeting, which included firms
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: such as Lockheed, Martin, arthorpe Grumming, Boeing, atomless weapons firms,
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: and Rill and Data and analytics company Planeteer, company executives
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: were asked to directly lobby lawmakers to increase defense spending
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: through congressional reconciliation, that people said. Fox News earlier reported
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: this meeting. The Pentagon has in recent months announced several
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: framework agreements with the large is US defense contractors and
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: emerging startups to increase the supply of both low cost
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: munitions and sophisticated air defense weapons like the Terminal High
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: Altitude Area Defense or THAD and Patriot missile interceptors. These
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: framework arrangements are legal, non binding contracts between the US
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: government and private sector partners that signaled the Defense Department's
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: intent to purchase weapons, but rely on Congressional funding to
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: become final. Industry experts said they are agreements to agree,
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: so they're not contracts. Said Tom Karrico, director of the
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: Missile Defense Project, that the think tank Center for Strategic
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: and International Studies, almost nothing has been contracted and that's
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: the problem. Working directly with industry leaders to accelerate production
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: is not new. It has been the clear intent of
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: the President and this Secretary from the start, Pentagon chief
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement. He added that
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: in the Feinberg Memo, a reel is real and will
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: inform the fiscal year twenty twenty eight budgets submitted to
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: Congress funding and is entirely consistent with their ongoing push
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: to rebuild the defense industrial base. In the first month
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: of the Iran war alone, the US fired off more
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: than eight hundred and fifty Tomahawk cruise missiles and more
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: than one thousand Patriot and THAD interceptors. The Post previously reported.
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: The US also used more than thirteen hundred of the
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: Army's tactical ballistic missiles in the initial weeks of the fighting.
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: As of last week, the global in of Patriot missiles
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: had fallen from twenty two hundred before the war to
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: fewer than eight hundred and twenty seven, and THAD missiles
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: from four hundred and fifty two to fewer than two
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: hundred and seventy eight. According to an analysis by CSIS,
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: The department depleted US stockpile of munitions and defense systems
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: has increased the risk to US service members and forced
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: the White House to back away from escalating attacks. The
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: Post previously reported. The Pentagon has made efforts over the
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: last few months to increase its weapons supply. On Monday,
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: the Defense Department announced a framework agreement from Northrop Grumman
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: and Lockheed Martin to increase production of the Patriot Advanced
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: Capability three pack and THAD missiles. Last week, the Pentagon
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: awarded the Lockheed Martin contract worth up to fifty eight
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: point six billion dollars to triple production of pack threes
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: by twenty thirty. In May, the Pentagon announced several framework
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: agreements defense tech companies including Ander, Reel, Castilion Co, Aspire,
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: le Dos, and Zone five to aggressively expand the US
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: military strike capabilities and purchase their low cost missiles. The
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: Department in late June also hosted leaders from various Silicon
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: Valley startups, indicating they will be crucial in resupplying the
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: US with weapons. Speaking in November at the National War
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: College in Washington, Hegsith outlined his vision to overhaul the
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: Pentagon's acquisition process in partnership with US industry to ensure
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: it can operate on a wartime footing. American industry and
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: its innovative spirit are begging to be unleashed to solve
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: our most complex and dangerous war fighting problems, he said.
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: We need to get out of our own way, out
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: of your way, and enter into real partnership with you,
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: rather than over prescribe and decelerate your natural progress. The
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: Pentagon has bought brought in former Silicon Valley business leaders,
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: such as former Uber executive Emil Michael to serve as
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: the Defense Departments Under Secretary for Research and Engineering and
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: overhaul the defense innovation and procurement process, but moving forward
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: with the Pentagon's framework agreements to purchase weaponry crucial to
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: Defense Department strategy. To expedite acquisition depend on congressional passage
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: of a one point one point five trillion dollar defense
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: spending bill, which remains deadlocked as Democrats object to mass
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: of spending increases. That's the dilemma and that's the danger.
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: Kerko said, This really really critical thing is in jeopardy
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: because of congressional inability to appropriate. In the memo, Feinberg
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: said the Defense Department is fundamentally shifting how it develops, produces,
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: and fields military capabilities to meet current and future challenges.
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: Feinbart and Feinberg deemed several weapons programs critical and under
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: consideration for acceleration or increased procurement during the twenty twenty
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: eight fiscal year budget review. It included the next Generation
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: Interceptor Missile Defense program, the National Advanced Surface to Air
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: Missile System, and a mobile air defense radar system, an
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: advanced pilot training system, and a space based system for
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: missile tracking. The Feinberg Mello task industry leaders to plan
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: for accelerated delivery that would provide the fastest production schedule
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: to deliver a projected orders and increased capacity. It also
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: asked defense firms to propose specific capital investments and facility
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: expansions to support the Department's commitment to hire volume, sustained orders.
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: Find burg adit address how we will collaborate as partners,
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: and demonstrate your willingness to put skin in the game,
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: he wrote. Kerko said some defense contractors are spending their
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: own money to fund future production costs while Congress is
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: in a gridlock and framework agreements away to approval. But
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: he said that comes with a risk for industry. It's
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: a little bit of a gamble because they're sticking their
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: neck out. He said, they're publicly traded companies, and you're
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: not supposed to really stick your neck out on a promise. Now, finally,
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: the mall rank where they fell in love and skated
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: for nearly sixty years, is closing. The air still smells
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: like pretzels and caramel corn, teenagers and heavy eyeliner that
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: still spilled out of hot topic, and young girls practice
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: figure skating jumps on the ice. But construction crews had
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: started dismantling half of the mall, and they soon would
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: do the rink and it would be gone too for now.
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: Jerry Leonard skated away from the boom box he had
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: set up and toward a woman he had been his
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: partner in everything for sixty years. He took her hand,
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: and the opening chords of Celean Dion's Because You Loved
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: Me played. Tally Leonard looked up and Jerry felt what
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: he had always felt, heaven on Earth, and they began
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: to skate. He was seventy five, she turned eighty one
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: this week. A cougar, their friends joked. Tally and Jerry
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: had skated together on this shrink for the first time
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty seven, and it had been the center
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: of their lives ever since. They were there for days
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: a week, nearly every week, and even now middle agers
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: who hadn't visited in two decades knew to show up
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: for their one pm dance. Whole generations grew up believing
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: the mall and as stalwart skating couple would always be there.
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: But Americans stopped going to big shopping centers the country.
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: Nearly fifteen thousand had closed as online shopping boom. The
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: Lloyd's Center in Portland, Oregon lost its department stores. Years ago,
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: the mall hung on as a funky collection of art museums,
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: music studios, and a children's play spase called Mudland. People
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: continued to twirl and fall on the first floor rink,
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: but Portland officials decided long ago they wanted something different
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: on these twenty nine acres. Last month, the city council
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: approved a plan for mixed use housing and green space.
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: A group of skaters petitioned to save the rink for
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: Jerry Tally in Portland, but cities rejected the appeal. The
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: mall closes Saturday. Jerry knew as he and Tally looped
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: around the young people in baggy jeans, that he had
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: only a few days left to glide around across the ice.
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: But he wasn't ready to give himself over to grief.
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: Nothing lasts forever. He knew, Ceylon Dion no longer toured,
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: boom boxes were out of style, Cities change muscles, atrophy.
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: But Jerry and Tally had never known each other without
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: this shopping mall rink. What would happen when they lost it?
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: Who would they be if they couldn't skate? Looking back,
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: Jerry thanks of their story as one of a fateful
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: few steps. Would he have learned the sport had he
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: hadn't caught that leave it to Beaver episode where the
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: gullible beef By skates three sizes too big? And would
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: he have met Tally if his local rink and Yakama,
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: Washington stayed open year round. Their lives had only crossed
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: because of an out of town instructor told Jerry he
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: ought to spend the summer months in Portland, a city
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty five miles south were there's a
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: girl who skates like you. Jerry didn't imagine she would
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: want to skate with him as a hick from the sticks,
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: But one Tuesday in late February, he had the day
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: off from school, so Jerry and a group of friends
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: drove down to meet Tally. He couldn't believe how smooth
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: skater Tally was. She was better than he was, but
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: he knew what the instructor meant. They both had a
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: soft way of moving, with good leg extensions and the
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: same way of holding themselves on the ice. They skated
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: to whatever the radio was playing. Then maybe the Turtles
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: Happy Together or Ruby Tuesday by Rolling Stones was the
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: closest he had ever felt to flying heaven on earth.
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: He thought for the first what would become an unaccountable
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: number of times. Jerry would ask himself later what would
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: become of their partnership without the mole. For now, the
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: song was over, and Tally was a few feet away.
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: He skated toward her and wrapped his arm around her
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: back and kissed her as we always had. When the
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: teenagers and remote workers clapped, they bowed and left the ice.
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: And this conclusion reading of the Washington Post for today, Monday,
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: August tenth. Your reader has been Rod Brotherton. Thank you
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: for listening, and now places stay tuned for continued programming.