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Documents: LightSquared shaping up as the FCC’s Solyndra

Published: 12:12 AM 02/21/2012 | Updated: 6:41 PM 02/21/2012

By Matthew Boyle - The Daily Caller


WASHINGTON, DC - DECEMBER 21

Documents and copies of communications obtained by The Daily Caller indicate that the Federal Communications Commission propped up broadband company LightSquared with favorable regulatory decisions and other special treatment, while driving its competition out of business.

In August 2008, Wall Street hedge fund Harbinger Capital Partners, owned by longtime Democratic political donor Philip Falcone, sought to buy a majority stake in the satellite company SkyTerra — the company that would later become LightSquared. On June 27 of that year, just before Falcone’s Harbinger Capital sought FCC approval for that purchase, Falcone donated $28,500 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. But on Sept. 3, 2008, $20,000 of that donation was returned for an unknown reason.

The donation was unusual for Falcone: He had only donated to Democrats in and around New York City over the past decade, and he had a long record of donating to Republicans, including to George W. Bush’s presidential campaigns in 1999 and 2004. But Falcone’s DSCC contribution was the first in what would become a pattern of major Democratic donations in the coming months and years.

Before Barack Obama became president, he was personally an investor in SkyTerra. Falcone’s Harbinger Capital Partners donated $50,000 to Obama’s inaugural committee on Jan. 20, 2009, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. At the time, Falcone was still looking for the FCC’s sign-off on his hedge fund’s desire to purchase a majority stake in SkyTerra. The George W. Bush administration had failed to green-light the deal.

According to White House visitor logs, Obama’s new FCC chairman, Julius Genachowski, a classmate of the president’s from Harvard Law School, met with White House Personnel Director Don Gips on Feb. 18, 2009. Gips’ personal financial disclosure forms show he had between $250,000 and $500,000 of his personal finances invested in SkyTerra via stock options. Gips bundled at least $500,000 in donations to Obama’s 2008 election campaign, and served on the advisory board of Obama’s White House transition team.

It’s unclear what specifically Gips and Genachowski were discussing at that White House meeting; but shortly after that meeting SkyTerra named two members of Obama’s White House transition team to senior leadership positions at the company. On March 9, 2009, SkyTerra hired Gary Epstein, an FCC political appointee for the first few months of the Obama administration and a member of Obama’s transition team, as its executive vice president. On May 11, 2009, SkyTerra named Jeff Carlisle, another Obama transition team member, to serve as its vice president of regulatory affairs.

Not too long after those Obama-tied hires, lawyers for Falcone’s Harbinger fired off an email that may suggest FCC coordination to approve the sale of SkyTerra to Harbinger outside of what is procedurally acceptable. In an email titled “we’re signed off with Team Telecom,” Henry Goldberg of Harbinger’s law firm, Goldberg, Godles, Weiner & Wright, wrote to FCC International Bureau Chief Howard Griboff on July 24, 2009.

Read more:

http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/21/documents-lightsquared-shaping-up-as-the-fccs-solyndra/#ixzz1n8y0HpdX