Jim Nielsen Expose’ Part 3 – Getting Rich In Office / Conflicts of Interest / Corruption

Get Ready folks. Jim Nielsen has a long history as an officeholder.

The previous expose’ I did on Jim Nielsen was based on a couple of Sacramento Bee articles.

I recently obtained a copy of a 12-page expose’ done on Senator Jim Nielsen by the Chico News and Review. The date of the expose’ was October 1990. This expose that was accurate was one of the main reasons why Jim Nielsen was defeated by challenger Mike Thompson for State Senate in 1990.

Given that I have been following Jim Nielsen’s demonstrated pattern of duplicity on Water, his participation in the attempt to gut the California GOP Platform and the like – I had some expectations for what I would see in the CN&R expose’. Nothing could really prepare me for what I was going to see in this article.

Here is a summary – again, heavily citing the article:

Jim Nielsen pocketed over $70,000 (in 1980’s dollars) of Honoraria (aka Speaking “fees”) while in office. The donors listed included many with legislation before the Sacramento Government.

Jim Nielsen took a salary from a pesticide manufacturer during the entire time he was in the State Senate – he used his office to successfully lobby the state board of water resources to do nothing about pesticide runoffs coming out of Northern California Rice Farms.

Jim Nielsen started taking a salary from a pesticide manufacturer in Woodland – while using his office to successfully lobby against efforts to address pesticide runoff by the water resources board many times. While I disagree with the CN&R’s leftist editorial bent in favor of the onerous current laws – the point here is that Nielsen had a grotesque conflict of interest and was 100% wrong as it appeared he was getting paid directly to intervene to stop efforts to clean up the Sacramento River.

Jim Nielsen appears to have paid his second wife $75,000 in “consulting fees” in order to artificially reduce his income to get out from under a messy divorce settlement related to the failure of his 17-year marriage to wife one. While the previously written about Sacramento Bee articles alluded to it, the CN&R went in to graphic detail (so will I later).

Jim Nielsen lobbied for and got approval of a state grant in 1987 of $500,000. Most of it went to construct a Co-generation plant in Williams that he had a financial interest in. Apparently, writing bills to benefit themselves is something Doug LaMalfa and Jim Nielsen have in common.

In 1990 after his divorce from wife #2, Jim Nielsen was sued by a business partner in the aforementioned power plant. He was accused of double-dealing and a conflict of interest. Nielsen’s attorney withdrew and submitted legal documents stating that Jim Nielsen owed him over $13,000 in unpaid legal fees.

From 1989-1990 – Nielsen is alleged to have been using his employees on State Payroll to do campaign work.

Jim Nielsen got caught declaring under penalty of Perjury that his residence at the time was in Rohnert Park. On documents related to the above mentioned Lawsuit, Neilsen listed his address as being in Woodland. Woodland was outside the Senate District that Jim Nielsen infested at the time and is also outside the current SD-04 district.

The Right On Daily blog will unpack each of the above issues in detail in the coming days – so that voters can be better informed about “Conservative Rancher” Jim Nielsen from Woodland.