By Harold Emert
RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The US Justice Department is investigating why JBS, the world’s largest and richest meatpacking company, headed by Brazilian brothers Joesley and Wesley Batista, both involved in the Lava Jato scandal, has received over US$62 million from President Trump’s Department of Agriculture.
The disclosure by the New York Daily News has outraged American farmers and their supporters. They observe that JBS reported a net income of US$273 million for the first quarter of 2019.
The owners of JBS are not allowed to leave Brazil due to charges filed against them by Lava Jato investigators.
Through plea bargaining, they were released after serving jail sentences (from September 2017 until March 2018) in exchange for inside information on payoffs to Brazilian government officials by the meatpacking industry.
The plea bargain was later rescinded because of suspicions by the Brazilian Prosecutor General that the Batista brothers and other JBS executives had “obstructed the investigation of criminal behavior they were aware of”.
JBS is accused of bribing 1800 politicians in Brazil, including candidates for President and other powerful figures, making payments of over R$5 million (US$1.2 million). The Batista brothers have confessed to bribing hundreds of officials in Brazil and have spent some time in jail.
The company received three payments or “bailouts” from a US$12 billion fund which the Trump Administration program originally designed to help American farmers, according to the Daily News report.
Attempting to determine if JBS violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, US Justice Department investigators were in Brazil late last year to interview the brothers.
Trump’s Agriculture Department reportedly issued US$14.5 million in bailout cash for pork products to JBS this February, and another US$25.6 million in early May, totaling more than US$62.4 million.