On Background with Susan Crabtree

Ep. 26 | California's $6 Gas and the Reality Star Who's Beating the Mayor

California's primary is next week and the numbers are wild! A reality TV star is within 1 point of the sitting LA mayor. One Democrat running for governor said on camera that California "needs Chevron" while taking their checks. Another has spent $195 million on ads and is still stuck in the polls. And two Republicans are splitting the vote in a way that may hand the governor's race entirely to Democrats, cutting off the only real check on Gavin Newsom's record. Susan Crabtree and Eric Eggers break it all down on this week's On Background.

Ep. 25 | Steve Hilton on Newsom's Empire of Waste

Steve Hilton is leading the race for governor of California, and he sat down with Susan Crabtree and Eric Eggers to explain why. The numbers tell the story. California ranks 50th out of 50 for opportunity. 50th out of 50 for business climate, ten years in a row. Highest poverty rate, highest unemployment, highest cost of living. Where is the money going? Hilton's Golden Together fraud reports found $928 million of a $1 billion climate fund, money meant to put solar panels on low-income apartment buildings, redirected to Democrat political organizing. A separate nonprofit, Tzedek, gets roughly 80 percent of its revenue from taxpayers and openly hires "paid canvassers of varying immigration status, including undocumented" to elect Xavier Becerra. This is what one-party rule buys you.   Follow on X! @susancrabtree @Eric_Eggers

Ep. 24 | Secret Service FAILS Again After WHCD Attack

A gunman opened fire at the White House Correspondents Dinner with the President, Vice President, and most of the Cabinet in the same room. The Secret Service Director called the setup “perfect.” On this episode of On Background, Susan Crabtree and Eric Eggers are joined by former House Oversight Chairman Jason Chaffetz to examine what actually happened, what the agency is still hiding, and why a decade of warnings has produced almost no reform.   Chaffetz, who led the most aggressive Secret Service oversight in modern congressional history and authored a 2015 committee report titled “United States Secret Service: An Agency in Crisis,” walks through the structural failures that have only worsened. The average Secret Service employee receives 30 minutes of training per year. The agency is roughly 1,000 agents short. Many uniformed officers patrol the White House grounds without ever having been inside the building. The promised White House training replica has ballooned from $8 million to more than $140 million.   Susan adds her latest reporting, including new details about the Butler, Pennsylvania assassination attempt, the supervisors who were promoted instead of disciplined, the campaign’s request to remove the farm equipment that would have blocked the gunman’s line of sight, and an internal culture that has stopped responding to her questions since her exclusive reporting on a Secret Service agent investigated for alleged tax fraud.   The episode also covers Director Sean Curran’s leadership, the missing transparency about which officer was actually hit, ongoing congressional briefings led by Chairman James Comer, and the six structural reforms Chaffetz says must happen before the World Cup brings unprecedented protective demands to American soil.   This is a sober look at the institution charged with protecting American leaders, and the consequences of letting it fail in slow motion.   Follow on X! @susancrabtree @Eric_Eggers

Ep. 23 | Swalwell's Fall, the Corruption Machine & the Law to Silence Journalists

Eric Swalwell's exit from the California governor's race was abrupt. But according to Susan Crabtree, it was not unexpected.   In this episode of On Background, Susan Crabtree and Eric Eggers trace the years of rumored misconduct that preceded Swalwell's fall, the political calculation behind his implosion, and what it reveals about access journalism in both California and Washington, D.C. They examine the congressional ethics system, including the slush fund used to quietly settle harassment claims, and why it is structurally incapable of accountability.   They also turn to the race to replace him. Billionaire Tom Steyer has emerged as the Democratic frontrunner, despite admitting he has not been following Gavin Newsom's record and having rolled out a plan that would effectively end immigration detention in California.   Then Crabtree details the story she is currently reporting: the network of immigration nonprofits absorbing billions in taxpayer funds, including money used to shield convicted felons from deportation. In response to that kind of journalism, California legislators have introduced a bill that would fine reporters $10,000 and subject them to jail time for investigating those organizations.   Crabtree also previews a coming investigation into how sexual harassment cases within the California congressional delegation were handled over the years, and who knew what, when.   Follow on X! @susancrabtree @Eric_Eggers @Govt_Acct_Inst   Watch full episodes of On Background with Susan Crabtree and Eric Eggers on the Government Accountability Institute YouTube channel.   Watch Here: https://www.youtube.com/@Govt_Acct_Inst

Ep. 22 | California's Empire of Fraud

California's fraud problem is no longer a local story. Federal investigators are now pursuing thousands of cases tied to state-run programs, and Susan Crabtree has been on this story for months.   In this episode of On Background, Susan Crabtree and Eric Eggers detail the scope of what they call California's empire of fraud. They cover the DOJ's Never Say Die hospice fraud arrests, the collapse of the state's COVID-era unemployment insurance system, and the explosive growth of the In-Home Support Services program, a Medi-Cal sub-program now linked to widespread abuse. They also examine the political infrastructure that allowed the fraud to grow, including officials who were promoted rather than held accountable.   Crabtree previews her next area of investigation: the nonprofit networks she calls the immigration industrial complex, which channels more than a billion dollars toward shielding illegal immigrants, including convicted felons, from deportation.   This episode offers a detailed, sourced look at how California's governing failures have reached a national scale.   Follow on X!   @susancrabtree @Eric_Eggers @Govt_Acct_Inst   Watch full episodes of On Background with Susan Crabtree and Eric Eggers on the Government Accountability Institute YouTube channel.   Watch Here: https://www.youtube.com/@Govt_Acct_Inst [https://www.youtube.com/@Govt_Acct_Inst]