Catholic Church Spent $2M on Major N.Y. Lobbying Firms - dtss.us

Catholic Church Spent $2M on Major N.Y. Lobbying Firms to Block Child-Sex Law Reform

The state Catholic Conference has turned to some of Albany’s most well-connected and influential lobby firms to help block a bill that would make it easier for child sex abuse victims to seek justice.

The Catholic Conference, headed by Timothy Cardinal Dolan, has used Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker, Patricia Lynch & Associates, Hank Sheinkopf, and Mark Behan Communications to lobby against the Child Victims Act as well as for or against other measures.

They have spent more than $2.1 million on lobbying from 2007 through the end of 2015, state records show. That does not include the conference’s own internal lobbying team.

Filings show the lobbyists were retained, in part, to work on issues associated with “statute of limitations” and “timelines for commencing certain civil actions related to sex offenses.” Other issues included parochial school funding and investment tax credits.

“They are willing to spend limitless money in order to basically keep bad guys from being accountable for their actions,” said Melanie Blow, chief operations officer of the Stop Abuse Campaign. “I think they’re doing it because they don’t want to have to pay out settlements.”

Pedophilia has become a huge topic of discussion over recent weeks as not only have sexual abuse outings been taking place in Hollywood, but the exposure of pedophilia in Hollywood and amongst the elite is becoming more common. The reality of child molestation by the Roman Catholic Church has surfaced time and time again, and yet, somehow, it continues to happen.

According to Jack and Diane Ruhl of the National Catholic Reporter, who decided to research this particular topic, since 1950, the Vatican has spent a disgusting $3,994,797,060.10.

The figure is based on a three-month investigation of data, which includes a review of over 7,800 articles from LexisNexis Academic and NCR databases and information from BishopAccountability.org.

Reports from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops were also used.

If the amount of money dished out was divided evenly amongst the U.S.’s 197 dioceses, each one would get almost $20 million.

In the early nineties, a monk who worked at the Vatican opened up to The New Yorker, admitting:

“You wouldn’t believe the amounts of money the church is spending to settle these priestly sexual-abuse cases.”

By 1992, U.S. Catholic dioceses had given 400 million dollars to settle hundreds of molestation cases.

That was a shocking chunk of change then, and that figure has only risen exponentially since. The men running the Vatican are well aware of the problem, and yet they refuse to provide justice.

When Pope Francis addressed hundreds of bishops on the issue, he said:

“I realize how much the pain of recent years has weighed upon you, and I have supported your generous commitment to bring healing to victims — in the knowledge that in healing we too are healed — and to work to ensure that such crimes will never be repeated.”

The Catholic Conference has argued that opening a one-year window to revive old cases could ultimately bankrupt the Church.

The Catholic Church, some Orthodox Jewish groups, and other private entities opposed legislation by Assemblywoman Margaret Markey (D-Queens) and Sen. Brad Hoylman (D-Manhattan) that would eliminate the time limit that prohibits adults who were victimized as children from bringing civil cases after their 23rd birthdays.

Hank Sheinkopf runs a firm hired by the church to lobby in Albany. Sheinkopf has had close ties with Gov. Cuomo, whose brother happens to be the CNN anchor, Chris Cuomo. Getting it yet?

Also, we must not brush aside one very important connection. How can Trump supposedly be fighting the pedophiles/traffickers when he was endorsed by one of the Cardinals responsible for lobbying for laws that FAVOR abusers/pedophiles?

The Cardinal Timothy Dolan pictured below with President Trump on a couple different occasions.