From David Sirota at pando.com:
Below is a spreadsheet showing that political donors associated with 43 financial firms managing New Jersey pension money have spent a total of $11.6 million on contributions to New Jersey politicians and to major political organizations operating in New Jersey elections.
Many of those donations have gone directly to Gov. Christie’s election campaign and to the New Jersey Republican State Committee. Additionally, many of the contributions came either just before or just after the Christie administration awarded the firms multi-million-dollar pension management contracts. Indeed, Christie officials have given many of the firms that have made the donations additional pension investments, often worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
In total, New Jersey government data show that the 43 firms now manage roughly $14 billion worth of New Jersey state pension money.
http://pando.com/...
Here is a link to the spreadsheet created by pando.com:
http://www.scribd.com/...
Many, if not all of these itemized transactions are likely illegal under SEC Pay-To-Play laws, as well as New Jersey Pay-To-Play statutes.
The sheer arrogance of Christie, who thought he could get away with doling out billions of dollars in pension money to his crony pals, is breathtaking.
Now Christie is taking hundreds of millions of dollars from these pension funds to patch a crater in his mismanaged state budget. He is a walking crime in progress, and must be stopped.
Update 1:
From the comments, AnnetteK found this tweet:
CNN reports that the investigative stories by @davidsirota on #paytoplay abuses in New Jersey has resulted in an AG formal investigation.
5:39 PM - 22 May 2014