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Judd Legum

@JuddLegum

Jun 4 • 12 tweets • 4 min read • Read on X

1. One of the main drivers of inflation in the US is skyrocketing rents, which are up 30%+ over the last four years.

So, it's surprising that the recent FBI RAID on a corporate landlord based in Atlanta has received little attention.

The raid was part of a federal probe of an alleged CRIMINAL CONSPIRACY AMONG LARGE LANDLORDS TO JACK UP RENTAL PRICES

Follow along to learn how the scheme works

🧵

2. The investigation centers around RealPage, advanced property management software used by many corporate landlords.

Landlords that are supposed to be in competition w/each other "outsource daily pricing and ongoing revenue oversight" to RealPage

popular.info/p/feds-raid-co…

3. An e-book produced by RealPage says that the company allows corporate landlords who are “technically competitors” to "work together . . . to make us all more successful in our pricing." RealPage bragged that landlords that use its software “continually outpace the market in good times and bad.”

In other words, RealPage helps landlords charge higher rates than they would in a truly competitive market.

4. Corporate landlords that use RealPage software dominate the rental market in many metropolitan areas. In Phoenix, "70% of multifamily apartment units listed in the Phoenix metropolitan area are owned, operated, or managed by companies that have contracted with RealPage."

5. RealPage's former CEO revealed that participating landlords share "occupancy rates, rents charged for each unit and each floorplan, lease terms, amenities, move-in dates, and move-out dates." After feeding in this highly-detailed information that would normally be kept proprietary, "landlords agree to outsource their pricing authority to RealPage—rather than competing with one another on price."

6. According to a lawsuit filed by Arizona, RealPage "puts significant pressure on participants to ensure they adopt RealPage’s prices." Specifically, RealPage employs "pricing advisors" who "meet with landlords to ensure that properties are implementing RealPage’s set rates."

This is described by Arizona as "policing the conspiracy to make sure no one cheats by lowering prices and trying to gain market share."

7. RealPage advises that landlords "should be compliant" w/its pricing recommendations. Landlords "agree that if they fail to consistently implement RealPage’s set rates, their contract... will be terminated."

The creator of RealPage's algorithm explained if "you have idiots undervaluing, it costs the whole system."

8. Pausing here to say if you like the info in this thread you'll LOVE the Popular Information newsletter.

It's important to have ways to get news directly and not rely on algorithms controlled by right-wing billionaires

It's free to sign up

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9. While the RealPage software eliminates the need for competitors to meet in a smoke-filled room, Arizona asserts that it "is still illegal… for competitors to join together decision-making power to raise, depress, fix, or stabilize prices—no matter the technology used to effect a price-fixing agreement."

10. Why is the FBI specifically raiding a corporate landlord that uses RealPage in Atlanta? The agency is not commenting, but a class-action lawsuit revealed that landlords who use RealPage control a large number of properties in the Atlanta area.

Here's a map of the RealPage properties in and around Atlanta:

11. Where will the FBI conduct its next raid? They have plenty of choices. RealPage also controls a large share of the market in Baltimore, Charlotte, Houston, and Miami.

12. Do you know someone who could use this info?

It's all right here, with links to all the primary sources:

popular.info/p/feds-raid-co…

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More from @JuddLegum

Judd Legum

@JuddLegum

Jun 3

1. Trump is now a convicted felon.

Since the verdict, various politicians and pundits have advanced arguments suggesting that Trump's convictions were illegitimate, unfair, or inconsequential.

In this thread, I will dismantle these one by one.

🧵

2. Perhaps the most common argument is that the charges against Trump were "obscure" and "entirely unprecedented."

On the most basic level, this is false.

The same office has prosecuted dozens of cases of first-degree falsification of business records over the last 15 years.

It's the bread and butter of the Manhattan DA.

It is true that prosecuting someone for falsifying business records to conceal a campaign finance violation is uncommon — but that is because the crime itself is uncommon.

There are not that many people who run for political office in New York who also run their own businesses. And even fewer who falsify business records as part of a conspiracy to conceal violations of campaign finance law to help them win.

The idea that the prosecution is unusual is important only if it suggests that the government routinely lets others get away with similar conduct. There is no evidence suggesting that this is true.

3. @marcorubio and many others have claimed that prosecutors didn't reveal their legal theory against Trump until closing arguments. This is false.

The verdict required the jury to find that Trump falsified business records to conceal an intent to commit another crime.

The specifics of the prosecutors' theory were disclosed in great detail in a November 2023 legal filing.

Read 11 tweets

Judd Legum

@JuddLegum

May 30

1. Across the country, inspired by Trump, Republican legislators have passed laws restricting how teachers can discuss race and gender

This week, a federal judge struck down one such law as unconstitutional, citing the experience of a high school teacher who showed her class the music video for Beyoncé's Formation

🧵

2. In 2021, New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu (R) signed a new law, modeled after a Trump executive order, that prohibited government employees, including public school teachers, from promoting "divisive concepts."

popular.info/p/judge-defend…

3. The law was passed in response to a panic about Critical Race Theory infiltrating schools.

But instead of banning CRT and related concepts like structural racism and implicit bias, the law banned instruction on a series of vague and inscrutable topics

Read 13 tweets

Judd Legum

@JuddLegum

May 29

1. A civics training for teachers created by the Florida Dep't of Education likens a Canadian psychology board sanctioning @jordanbpeterson to the systematic mass murder of dissidents in Stalin's Soviet Union

Teachers should tell students that both actions are motivated by the same ideology

2. The linking of "cancel culture" to the murder of hundreds of thousands is part of a new curriculum on "the dangers and evils of Communism."

@RonDeSantis signed a bill in April that will make this mandatory for all Florida public school students

popular.info/p/florida-civi…

@RonDeSantis 3. The training on Communism was presented to thousands of Florida teachers, lured by cash stipends, in the summer of 2023.

The slides were obtained by Popular Information through a public information request filed by @FLFreedomRead

Read 7 tweets

Judd Legum

@JuddLegum

May 28

1. The Florida Department of Education is training thousands of teachers to indoctrinate students in the tenets of Christian nationalism

We have receipts 🧾

Follow along for details

🧵

2. A three-day training course on civic education, conducted throughout Florida in the summer of 2023, included a presentation on the "Influences of the Judeo-Christian Tradition" on the founding of the United States.

According to speaker notes accompanying one slide, teachers were told that "Christianity challenged the notion that religion should be subservient to the goals of the state," and the same hierarchy is reflected in America's founding documents.

3. The next slide in the deck quotes an article by Peter Lillback, the president of Westminster Theological Seminary and the founder of The Providence Forum, an organization that promotes and defends Christian nationalism.

The group's executive director, Jerry Newcombe, writes a weekly column for World Net Daily — a far-right site known for publishing hundreds of stories falsely suggesting Obama was a Muslim born in Africa.

Read 17 tweets

Judd Legum

@JuddLegum

May 23

1. @tomemmer (R-MN), the @GOPMajorityWhip, issued a scathing statement condemning out-of-state college protesters, accusing them of anti-semitism

On Saturday, @mngop endorsed Royce White, an anti-Semite, to be the party's nominee for US Senate

What has Emmer said?

Nothing

2. In April 2022, Royce White wrote on his Substack that the faith of many Jewish people has been replaced by "materialism" and "a survivalist impulse that can give birth to the darkest of intentions and most grandiose effort for world control."

popular.info/p/the-minnesot…

3. White defended Ye after the rapper praised Hitler in 2022. At the time, White criticized Jews for focusing on the Holocaust "to provide a victimhood cover for their own corrupt practices." White later praised Ye for speaking out against "the Jewish lobby."

Read 9 tweets

Judd Legum

@JuddLegum

May 22

1. On Monday, a federal judge dropped an extraordinarily important decision.

It has received ZERO media attention.

In 1871, Congress passed the Ku Klux Klan Act, which allowed people to sue law enforcement officers who violated their Constitutional rights. It was intended to curb white supremacist violence against Black Americans.

In 1967, the Supreme Court flipped it on its head.

They "interpreted" the Ku Klux Klan Act to provide "qualified immunity" to law enforcement officers who violate Constitutional rights in "good faith." It has allowed law enforcement officers who abuse their power to escape accountability.

A federal judge, Carlton Reeves, just issued a powerful ruling urging the Supreme Court to acknowledge its mistake and repeal the doctrine of qualified immunity.

Follow along if interested.

🧵

2. Here are the basics of the case before Reeves:

On February 13, 2020, Nicholas Robertson was shot in Jackson, Mississippi.

Two months later, Samuel Jennings was arrested for burglary and grand larceny in an unrelated incident.

Jennings provided Thomas with a rambling written statement pinning the blame for Robertson's murder on a man named Desmond Green.

Thomas used this uncorroborated statement to convince a grand jury to indict Green for murder.

3. For 22 months, Green was held in a jail "full of violence, rodents, and moldy food." According to Green, he "often did not have a mattress, or even a pad, to sleep on." Green said he "constantly feared for his life."

But Green was indicted on a lie.

popular.info/p/an-extraordi…

Read 13 tweets

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