Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh Sought To Cap 9/11 Payouts To Victims' Families at $500G
Last edited Thu Aug 30, 2018, 11:08 PM - Edit history (1)
Source: New York Daily News
By Reuven Blau, New York Daily News, 2 hrs. ago.
Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh wanted to cap the amount victims of 9/11 and their family members could receive from the federal government at $500,000, records obtained by the Daily News show.
Kavanaugh, who served as associate White House Counsel during President George W. Bush's administration, sought to limit the federal government's liability following the terrorist attacks. Pushback from Sen. Chuck Schumer and other federal lawmakers squashed that proposal.
As Congress was debating the parameters of the fund, Kavanaugh wrote to Bush aide Kristen Silverberg on Oct. 14, 2001, that questions were being raised about "3 aspects of our proposal" including a "$500,000 cap."
Kenneth Feinberg was appointed special master of the Victims Compensation Fund, which put no constraints on the amount he could award to any victim. He decided compensation based on a number of factors such as "the economic loss suffered as a result of the victim's premature death" as well as "pain and suffering." Payments ranged from $220,000 to as high as $7.1 million. The average payout was $1.8 million, dwarfing the proposed cap...More...
Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/supreme-court-nominee-brett-kavanaugh-sought-to-cap-9-11-payouts-to-victims-families-at-dollar500g/ar-BBMEAYe
The Victims Fund was created to provide financial assistance to people injured or killed on 9/11. It was also established in large part to save the airline industry from financial ruin.
Airline executives at the time worried that thousands of 9/11 family members would sue their companies, claiming they failed to take basic security measures to protect passengers in the crashed planes. The airlines relied on private security to screen travelers and that lax effort failed to spot 19 terrorists on 4 flights armed with pocket knives.
As a condition to enter the fund, victims were forced to agree to never sue the airlines. A group of 95 victims did not take money from the fund, filed legal claims against the airlines and settled for a total of over $500 million.
According to NARA, the National Archives and Records Administration (aka 'The Paper Mountain'), the long public service career of Kavanaugh has generated a massive amount of records, six to seven million pages.
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