CBS News
Senators expected to hold Steward Health Care CEO Ralph de la Torre in contempt
Lawmakers say they would seek to hold Steward Health Care CEO Ralph de la Torre in contempt of Congress if he doesn’t appear at a hearing Thursday on Capitol Hill, senators from both parties told CBS News.
“If someone shows contempt for the people of the United States by not coming to testify both to potentially clear his name, but also to give them insight, then that is a contemptible thing,” said Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, the ranking Republican member of the Senate committee investigating Steward.
The company, which had owned more than three dozen hospitals across eight states, declared bankruptcy earlier this year and has been struggling to find buyers for its facilities. Last week, de la Torre’s attorney wrote to the committee, saying his client would “not participate” in the hearing, asserting the testimony needed to be postponed until after Steward’s bankruptcy proceedings were resolved.
The committee’s chairman, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, refused to postpone the hearing, where lawmakers will also hear from health care workers and local officials in communities impacted by Steward’s bankruptcy.
For nearly two years, a CBS News investigation has documented how private equity investors and de la Torre extracted hundreds of millions of dollars while health care workers and patients struggled to get the life-saving supplies they needed. Last month, the company closed two Massachusetts hospitals, leaving about 1,200 workers jobless, according to the state.
The decision to compel de la Torre’s testimony is incredibly rare — the last subpoena issued by the committee occurred in the 1980s. Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, a member of the committee, said he considers de la Torre to “a fugitive on the run,”
“If he doesn’t show up, he’s defying a legal order that he appear,” Markey told CBS News. “Therefore he should be accountable and held in contempt,” adding the committee will work on a bipartisan basis to determine whether de la Torre would face criminal or civil penalties for failing to appear.
In addition to congressional scrutiny, Steward is the subject of a criminal probe by the Department of Justice. A federal grand jury in Boston is examining the compensation, spending and travel of the company’s top executives, including de la Torre, a person familiar with the matter told CBS News.
Through a spokesperson, de la Torre has denied wrongdoing.
Matthew J. Lee/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
“Dr. de la Torre did everything in his power to help Steward Health Care overcome numerous industry headwinds and challenges, including personally purchasing necessary equipment and supplies in order to address the needs of patients and personally guaranteeing loans for the company with his assets,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
Markey said he isn’t buying that explanation, and accused de la Torre, a former cardiac surgeon, of violating his Hippocratic oath.
“What Dr. de la Torre and private equity have perpetrated is something that is so heartless, so cruel, and so harmful to the most vulnerable people in our society,” Markey said.
Louisiana is also home to a Steward hospital, and Cassidy, who is also a medical doctor, said he’s been hearing disturbing stories from his constituents about supply shortages at the facility.
“It’s been unable to pay its bills, and folks are being turned away,” Cassidy said. “We’re told at least one died awaiting transfer. Now, think about that. That doesn’t sound like the United States of America.
Cassidy said he is committed to working across the aisle with Markey to address some of the financial maneuvers that allowed Steward’s investors to profit as patient care suffered.
“Although he’s a liberal Democrat and I’m a conservative Republican, we are united in how to make sure people get the health care they need,” he said.
contributed to this report.
TRENTON, N.J. — Democratic Newark City Council President LaMonica McIver has defeated Republican small businessman Carmen Bucco in a contest in New Jersey’s 10th Congressional District that opened up because of the death of Rep. Donald Payne Jr. in April.
McIver will serve out the remainder of Payne’s term, which ends in January. She and Bucco will face a rematch on the November ballot for the full term.
McIver said in a statement Wednesday that she stands on the “shoulders of giants,” naming Payne as chief among them.
She cast ahead to the November election, saying the right to make reproductive health choices was on the ballot as well as whether the economy should benefit the wealthy or “hard working Americans.”
“I will fight because the purpose of politics and the purpose of our vote is to give the people of our communities and our nation a bold voice,” she said.
Bucco congratulated McIver on the victory in a statement but said he’s looking forward to the rematch in November.
“I am not going anywhere,” he said in an email. “We still have a second chance to make district 10 great again!”
Who are LaMonica McIver and Carmen Bucco?
McIver emerged as the Democratic candidate in a crowded field in the July special election. A member of the city council of New Jersey’s biggest city since 2018, she also worked for Montclair Public Schools as a personnel director and plans to focus on affordability, infrastructure, abortion rights and “protecting our democracy,” she told The Associated Press earlier this summer.
Bucco describes himself on his campaign website as a small-business owner influenced by his upbringing in the foster system. He lists support for law enforcement and ending corruption as top issues.
The 10th District lies in a heavily Democratic and majority-Black region of northern New Jersey. Republicans are outnumbered by more than 6 to 1.
It’s been a volatile year for Democrats in New Jersey, where the party dominates state government and the congressional delegation.
Among the developments were the conviction on federal bribery charges of U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez, who has denied the charges, and the demise of the so-called county party line — a system in which local political leaders give their preferred candidates favorable position on the primary ballot.
Democratic Rep. Andy Kim, who’s running for Menendez’s seat, and other Democrats brought a federal lawsuit challenging the practice as part of his campaign to oust Menendez, who has resigned since his conviction.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
CBS News
Sean “Diddy” Combs at same Brooklyn detention center that held R. Kelly, Sam Bankman-Fried, other high-profile inmates
A second judge refused to grant bail to Sean “Diddy” Combs on Wednesday and he could remain in federal custody at a Brooklyn detention center until his trial for sex trafficking charges. Combs joins other high-profile inmates, such as singer R. Kelly, fallen cryptocurrency mogul Sam Bankman-Fried, rapper Ja Rule —even Al Sharpton served a brief stint— who were held at the same federal detention center.
Notorious for its horrible conditions —inmates won a $10 million class action settlement after enduring frigid conditions during an 8-day blackout in 2019— the waterfront industrial complex, MDC Brooklyn, houses 1,200 inmates.
JOHANNES EISELE/AFP via Getty Images
Violence and corruption have long plagued the facility; U.S. District Judge Gary R. Brown of the Eastern District of New York wrote the detention center had “dangerous, barbaric conditions” in a recent sentencing opinion. Two inmates were stabbed to death in recent months and several correction officers have been convicted for smuggling contraband and accepting bribes.
Combs joins a list of high-profile personalities that have landed at the MDC Brooklyn, partly because the city’s other federal detention center, MDC New York, closed in 2021, also due to horrible conditions. The disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein died by suicide in his cell there in 2019. “Numerous and serious” instances of misconduct among corrections staff gave Epstein the opportunity to kill himself, a subsequent federal watchdog investigation found.
Kelly sued the federal detention center in 2022 for wrongly putting him on suicide watch after his sentencing. Kelly sought $100 million because he said the detention center knew he wasn’t suicidal after he was convicted in 2021 for racketeering and violating the Mann Act, which bars transporting people across state lines for prostitution.
Yuki Iwamura/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Former crypto billionaire Bankman-Fried survived on bread, water and sometimes peanut butter when he was in the MDC Brooklyn, his attorney said, because the detention center continued to serve him a “flesh diet” despite requests for vegan dishes.
Ja Rule stayed at the MDC Brooklyn for a brief time before being released after serving most of his two-year sentence for illegal gun possession. Most of his prison time was spent in a state prison in New York.
Sharpton served a 90-day sentence in 2001 and went on a hunger strike for protesting the U.S. Navy bombing of the island of Vieques, in Puerto Rico.
Combs was taken into custody on Monday and according to an indictment unsealed Tuesday he was charged with sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to engage in prostitution.
His attorney Marc Agnifilo told CBS News, “It’s impossible to prepare for a trial from where he is,” after a first federal judge denied Combs bail on Tuesday.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Robyn Tarnofsky agreed with prosecutors who argued the hip-hop mogul, who is accused of using his business empire as a criminal enterprise to conceal his alleged abuse of women, is a flight risk and poses an ongoing threat to the safety of the community.
Agnifilo said the part of the detention center where Combs is being held is “a very difficult place to be.”
contributed to this report.
