Report Alleges Hogsett Funneled Donor Influence Through City Hall

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
Hammer and Nigel.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:01)
You believe these characters?

**SPEAKER_1** (0:02)
They're weird of us.
The Hammer, more reporting, new reporting on allegations against the Joe Hogsett administration. What is this from the Indy Star and Mirror Indy? Both the part three of their, quote, Mr. Clean series, examining the inner workings of the Hogsett administration and how shady, I guess I should say. Yes. Shady is probably a good word, it is.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:33)
And the reason they call this the Mr. Clean series is that's kind of become the nickname of old boss Hogsett, Mr. Clean. It's a tongue in cheek reference to all of the shady stuff that goes on, but the fact that he comes out on the other side, squeaky clean.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:53)
All the shady people that he surrounds himself with.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:57)
The Thomas Carl Cooks, I mean, all of them. So this has been a very good series. Like we beat up on the Indy star from time to time, but this warrants your absolute attention. We will give credit where credit is due.
This has been a fantastic series, this whole Joe Hogsett thing. And there's a couple of different reporters that are doing these things. But the latest one talks about how developers, engineering firms, architects, law firms downtown, power brokers who have donated around nine million dollars to Hogsett's campaign since he started raising money in 2014, magically are getting top notch gigs in the city.

**SPEAKER_1** (1:49)
Ta-da!

**SPEAKER_2** (1:51)
Some of them, you know, with the city of Indianapolis, some of them within the campaign of Joe Hogsett. It's a little pay to play, if you will.

**SPEAKER_1** (2:00)
Oh, is that how that works in the local city politics? You donate millions and then you get these lucrative no-bid contracts?
Is that how? Allegedly?

**SPEAKER_2** (2:11)
Allegedly.
And if, let's just say, you didn't want to donate to Joe Hogsett, you were left high and dry. Staffers say they were repeatedly pressured by senior admin officials to volunteer for Hogsett's campaign in ways they now believe were unethical.

**SPEAKER_1** (2:33)
No, nothing unethical ever was alleged.

**SPEAKER_2** (2:36)
You mean to tell me Joe Hogsett might not be a good guy? It reminds me of that scene in The Hangover where Alan comes clean and he lets them know that Doug sold them the drugs at the liquor store and it was accidentally Rufies and Ed Helms character Stu. You mean the drug dealer at the liquor store was not a good guy?
That's where I'm at with Joe Hogsett. Joe Hogsett, Mayor Hogsett and Black Doug from The Hangover, the same person, drug dealer at the liquor store and shady mayor allegedly of Indianapolis.

**SPEAKER_1** (3:14)
I mean, Thomas Carl Cook, the guy that was his chief of staff that he had to let go, brought him back for another campaign even after all the controversy with him.

**SPEAKER_2** (3:25)
When he knew what was going on because complaints had already been filed. And we know this because this was also part of the series and Mr. Clean.
Thomas Carl Cook, allegedly one of the biggest scumbags in Indy.

**SPEAKER_1** (3:40)
Repulsive.

**SPEAKER_2** (3:41)
And Joe knew about it.
The timeline is there according to the witness testimony. Everybody knew, but Joe had to make sure that his guy was there with him on his re-election campaign.

**SPEAKER_1** (3:56)
Those witnesses tried to get up and speak in front of the City-County Council. Remember how that went for them?

**SPEAKER_2** (4:01)
Oh, Vop Osley jumped up like a little lap dog and told them to kick rocks and kick them out. And again, maybe I'm misunderstanding this. Please correct me if I'm wrong. After he did that, Vop Osley went to the back and sniffed Joe Hogsett's butt.
Just did that because he'll do anything for Joe. And now Vop is running because he thought Joe was going to ride off in the sunset.

**SPEAKER_1** (4:27)
But who knows?

**SPEAKER_2** (4:28)
Doesn't sound like that may be the case now because Joe Hogsett can't find another job. He's that much of a dumpster fire. Nobody wants to hire this guy. He thought he'd get some Kush gig at a university or some sort of CEO or a think tank position. But the only tank Joe belongs in is a drunk one.
Reporters in this series found that Boss Hogsett's administration awarded millions of dollars in no bid contracts to the mayor's former staffers and top donors, including for work that in some cases produced few tangible results for the taxpayers.

**SPEAKER_1** (5:12)
What do you know? Welcome to Marion County, ladies and gentlemen.

**SPEAKER_2** (5:17)
Look, I'm happy Mirror Indy and the Indy Star are doing this deep dive because it's not just us anymore. Like for a long time, I feel like this show was the only one that was trying to tell you how much of a human cigarette butt Joe Hogsett really was. And based on sources that we cannot give away, we were the ones that told you where we believe he was at during the riots.