I’m often asked how the FLDS generates money. Where did all the financial resources come from to support Warren Jeffs when he was on the run from law enforcement for two years? How did the sect pay for the 1,700 acres and huge limestone temple down on the ranch just raided in Texas? One answer is that FLDS men are highly industrious and very successful in the construction business. They have numerous companies spread across the Southwest, which until recently has seen a building boom, and their earnings are funneled back into the church and its leadership. The sect excels at underbidding other construction outfits, because it employs boys from its own community without having to pay them much -- or nothing at all. Some have called this “slave labor.” The FLDS has undercut its competition not just in the private marketplace, but also in government contracts. Many men in the sect have been officially married to one wife, but might have a dozen or more unofficial “spiritual wives” who could qualify for welfare payments -- another way to drain money from the government. The sect calls this tactic “bleeding the beast.”
The raid occurred in darkness and changed many things, literally overnight. After the authorities entered the compound outside of Eldorado, Texas, Representative Kay Granger, a Fort Worth Republican, wrote to her fellow Congressional members requesting a hearing to look into a Department of Defense contract awarded to an FLDS company. A contract worth $1.2 million had been given to New Era Manufacturing, formerly based in the FLDS hometown of Hildale, Utah, before it relocated to Las Vegas. New Era supplies wheel and brake components for military aircraft. The “Fort Worth Star Telegram” reports that New Era has employed church followers at little or no pay.
“As a Member of Congress,” Granger wrote, “I am concerned that federal tax dollars may have been misused to fund this sect’s illegal activities.”
In recent years, with the FLDS drawing more and more negative publicity for its marital practices and allegations of sexual abuse, the federal government finally took notice. In 2007, Nevada Senator Harry Reid, the Democratic Majority Leader and highest-ranking Mormon in U.S. history, asked Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to investigate the sect. At the time, Warren Jeffs was in jail in Utah awaiting trial for accomplice to rape. Senator Reid was dissatisfied with how Utah and Arizona had handled the potential criminal activities of the FLDS and wanted the Department of Justice to launch a comprehensive probe of the church, including its finances. Reid basically called on the feds to approach this as they might an investigation into organized crime. Gonzales failed to respond, but after the Texas raid the Senator made the request again, this time more forcefully, calling on new Attorney General Michael Mukasey to take action. Mukasey is considering the options.
There are parallels between how Michael Corleone gained power over his fictional Mob family in “The Godfather,” after Don Corleone began to falter, and how Warren Jeffs took control as the Prophet of the FLDS, when his father got sick and then died. Will there be more parallels between these stories -- with the feds investigating a religious community as if it were a crime family?