In 1905, George Washington Plunkitt made arguably the most famous defense of political graft in American history.
“Everybody is talkin’ these days about Tammany men growin’ rich on graft,” the New York state senator and Tammany Hall member wrote, “but nobody thinks of drawin’ the distinction between honest graft and dishonest graft.”
Plunkitt was responding to The Shame of the Cities, a book by journalist Lincoln Steffens that exposed sweeping political corruption in U.S. cities.
The ward boss’s shameless defense of “honest graft,” which is still assigned to undergraduates a century after Plunkitt’s death, comes to mind when looking at the fraud, waste, and abuse Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency and others are uncovering.
To take but one example, consider the billions of dollars in taxpayer funds the Environmental Protection Agency awarded last year to Power Forward Communities. If you’ve never heard of the nonprofit group, you’re forgiven. Almost nobody has — because it didn’t exist until late 2023.
Power Forward Communities had no footprint, online or otherwise, until October 2023, when it was announced as part of the Rewiring America program, an organization linked to former Georgia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, which says its mission is “all about Rewiring America’s values, people, and culture.”
Less than a year after its creation, Power Forward Communities was awarded $2 billion via the EPA’s National Clean Investment Fund — even though it reported just $100 in revenue during its first three months of operation.
The payment, which is slated to continue through June 2031, caught the attention of Lee Zeldin, the new EPA administrator.
“It’s extremely concerning that an organization that reported just $100 in revenue in 2023 was chosen to receive $2 billion,” Zeldin said.
Indeed. It’s graft on a scale the Tammany Hall charlatans couldn’t have imagined.
Historical sources say 19th-century politician Boss Tweed and his ring of cronies took in at least $50 million in corrupt money in backroom deals, kickbacks, and skimming before Tweed was convicted of larceny and forgery in 1873 and fled to Cuba, and later Spain. In 2025 dollars, that’s about $1.3 billion — considerably less than the single payoff former President Joe Biden’s EPA awarded Power Forward Communities.
People will contend that this type of graft, defined as the unethical use of a politician’s authority for personal gain, differs from Tammany Hall’s, and they’re right. Political corruption changes from generation to generation, as do the laws that codify what types of graft are illegal and which are unethical. The line between the two is blurry, and nobody understood this better than the Tammany Hall ring, whose members built one of the most famous graft machines in U.S. history, one that continued well after Tweed’s indictment and eventual death.
Tammany Hall became an infamous symbol of political corruption in U.S. history, but it wasn’t unique. Steffens, who published his book in 1904, traveled not just to New York but also to cities such as St. Louis, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Minneapolis, documenting how local lawmakers misappropriated public funds and maintained power through bribery and patronage.
The book galvanized an apathetic citizenry into action and led to state and federal reforms that cracked down on corruption, including regulations on how government contracts are awarded. For example, many states today require competitive bidding for contracts over certain thresholds, understanding that no-bid contracts are a recipe for political favoritism, nepotism, and backroom deals, not to mention inflated costs.
The $2 billion handout to Power Forward Communities, a fly-by-night operation with political ties to the White House, is a textbook example of how politicians abuse power and waste scarce resources. If it’s not unlawful, it’s certainly unethical. Yet Plunkitt would no doubt approve.
”If I have a good thing to hand out in private life, I give it to a friend,” Plunkitt innocently wrote. “Why shouldn’t I do the same in public life?”
The obvious answer is that the funds are not Plunkitt’s to give. Still, his candid quip exposes the progressive mind, which sees “honest graft” as no different from the entrepreneur who uses his own capital and that of willing investors to offer products and services to customers.
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As Musk and company continue exposing blatant graft and corruption, the attacks against the Tesla founder are likely to grow. DOGE isn’t just bringing sound business practices to Washington — it’s uncovering waste, fraud, and abuse that would make Boss Tweed and the Tammany ring blush.
It’s unclear how much naked corruption people are willing to tolerate in a deeply divided nation, but DOGE and administrators such as Zeldin deserve credit for bringing sunlight to the corrupt political machinery of Washington. Hopefully, it proves as galvanizing as it was for the reformers of the early 20th century who determined that Tammany Hall-style graft would not be condoned or tolerated.
Jon Miltimore is a senior editor at the American Institute for Economic Research. Follow him on Substack.