LiveNation. OCPA. Melahat. Gaza. District Carpetbagging. Not-so-Great Park. Farrah. FivePoint. Agran Cultists. Agran Haters. Lost Veterans Cemetery. Strader. While Irvine Republicans run the gamut from Corporate Whores who boast of terrorizing Indians with bloody cows’ heads to Corporate Whores who DON’T boast so much of terrorizing Indians with bloody cows’ heads, are there any Irvine Democrat politicians who are not Train Wrecks in one or several ways?
If there’s anything that gives us moral clarity in this Bosch painting once known as The City of Beige, it’s the outrageous packet of lies the LiveNation/Republican clique demanded Tammy Kim sign off on, in return for dropping their residency suit against her (which was flailing anyway already but she could no longer afford to fight, financially or emotionally.)
And we have copies, screenshots of all of that, for those of you who think Tammy may be exaggerating and you’re too lazy to go to her website. Behold, the shameless attempts of a multinational corporation, LiveNation, to shut up a critic and force her to lie and sing their praises:
1. Tammy Must Lie about Irvine’s ’23 rejection of LiveNation.
(Proposed) Affidavit of Tammy Kim:
- In the Winter, Spring, and Summer of 2023, as an Irvine City Councilwoman, I was a member of two-person ad hoc Committee to negotiate the terms of an Agreement with Live Nation for a permanent amphitheater in Irvine, California at the Great Park.
- As a Councilwoman and a Committee member, my duty was to the City of Irvine and to faithfully negotiate in good faith under the Exclusive Negotiating Agreement with Live Nation.
- While negotiating, I was aware that Oliver Chi, City Manager, was trying to create a permanent amphitheater which could be run by the City of Irvine (similar to the Greek Theater in LA).
- I met with and solicited information from AEG, a competitor to LiveNation, and I am also aware that Mr. Chi and other staff members did the same.
- I am also aware that while the negotiations were supposed to be conducted with two members of the City Council, Mike Carroll and me, Mr. Chi was leaking details to other Councilmembers, Larry Agran and Kathleen Treseder, which constitutes a violation of the Brown Act by constituting a “serial meeting.”
- I personally had conversations with Councilmember Kathleen Treseder outside of the two-member subcommittee about the amphitheater negotiation and due to the Brown Act one of us should not have participated in that hearing.
- I am also aware that Mr. Chi and/or staff at his direction assisted Kathleen Treseder with drafting a motion to eliminate LiveNation from consideration for the permanent amp and that Mr. Chi coordinated to have Councilmember Agran and myself join in Treseder’s motion to violate the terms of the Exclusive Negotiating Agreement and to take away years of good faith work that been conducted in the joint design and planning for a permanent music venue at the Great Park.
- The vote which occurred on July 25, 2023 was a violation of the terms of the ENA which had been coordinated by Oliver Chi for the benefit of him and his staff to take over control of the amphitheater and design and construction.
- Irvine Meadows Amphitheater and FivePoint Amphitheater were fantastic live music venues in Irvine.
- The Irvine City Council voted multiple times to exclusively negotiate with LiveNation for a permanent concert venue at the Great Park.
- LiveNation, Starpointe Ventures, and Patrick Strader were not treated fairly by the Irvine City Manager, Kathleen Treseder, and the overall process and was deprived of the opportunity to have a good faith hearing on the proposal.
Wah, they were “not treated fairly” in ’23. SO unfair, SO unfair. Sounds just like Trump. In any case this revisionist history is what they tried to make Tammy sign off on – complete with false accusations of Brown Act violations by Kathleen Treseder and malicious lies about city staff – all in an apparent effort to pave the way for LiveNation’s re-entry into Irvine under the new Council. Good for Tammy not signing this bullshit. She, Treseder and AGRAN had plenty of good reasons to vote against LiveNation in ’23.
My colleague Greg points out,
“If Kim is telling the truth that the assertions against Treseder are false, and if we presume that they person making the demand (or their client) knew that they were false, then this would constitute suborning perjury from her in any future testimony she might be called upon to provide (in, say, a hypothetical defamation action by Treseder.) Were this material to the settlement, her telling the truth could have led to the reinstatement of criminal charges against her!“
2. Tammy Must Say What a Great Guy Anthony Kuo is!
While she’s at it, Tammy must say all this about her opponent, the somewhat strange Kuo, who happens to be a dependable LiveNation supporter:
- “Anthony Kuo is an upstanding citizen of the highest moral standing.”
- “I served on the Irvine City Council with him from 2018-2022.”
- “I witnessed firsthand as he represented Irvine as a City Councilmember with the highest level of aptitude and conduct.”
“An upstanding citizen of the highest moral standing.” LOL. Did Anthony write that part himself? [Greg says: “A political endorsement as a condition of settlement. The mind reels.”]
3. Tammy Must NEVER say anything MEAN about:
And THIS is priceless: At the risk of $100k a violation, Tammy must not only pretend this whole agreement doesn’t exist, but also agree to never say ANYTHING CRITICAL about any of these fine people, no wait, let me get the exact words:
“…at all times following the execution of this Agreement, Kim shall not make or cause to be made any statements, whether oral, written, electronic, or otherwise, that could reasonably be construed as derogatory, defamatory, or critical of the following parties:
- Ron Scolesdang
- Mike Carroll
- Anthony Kuo
- Patrick Strader
- Brian Probolsky
- Adam Probolsky
- James Mai
- LiveNation
- Dave Ellis.
“This prohibition applies to all forms of communication, including but not limited to social media, emails, text messages, publications, interviews, or verbal statements to third parties.”
Was that an EXHAUSTIVE list of the creeps and swindlers operative in Tammy’s neck of the woods? It’s pretty close. Hard to see how ANYBODY, let alone a Councilwoman trying to do her job, could keep silent about the bumbling kleptocracy of the Probolsky brothers, the insidious grasping menace of Strader, or the gleeful race-baiting of Mai. And how could you possibly do your job without saying anything “critical” about LiveNation itself? Finally… Dave Ellis? What’s Dave Ellis doing in Irvine now?
THIS Dave Ellis?
4. And by the way, LiveNation has NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS!
Meanwhile Strader sent Tammy this threatening nasty-gram.
Tammy still questions, if not LiveNation, who else coulda spent what appears to be $200k getting her off the ballot, and why? If actual LiveNation brass have deniability of this operation, it’s still being done for their benefit, by a gaggle of parasites who hope to profit from it.
And it’s abundantly clear that…
None of this had ANYTHING to do with Tammy’s residence.
She wouldn’t sign on to any of their lies, but she did drop out of the race, so the District 5 seat will go to Kuo, the LiveNation Republican. (The next-most-viable, Democrat Betty Martinez Franco, is an old associate of both Jeff Flint and Melahat, who told folks she got in the race just to take votes from Tammy.)
Now that I see how badly the big money wanted to shut up Tammy Kim, I wish we’d-a supported her more. If not for Mayor, then at least for District 5, despite her residency issues, her affinity for Instagram & identity politics, and her refusal to criticize Israel’s genocide or back a ceasefire resolution.
I wish I could say something good about the DPOC supporting her, but I think that’s less about her standing up to special interests and more about their hatred of Larry Agran, the Jew who dares to criticize Israel – I know how quick the insider Democrats, especially in that area, are to cry “anti-Semitism” at the drop of a hat.
And I think I will have to follow this with a piece on Larry, since he will be not only Mayor but the SWING VOTE between 3 moderate Democrats and 3 LiveNation Republicans. The world, or the city anyway, will once again revolve around Larry Agran. Stay tuned for “Agran’s Game.”
What could Kuo and Agran be hobnobbing about?
Vern, thank you, thank you, thank you for writing this spot-on critique. You get it. The worst, most toxic influence in Irvine politics is lobbyist Patrick Strader and his right wing gang of power players like the Probolsky’s and certain Irvine city council puppets.
I call this group the Irvine Mafia. I believe they use intimidation tactics, backroom deals, and outright threats like the Italian mob in New York did in their heyday. They hide behind their veil of legitimacy (lobbying, consulting, business ventures) and then engage in underhanded tactics built on fear and coercion. Well done sir.
Two things.
Not all of those these democrats are moderate. At a minimum, mushroom girl is straight up kookoo.
As for Agran, well he is the last great white hope. The city has forever changed.
And, Tammy miscalculated horribly regardless of this other stuff.
(1) Do you see Treseder listed in Vern’s litany?
(2) Do you even know what a “Great White Hope” is?
(3) Your bias about Tammy is showing — although I expect she’d have a lot better luck with a claim that trying to get her to endorse candidates — something irrelevant to the lawsuit in question — constituted extortion.
Dave Ellis?
Gross.
Ellis: The metamorphosis into an oxygen breathing creature was slow and painful.
The reference to Brian Probolsky is interesting. I wonder why they didn’t put the dope-pushing Rafiei on the list.
But Anthony Kuo is an upstanding citizen of the highest moral standing.
And heterosexual, Vern, you forgot heterosexual. Those photos of him with Larry above have set off the gaydar.
Sad, if he were a Democrat he wouldn’t have to pretend.
Her post mortem disclosure raises more questions than answers.
Like what does she know about that laundry list of individuals, how does she know what she knows about those individuals that they wanted her silenced and why did they want to silence her now??
Also if special interests/third person political operatives used a white guy to conduct the political takedown of Tammy Neshanian, would it be Asian hate?
[Ed. One small alteration was made to the above sentence.]
This is an atrociously asshole comment. It’s like asking “what is it about what this victim did that made these two men want to rape her?” You’re intentionally, by all appearances, looking in the wrong place. This has nothing to do with Tammy’s own actions at all. This is merely a continuation of your crusade to hang culpability around her neck. You can make absolutely no legitimate inferences from this lost about what she herself knew about others. Even posing the question as you do is perverse.
The properly formed questions would be “what do the people who formed these questions think she knows about these individuals and how do they think she got that knowledge?” The attorneys (presumably at their clients’ behest) don’t need to know what she “knows”; they just want to ensure that, IF she knows anything, she would be too intimidated to ever come forward with it. I’ve never done that in my practice; can you say the same?
The names on the list were not put there by Tammy Kim. The people who put them there may not have known what she did or did not know about them — but they sure knew who they wanted to protect! You know as a lawyer that when you get a release you try to make it as broad as possible. The question this raises is: “why are they so intent on insulating these people from negative comments”? That’s not proof of guilt on any charge — but I’d say it’s probative.
Your even posing this victim-blaming smear of a question betrays a twisted sense of legal ethics. Is this how you operate in your divorce and custody cases? If so, those who oppose you in family law cases might well take note.
Tammy [deletions of inappropriate commentary here] After Farrah one as mayor[sic], she promptly stabbed Kim in the back withdrawing her support.
There is also Kim voting with Kuo and Carroll in favor of electric chargers being placed at the great park. [Attempted witticism deleted]
https://youtu.be/1f1l0R3J6RE
https://youtu.be/XNcTxyDCKXc
https://youtu.be/D3YOVwPI34o
Hat tip Dee Fox re the you tube footage.
[More attacks deleted.]
Is there a part of the piece that calls her perfect? No.
I squeezed a world of complaints about all Irvine politicians into my first paragraph, the “Train Wreck” paragraph. The Staccato Litany of Issues.
Vern: You said that you appreciated Eric’s coverage of the Tammy lawsuit. That’s over. So is Eric’s usefulness here.
Thanks for the hat tip! I enjoy your public comments at the city council meetings. I may not completely agree sometimes but I believe in what you say, if that makes sense. I think we both agree 100% that Treseder is a wacko! Did you see my short video on utube where she told people at a DGI meeting that the last time Trump was in office, he tried to deport American Citizens? It’s like what country do you deport them to?
Tammy lied about her residency in Dist. 5. Irvine choose to split into 6 parts. Kim chose to cheat.
Immediately before the Live Nation contract came on the City Council Agenda, Voice of O C explained the terms of the contract. For example, Live Nation wanted parking fees for EVERY event, not just their own. The meeting was flooded with comments. If the council voted LiveNation in, not one councilmember would of been reelected. So I give The Voice of O C credit for the rejection of Live Nation.
The Voice of OC, okay, along with the three Councilmembers who rejected it – Tammy, Treseder and Agran.
Farrah and Carroll didn’t give a damn about what the Voice of OC wrote, or what the public said.
PS and Carroll WAS reelected despite his vote.
That agreement was preposterously bad.
It reeks of desperation except that they had a little bit of leverage which all evaporated after the case was disposed of as they lost confidentiality of the settlement discussions provided by the evidence code.
They couldn’t buy her silence; they had nothing to offer. They wanted her to roll over twice while still being exposed to criminal liability. I think they are scared of Melahat fallout. Cuz I bet ya things are gonna get nuclear.
I would not take that bet.
Melahat seems to retain a major role in Irvine politics. I’m very surprised if that would be consistent with any plea agreement she would have signed.
Chmielewski gets to this four days later…
https://theliberaloc.com/2025/02/12/the-tammy-kim-settlement-and-the-rest-of-the-story/
I think this tale may have run its course.
And of course, as the Q’eqchi’ folk of Guatamala say: don’t touch the pink toad.
Did Tammy bring a counterclaim against Ron S. in this litigation? If not, she had no extant claim to “settle.”
In fact, I believe that she could not solicit money to leave the race, because that would be soliciting a bribe. The closest thing to a bribe that might be legal is that Ron S. might have been willing to defray her campaign expenses for the race — but I’m not even sure that that’s legal. And I doubt she’d have been able to make such an offer other than through her attorney — who I’m confident would have told her he could not do so.
Like Trump, Chumley’s prose is full of conclusions without predicates.
Next all of those individuals on that list – except maybe Ron – are going to say they were never even aware of Ron’s petition until it was reported on by local media outlets. So there was someone else other than Ron or the listed individuals or entity pulling the strings with Ron’s lawyers. Hmm.
Well yeah that’s what they all told Dan when he checked with them.
They also told him that Tammy tried to get $10k and then $5k to bow out, which she denies. And do they have “receipts” like she does? No they do not.
The Liberal OC is run by and populated with Agran Cultists, who hate Tammy (and Treseder) more than Republicans do, and they’ll believe anything bad about her.
David’s probably right though, this story has run its course.
It hasn’t run its course so long as the Special Election remains. What do we know about the fourth candidate — the one who isn’t Tammy, Kuo, or Melahat-supported? I’d endorse her blind, but apparently that doesn’t work. Could she be a second Melahat shill?
Dana is another candidate running…she is a Republican. I like her, she would be a good one, however, I am conflicted.
Thank you for writing about this. I heard about Ellis and Strader doing some illegal things with real estate contracts at the great park. Might want to keep an ear out on that. F@&$#% corruption that hurts honest business.
Question…
Is Melahat Rafiei still lurking around? I thought she went to jail, or at least is wearing an ankle monitor. Is she, or has she ever been involved with the OCPA?