Meet the Shady Corporation That Allied With Romney While Scamming Customers
Meet the Shady Corporation That Allied With Romney While Scamming Customers - NationalJournal.com
Every company hopes for the kind of ribbon-cutting that APX Alarm organized on a clear and cold December day in Provo, Utah, when it opened its new headquarters. It was only 2009, but Mitt Romney—already the GOP presidential front-runner—was treating the ceremony like a campaign event. “This,” he told the assembled crowd and local reporters about the home-alarm company, “is the kind of stimulus that makes the country great.”
That day, President Obama had convened a jobs summit in Washington, but Romney wanted the people of Provo to know that conclaves don’t create jobs. “A lot of politicians and economists, professors and so forth, will come together” in Washington, he complained. “I wish they were here instead seeing how jobs are actually created—not just talking about it, not just wondering how government can make things better, but instead seeing how jobs in this economy are actually created in the private sector, with real businesses.” This paean to industry eventually found its way into his stump speech.
Romney was truly in his comfort zone. Here was a successful start-up business, in a state where he has deep roots, run by Mormons he knew and trusted who had given generously to his campaign. Its C-Suite included a former adviser to the Massachusetts governor and future fundraisers. CEO Todd Pedersen and COO Alex Dunn, together with their wives, had personally contributed more than $15,000 to Romney’s 2012 presidential ambitions thus far and would give another $300,000 in the coming years, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, which compiles FEC filings.
But there was a problem. APX, which rebranded itself as Vivint in 2011, had received an “F” rating from the Utah Better Business Bureau, and the national organization had logged hundreds of complaints about the company. It had been the subject of government action in at least seven states (the total is now at least 11) for alleged sins that ranged from deceptive sales practices to operating without a license. Disgruntled people, often seniors, were pressured to buy the company’s alarm system and then forced to pay much higher costs than they had expected, according to their complaints to police, state investigators, and local reporters. Vivint has never admitted wrongdoing and did not return many calls for comment over two months.
