Everyone Knew Her As Nancy

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's home district includes San Francisco. Star-Kist Tuna's headquarters are in San Francisco, Pelosi's home district. Star-Kist is owned by Del Monte Foods and is a major contributor to Pelosi. Star-Kist is the major employer in American Samoa employing 75% of the Samoan workforce.

Paul Pelosi, Nancy 's husband, owns $17 million dollars of Star-Kist stock. In January 2007 when the minimum wage was increased from $5.15 to $7.25, American Samoa was exempted from the increase. This would make obvious price discrepancies between products. When the huge bailout bill was passed, an earmark was added to the final bill adding $33 million dollars for an 'economic development credit in American Samoa.'

Now, as far as a comment goes: SNOPES writes she could find no "direct" evidence one way or the other on the above. Sounds like a non-denial non-denial non-admission non-Republican answer.

SNOPES also writes this story is a "mixture of true and false" statements. In other words, this story is basically true or rather, it's a smoking gun. We all know how the left and the right differ on smoking guns.

Prior to 2007, the U.S. territories of Northern Marianas and American Samoa were exempt from federal minimum wage standards; instead, a committee appointed by the U.S. Department of Labor established the minimum wage standards in those territories. The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 (H.R. 2), introduced to Congress in January of that year, sought to revise U.S. federal minimum wage standards, including the gradual rising of the federal minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 per hour.

Samoa is represented by a Democrat, Del. Eni F.H. Faleomavaega.

Faleomavaega's campaign coffers have been well stocked by the tuna industry that dominates his island economy. StarKist owns one of the largest canneries on the island, and Del Monte Foods, StarKist's parent company, is based in San Francisco, which Pelosi represents.

Speaker Pelosi was the Congressional leader of the party that sponsored H.R. 2 (214 of the bill's 222 cosponsors were Democrats), and it is true that Del Monte Foods' San Francisco headquarters are located within the boundaries of the California district she represents in Congress. Democrats maintained that Speaker Pelosi did not work on the details of the bill, and that the exemption for American Samoa was created at the behest of the island's Congressional delegate: A spokesman for Pelosi said the bill excluded American Samoa at the request of nonvoting Delegate Eni Faleomavaega, a Democrat who represents the Pacific island territories in the House did indeed strongly advocate that American Samoa be allowed to retain its exemption from federal minimum wage standards:
Faleomavaega had an epiphany: A "decrease in production or departure of one or both of the two canneries in American Samoa could devastate the local economy, resulting in massive layoffs and insurmountable financial difficulties," he said.

[HERE'S THE BIG STUFF, FOLKS!!] He went on to say "The truth is the global tuna industry is so competitive that it is no longer possible for the federal government to demand mainland minimum wage rates for American Samoa without causing the collapse of our economy and making us welfare wards of the federal government."
*****READ THAT AGAIN AND THINK ABOUT IT ***** [What that says is an accurate microcosm of our Great Society LBJ beefed up. To paraphrase Faleomavaega, ‘why not let the market decide wages and prices, because if we interfere with a minimum wage, prices will go up, employers won't be able to afford to hire more people, business will drop, more people will be on welfare, etc.’ He wants a FREE MARKET ECONOMY for American Samoa!

I can hear Nancy and the rest of the left saying, “but it’s different for us.”

Yeah, reet.