Legal
Duncan Hunter You Are LOCK HER UP!
Boy, BYE.
March 17, 2020 03:53 PM
Pour one out for the Chairman of the Bros Caucus, bruh! Former California congressman Duncan Hunter was just sentenced to 11 months in the hoosegow for scamming allllll the money from his campaign account. Guess Judge Thomas J. Whelan wasn't convinced by Hunter's argument that the whole thing was an anti-Trump WITCH HUNT launched by Hillary Clinton and her minions in the DEEP STATE. Figures for a Clinton-appointee — he's probably in on the whole thing!
Why, you can see the BIASSSS right there in the original 60-count indictment. Who but a Deep Stater could fail to see the inherent logic in charging Uber rides to and from the homes of Hunter's many ladyfriends to the campaign credit card? Don't know how you do it, your Honor, but in San Diego they call that extramarital bonezoning a "legislative act," if you know what I mean.
Ditto for the $1,008 weekend in Tahoe he charged to the campaign. Because, after all, his girlfriend at the time was a lobbyist! In fact, as the San Diego Union Tribune noted, "three of the women were noted to be lobbyists and two others were reported to be congressional staffers." So that's all official congressional horndogging bidniss, protected by the speech or debate clause of the Constitution of the US!
<p>As for the 29 trips to Costco on which Hunter and his actual wife, Margaret Hunter, charged $11,375.46-worth of groceries and personal items to the campaign card, well, at least some of it <em>could</em> have been for charity, right? Okay, yes, Margaret Hunter was lying when she told the campaign treasurer that a January 11, 2012, trip was to purchase "gift basket items for basket donation - Temecula chamber gala auction." But, like, it <em>could have been true</em> if they had actually donated their milk and toilet paper to the gala. </p><p>Same for the $87.50 they charged on July 18, 2015, for movie tickets that Mrs. Hunter described as "gift ticks towards a local league football fundraiser." She <em>could have</em> meant to donate those tickets and just accidentally taken the kids instead. You can't rule it out!</p><p>And in retrospect, it was probably an error to use the campaign card for $229.44 at Disneyland, $253.62 at Sea World (it was an "educational tour"), $6,150 for tuition and school lunches, $700 at the dentist's office, and $99.53 for a cut and color at the Regis Hair Salon (AKA "Gift Basket Items").<em> Among many, many others. </em>But the Hunters reimbursed the campaign account once the feds came knocking, so, no harm, no foul, right?<em></em></p><p>Who among us hasn't let our kid use the wrong credit card for $119 of purchases on the Steam video game platform, then reported the charges as fraudulent when we got caught? Isn't that really a family matter, best handled outside the courts?</p><p>And can you really blame Duncan Hunter for the US Navy's intransigence? He really did try to book a tour of the naval facility near Naples, which would have magically transformed the entire $14,261.33 charge for a family trip to Italy into a campaign expense. Should Duncan Hunter be penalized because the Navy couldn't accommodate his schedule? How is that even fair!</p><p>Plus, that time when he claimed a mileage reimbursement for a "468-mile trip to Virginia Beach with Individual 14, Congressman A, and Congressman A's date" despite the fact that they didn't take Hunter's car was just an accounting screwup. Could happen to anybody!</p><p>In short, this whole thing was a stitch up. A Democrat hoax. A sham! That's why Hunter <a href="https://www.wonkette.com/rep-duncan-hunter-set-to-plead-guilty-to-multiple-counts-of-being-duncan-hunter" target="_blank">pleaded guilty</a> back in December, because none of the charges were actually true.</p><p>It's a sad day, Wonkers. A very, very sad day.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<a href="https://media1.giphy.com/media/I4Jmrcjnr8Zfq/giphy.gif?cid=2fb0ca7685bee96f8f99df2abb5a6839bbda657a6a30aead&rid=giphy.gif" target="_blank"><img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMjg4MTU2Ny9vcmlnaW4uZ2lmIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzOTI5MTM5MX0.FlOw2DT2DC-lwX4H0gW1rvWbpnxhAXyGQXxHliUM2B0/img.gif?width=980" id="374ac" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="d6ae630fd17ae0f7d43e9865ea0d83c9" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image"></a>
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</p><p>[<a href="https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4779655/Indictment.pdf" target="_blank">Indictment</a> / <a href="https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/breaking/story/2020-03-17/former-rep-hunter-sentenced-to-11-months-in-prison" target="_blank">San Diego Union Tribune</a>]<br></p><p><strong>Follow Liz Dye on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/5DollarFeminist" target="_blank">RIGHT HERE!</a></strong><br></p><p><strong>Please click here to support your Wonkette. And if you're ordering your quarantine goods on Amazon, <a href="https://amzn.to/2wbH77j" target="_blank">this is the link that gives Wonkette a cut.</a></strong></p><p></p><form name="donation" method="post" class="donation-form"><p class="subheadline">How often would you like to donate?</p><div class="form-row row--plan"><label class="plan-type__label"><input type="radio" name="plan_type" value="once" class="plan-type" required="" checked> Just once
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campaign finance
Matt Gaetz Is ... Right About A Thing???
Credit where credit is due.
February 28, 2020 12:35 PM
Yesterday at CPAC, Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz announced that he will no longer accept money from political action committees, better known as PACs. And while we are no fans of Matt Gaetz, we will acknowledge that this is a good thing. Even padded with Trump-humping and digs at socialism, this was an impressive speech.
The American People are my only special interest. #CPAC2020 https://t.co/K4HjNJQoLn— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@Rep. Matt Gaetz)1582837424.0
This PAC donation process, with the expectation of exchanging money for favors, renders public service, which should be the noblest of professions, dangerously close to the oldest profession. I've never turned tricks for Washington PACs, but as of this very moment, I will not pick up their money in the nightstand anymore. I will never again accept a donation from a federal political action committee. Not one red cent. The American people are my one and only special interest.
You gotta give it up for Matt Gaetz. Not because it's a huge hit for his congressional campaign, which it isn't. This cycle, he's taken in a whopping $43,550 from PACs. He doesn't need the money anyway, since his seat is in one of the reddest districts in the country, and he can hold it forever for about eight bucks, particularly because he gets infinity free media appearing on Fox every other day preaching the gospel of Jesus Trump and yowling about socialism.
<p>But to his credit, Gaetz described the wholesale warping of DC because politicians, even those in safe seats, need to fundraise <em>every single day</em> because the party expects them to kick up cash to other candidates. </p><p>"Committee assignments and leadership opportunities are doled out to members most indebted to special interests. Congressional staffers even use the orientation process to tell new members of Congress which PACs and special interests will donate based on committee assignments and influence," Gaetz continued.</p><p>"The more a member of Congress proves his merit laundering money between special interest and our fake leadership, the more he moves up. In Congress, 'compromise legislation' and 'stakeholder consensus' are often code for special interests teaming up to screw Americans."</p><p>A. FUCKING. MEN.</p><p>And though he was careful to pay homage to the PAC-loving Dear Leader, saying, "Remember our independence from special interests is our loyalty to America and the America First movement that President Trump began when he came down that escalator, armed with our well-wishes and prayers," Gaetz also praised Rep. Ro Khanna, a co-chair of Bernie Sanders's campaign, who does not accept PAC money.</p><p>So, let's all give Matt Gaetz polite round of applause for being <em>right about a thing</em>. In fact, he's been right about several things lately, including his <a href="https://www.wonkette.com/katie-hill-had-sex-destroyed-country-somehow" target="_blank">support</a> for former-Rep. Katie Hill and his <a href="https://www.wonkette.com/everything-that-happened-since-yesterday-in-our-iran-iraq-clusterfuq-wait-breaking" target="_blank">vote</a> against giving Trump unlimited powers to march the country into war without congressional approval. All of which leads us to an astonishing conclusion ...</p><p>Matt Gaetz is <em>not,</em> as we had always assumed, a complete idiot, so mentally incompetent as to be without the ability to engage in moral reasoning. Unbeknownst to us, he's been able to tell the difference between right and wrong this whole time! Which means that his lies about Adam Schiff and the impeachment process, fight to destroy the Affordable Care Act, and pathetic stunts like that <a href="https://www.wonkette.com/matt-gaetz-too-stupid-for-laura-ingraham" target="_blank">ethics complaint</a> against Nancy Pelosi for ripping up Trump's speech can longer be excused as the pathetic blatherings of an unfortunate soul barely up to the challenge of solid food.</p><p>So, good job Congressman. And also, WE SEE YOU.</p><p>[<a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/house/485004-gaetz-tells-cpac-he-wont-take-pac-money" target="_blank">The Hill</a> / <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/02/27/matt-gaetz-swears-off-pac-money-117956" target="_blank">Politico</a>]</p><p><strong>Follow <a href="https://twitter.com/5DollarFeminist" target="_blank">Liz Dye</a> on Twitter!</strong></p><p><strong>Please click here to support your Wonkette, who made it through another week with you.</strong></p><p></p><form name="donation" method="post" class="donation-form"><p class="subheadline">How often would you like to donate?</p><div class="form-row row--plan"><label class="plan-type__label"><input type="radio" name="plan_type" value="once" class="plan-type" required="" checked> Just once
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Legal
Michael Avenatti? More Like Michael Ave-NAUGHTY!
Happy Valentine's Day to all the jerks we've loved before.
February 14, 2020 05:37 PM
Michael Avenatti, you dumb son of a bitch, GO TO JAIL! Today a federal jury in Manhattan convicted the lawyer on three counts related to an attempt to extort Nike out of $20 million. And though we'll always be grateful to him for bringing to light Michael Cohen and American Media Inc.'s illegal ratfucking of the 2016 campaign, we are never, never, never getting back together with our (literally) crazy ex-boyfriend. Sorry, Blue Eyes, we're through!
It's all so pathetically petty and sordid. Avenatti found a basketball coach in California who said he knew about illegal payments to high school athletes. But instead of negotiating an advantageous settlement for his client, Avenatti waltzed in to Nike HQ and threatened to "take ten billion dollars off your client's market cap" if the company wouldn't give him $20 million to perform an internal audit. Or to not perform an audit — he didn't really give a damn as long as he got paid.
And when Nike's lawyers said, "Can you call us back tomorrow, and speak very loudly and clearly when you lay out the particulars of your threat to expose us if we don't pony up the cash?" Avenatti said, "You bet! Let me give you 24 hours so you'll have plenty of time to call the FBI and get them situated to record our conversation!" We are paraphrasing, but not by much.
<p>
No doubt the jury was impressed to hear Avenatti justify the exorbitant sum he demanded by asking the Boies Schiller attorneys if they "had ever held the balls of the client in your hand where you could take five to six billion dollars market cap off of them."
</p><p>
Hey remember the day the Nike indictment dropped when Avenatti also got indicted in California for allegedly stealing from his paraplegic client and scamming $4 million from a bank in Biloxi, Mississippi? </p><blockquote>
Sadly, Avenatti was unavailable to be arraigned in New York, since he was arrested this morning in California. Womp womp. But before we get to the Sunshine State, let's stop for a brief layover at The People's Bank in Biloxi, Mississippi, where Our Hero <em>is alleged to have</em> submitted false tax returns to secure $4.1 million in loans. Who among us hasn't doctored three years' worth of federal tax returns to get a loan, right? Oh, you haven't? Well, before you get all high and mighty, Michael Avenatti will have you know that he never did that either. Because he hadn't actually submitted any returns in the first place, <em>so he fabricated them in their entirety.</em>
</blockquote><p>Such a fucking idiot, OMG! </p><p>Avenatti will be sentenced in New York in June, and he faces multiple criminal trials and civil suits in California. Brass tacks, he's going to jail for a long, long time, and everyone he ever owed money to is hosed. The ex-wife who posted his bond and appears to have abetted him in hiding money from his creditors, for which his <a href="https://www.wonkette.com/michael-avenatti-has-lost-his-damn-mind-will-now-look-for-it-in-jail" target="_blank">bail was revoked</a> last month, may also be in a wee spot of legal bother herself. </p><p>So, thanks Mikey for bringing us Stormy Daniels. Thanks for taking Michael Cohen down a peg. Thanks for showing the world how the <em>National Enquirer</em> conspired with Trump to steal the election. But ... nah. We're done here.</p><p>THANK U NEXT.</p><p>Now it is what? It's your OPEN THREAD. </p><p><strong>Follow Liz Dye on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/5dollarfeminist" target="_blank">RIGHT HERE!</a></strong></p><p><strong>Please click here to support your Wonkette, who made it through another batshit week.</strong></p><p></p><form name="donation" method="post" class="donation-form"><p class="subheadline">How often would you like to donate?</p><div class="form-row row--plan"><label class="plan-type__label"><input type="radio" name="plan_type" value="once" class="plan-type" required="" checked> Just once
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Trump
Trump Charged Secret Service Up The Wazoo To Protect Him At His Trash Palaces
And Eric Trump lied about it to your face.
February 07, 2020 02:55 PM
Donald Trump, for all his imbecility and incompetence, has one truly impressive talent: He knows how to grift. This is not the same as being a great businessman, as his bankruptcies and multiple failed enterprises readily illustrate. (Trump Steaks! The Trump Shuttle! Trump Organic Free-Range Condoms!) But when it comes to petty shit that can squeeze out a few tens or hundreds of bucks, Trump is on it, like refusing to pay his contractors when he was building casinos, or making sure his 2016 campaign paid top dollar to rent rooms in Trump Tower, and to maintain his fleet of gold-plated trashjets. Since becoming "president," the grift has continued, as Dok Zoom's pretend boyfriend David Fahrenthold details in yet another jaw-dropping Washington Post story about just part of the money Donald Trump's businesses make from renting rooms to the Secret Service, which has to stay close to Trump at all times.
As with most of the reporting that earned Fahrenthold a Pulitzer Prize in 2017, the piece is a combination of dogged research and an eye for details that just leave you blinking in astonishment. The bottom line is that records Fahrenthold was able to compile -- some from the public record, others from watchdog groups' lawsuits, plus interviews with insiders -- "show more than $471,000 in payments from taxpayers to Trump's companies." But that's just a start, since, as he notes, "these records cover only a fraction of Trump's travel during a fraction of his term — the actual total is likely to be higher."
For instance, during the first year of Trump's maladministration, his Mar-a-Lago club charged the Secret Service rates up to $650 a night. Later, that nightly rate seems to have dropped some, to payments of "$396.15, dozens more times in 2018." But don't go thinking that had anything to do with the Trump Organization deciding the high costs looked bad. Don't be silly! Instead, it appears that's because the "2018 receipts list the Secret Service as an "honorary member" of the club, which could have made it eligible for a member discount."
Such a great deal maker!
<h2>We'll Leave The Overpriced Gaudy Light On For You</h2><p>Fahrenthold duly notes that conflict of interest regulations don't apply to the chief executive. And the Secret Service is, by law, exempt from normal per diem limits on what government employees can pay for rooms. <em>Nobody </em>wants a president getting shot because the Secret Service had to stay a mile away to save a few hundred bucks. (This seems like a good place to remind you Terrible Ones of the <a href="http://wonkette.com/466226/programming-note-rules-for-commenting-radicals" target="_blank">commenting rules,</a> too.)</p><p>So for an early 2017 trip to Mar-A-Lago, those $650 a night charges were well beyond what the government would allow a mere acting deputy undersecretary for slashing climate regulations to pay. Most of the entourage stayed elsewhere, but the three $650 rooms at the resort cost </p><blockquote>more than triple the normal limit on federal spending for a hotel room in that area, which was $182. It was even more than what the State Department paid for rooms at Mar-a-Lago around the same time,<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/taxpayers-billed-1092-for-an-officials-two-night-stay-at-trumps-mar-a-lago-club/2017/09/15/e3e5dfdc-97c6-11e7-82e4-f1076f6d6152_story.html?tid=lk_inline_manual_59&itid=lk_inline_manual_59" target="_blank" title="www.washingtonpost.com"> which was $520 to $546</a>.</blockquote><p>Don't worry, though: A Secret Service spokesperson explained that's just duh, because "The operational needs of the Secret Service can differ from those in the Department of State." </p><p>And then there's the three-room cottage at Trump National Golf Club Bedminster, in New Jersey, which the Secret Service rented for $17,000 a month, according to 2017 receipts. That's insanely out of line from nearby luxury home rentals in Bedminster, where Zillow showed the average monthly rent for three or more bedrooms was $3,400, and even the priciest ran $8,500. But none of them were as <em>good</em>, don't you know. </p><h2>We HAVE TO Grift. It's the Law.</h2><p>Just to keep you whomperjawed, Fahrenthold contrasts those records with Eric Trump's blithe bullshitting about what a bargain the taxpayers get. Last year, when Trump was hot on <a href="https://www.wonkette.com/trump-doral-g-7" target="_blank">holding the international G-7 summit</a> at his Trump Doral International Golf Emporium, Bordello, and Fast Auto Detailing Center, Eric Trump<a href="https://www.wonkette.com/trump-doral-g-7" target="_blank"> bragged to Yahoo Finance</a> that it's just silly to think his dad would make a profit from filling his hotel with diplomats at premium rates in Florida's summer off season, because Donald Trump doesn't pay himself to stay at his own resorts, silly: </p><blockquote>"If my father travels, they stay at our properties for free," Trump said. "So everywhere that he goes, if he stays at one of his places, the government actually spends, meaning it saves a fortune because if they were to go to a hotel across the street, they'd be charging them $500 a night, whereas, you know we charge them, like $50," he added.</blockquote><p>Except Fahrenthold has the receipts, and not a one of them shows the Secret Service paying $50 a night. Then again, most of the records are invisible, so maybe the cheapest visits are among the hidden documents. That <em>must </em>be it. </p><p>Further, the con man in chief's con man son <a href="https://www.wonkette.com/trump-doral-g-7" target="_blank">insisted</a> the Trump Organization is legally obligated to charge all government guests something, because that's just the law, and boy, does his family ever respect the law! (Maybe that exclamation point should be a question mark.) </p><p>Needless to say, Fahrenthold, that nosy nosypants,<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/secret-service-has-paid-rates-as-high-as-650-a-night-for-rooms-at-trumps-properties/2020/02/06/7f27a7c6-3ec5-11ea-8872-5df698785a4e_story.html" target="_blank"> isn't sure he agrees </a>with you 100% on your police work, there, Eric: </p><blockquote>Eric Trump did not say what law required Trump to charge his own government, and the Secret Service did not respond to questions asking what law he was referring to. </blockquote><p>What's more, he notes, <a href="https://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/foia/mgmt_directive_112_02_gifts_to_the_department_of_homeland_security.pdf" target="_blank">internal guidelines</a> for the the Department of Homeland Security, the Secret Service's parent agency, say that "DHS may accept gifts to carry out program functions." And nah, nobody from the Trump Organization or the Secret Service would give straight answers about that supposed law that forces the Trumps to charge top rates. If it exists at all, it must be a really recent law, since neither of the presidents Bush nor Bill Clinton charged the Secret Service to use facilities at their various vacation homes and ranches. (Obama, that rootless cosmopolitan, stayed at hotels when he went to Hawaii to use diamonds as golf balls, at taxpayer expense.)</p><h2>Disclosure Is For Little People</h2><p>And then there's the pesky detail of actually following laws that any fool investigative reporter can look up: </p><blockquote>The Secret Service is required to tell Congress twice a year about what it spends to protect Trump at his properties.<br><br>But since 2016, it has only filed two of the required six reports, according to congressional offices. The reasons, according to Secret Service officials: key personnel left and nobody picked up the job.<br><br>Even in those two reports, the lines for Bedminster and Mar-a-Lago were blank.</blockquote><p>Ever the diligent fact-chaser, Fahrenthold asked about all that, and did his best to parse what he could get from Grifters_R_ Us.gov:</p><blockquote>The Secret Service officials said only that they abide by the law, but they did not elaborate. They are probably referring to a provision that requires them to tell Congress about "permanent" costs. They may not consider anything they've done at either club permanent.</blockquote><p>"Loopholes" are awesome if they let you cover shit up, and terrible if they protect whistleblowers or asylum seekers. </p><h2>Coming Soon: Endless Revelations Of Fuckery!</h2><p>And that's just some of the completely infuriating stuff Fahrenthold uncovered -- which, as we keep reminding you, is also only a sliver of the information that's even available. He closes with another mystery: For stuff like travel to Trump's <em>Châteaux des ordures,</em> the Secret Service has to be on site, so there's simply no avoiding some of what the Trumps extort from Secret Service (he also mentions that sometimes, when on-site managers ask too much, Secret Service honchos have called Eric to ask for a more flexible rate). </p><p>But what the fuck is up with <em>this?</em></p><blockquote>Why did the Secret Service spend so much at Trump's D.C. hotel, a place where — unlike Bedminster and Mar-a-Lago — Trump has not stayed overnight since taking office? In response to records request from NBC News, the Department of Homeland Security released a listing of 39 payments there during Trump's first year, totaling $159,000. <br><br>The documents do not give the reasons for those payments — or give the rate that Trump's company charged.</blockquote><p><em>That</em> story should be a doozy. $159,000 is one hell of a lot of shrimp cocktail.</p><p>And as proof God loves irony, a federal appeals court today<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/07/politics/emoluments-lawsuit-trump/index.html" target="_blank"> threw out one of the three current lawsuits </a>alleging Trump has violated the Constitution's emoluments clause, blocking Congress from demanding Trump's business records. Isn't America a wonderful place?</p><p>[<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/secret-service-has-paid-rates-as-high-as-650-a-night-for-rooms-at-trumps-properties/2020/02/06/7f27a7c6-3ec5-11ea-8872-5df698785a4e_story.html" target="_blank">WaPo </a>/ <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/07/politics/emoluments-lawsuit-trump/index.html" target="_blank">CNN</a> / Wonkette photoshoop based on <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/slgc/21449922939" target="_blank">image by "slgckgc,"</a> Creative Commons<a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/" target="_blank"> license 2.0</a>; Trump bucks by <a href="https://pixabay.com/illustrations/trump-donald-trump-cash-currency-2056666/" target="_blank">Eric Perlin</a>]</p><p>Yr Wonkette is supported entirely by reader donations. 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