Zombie GOP Rep. Duncan Hunter will be running for congress for the rest of his life. Because when you're not running for elected office, you can't raise any campaign money for your legal defense. And when you're fighting a 60-count Indictment in federal court, you need infinity dollars to pay your lawyers, particularly after your own wife agrees to testify against you after finding out about all the staffers and lobbyists you were boning. The trial is scheduled for January of 2020, so Duncan Hunter is keeping up the charade that he is actually going to serve out another term until long after that prison cell slams shut on his grifty ass.
But former GOP California Rep. Darrell Issa is ready to set fire to Rep. Dead Man Walking's sham campaign like a car alarm factory that just had its insurance quadrupled three weeks ago. Issa noped out of another run in CA-49 after then-candidate Mike Levin started showing up at all his town halls and kicking him in the jimmies with words . And that's why we call him Rep. Levin (D-California) today. But Issa is thirsty, so thirsty to get his ass back to DC, and he knows he's not doing it in the 49th.
Issa gives no shits about Duncan Hunter's legal bills and is licking his chops at the prospect of running for office in one of the last safe Republican seats in California. If a guy who got caught redhanded stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from his own campaign ALLEGEDLY can win in CA-50, then any Gipper with a pulse and two past indictments for car theft can hold it. And Darrell Issa has a pulse. ALLEGEDLY. And two past indictments for car theft. NOT ALLEGEDLY.
The Washington Post was first to note that Issa has launched an exploratory committee with an eye to running for Hunter's seat. What else could he do in response to the "tremendous outpouring of encouragement from supporters inside the district, and around the state and across the Nation"? This support does not extend to the Senate, however, where Issa's nomination to lead the US Trade and Development Agency has languished for 11 months. (Was it because he got mixed up in Ohio Rep. Mike Turner's divorce? We hear the GOP is real finicky about adultery these days.)
Hunter himself seems to have anticipated Issa muscling in on his turf 18 months ago, telling The Hill , "If I was to blow up in the air, then he would be running for it. If I was to blow up, then he would run for the seat. If I blow up, yes. Why wouldn't he run for my seat if I was to blow up in the air?" That's some oddly specific wording, there, ain't it! It's unclear whether he means "blow up" as in "wind up in the hoosegow," or "blow up" like "Help, there's an arsonist chasing me with a can of kerosene and a lighter." Maybe both!
If Hunter really does stay in the race to the bitter end, it'll be so very ugly. He ran an explicitly bigoted campaign in 2018 against Ammar Campa-Najjar, a practicing Christian of Palestinian and Hispanic descent who is running again in 2020. Darrell Issa's father was Lebanese-American, a fact which is guaranteed to be front and center in Hunter's ads if he actually sticks it out. Although ... Darrell Issa has $250 million to his name. So if he wanted to make a big old donation to Hunter's legal defense, he might be able to clear the field early. Not that Issa would stoop to committing a federal crime, of course. Perish the thought!
We're just sayin' ....
[ WaPo / DarrellIssa.com ]
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Huh. I had always imagined it was related to "regimental" Scots in uniform kilts. Maybe I just imagine kilts a lot, now that I think about it...
How is this evil still walking the earth?