Last week, after Bernie Kerik’s legal troubles got worse, Rudy Giuliani vowed to “check more carefully” into the background of his associates from now on.
How’s that working out? Not too well.
The man named yesterday by the Giuliani campaign to a law enforcement outreach campaign post in Minnesota was forced to resign a government job in 2004 when proof surfaced that he’d admitted to repeatedly using the word “nigger” in the past, Election Central has learned.
Sheriff Richard Stanek was appointed to the post of chair of Minnesota Law Enforcement for Rudy. The campaign’s press release promised that Stanek “will work with law enforcement personnel throughout the state to communicate Mayor Giuliani’s record of fighting crime and his commitment to first responders.”
But as a rival campaign has pointed out to us, it turns out Stanek has admitted to having a history of racially charged remarks. He was forced to resign his post as Minnesota’s public safety commissioner in 2004 after it came to light that he’d admitted in a deposition that he’d used racist slurs in the past, including repeated use of the word “nigger.”
As regular readers know, I’ve been keeping a list of Giuliani’s odd choice of associates, and it’s getting pretty long.
* Kenneth Caruso, a close Giuliani friend and business partner, has been accused of conspiring to steal $10 million invested through a Caribbean bank.
* Giuliani inexplicably backed Bernie Kerik, and made him the city’s police commissioner, after he’d been briefed on Kerik’s organized crime connections.
* Thomas Ravenel, the chairman of Giuliani’s presidential campaign in South Carolina, was indicted on cocaine distribution charges.
* Arthur Ravenel, the replacement chairman of Giuliani’s presidential campaign in South Carolina, has characterized the NAACP as the “National Association for Retarded People,” and has an unusual fondness for the Confederate battle flag.
* Alan Placa was accused by a grand jury report of sexually abusing children, as well as helping cover up the sexual abuse of children by other priests. Giuliani then put Placa, his life-long friend, on the payroll of Giuliani Partners. (Adds Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org, which tracks suspected priest abuse, “I think Rudy Giuliani has to account for his friendship with a credibly accused child molester.”)
* Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), the family-values conservative caught up in a prostitution ring, was not only Giuliani’s top Senate backer, he was also the regional chairman of Giuliani’s campaign.
I’ve never seen a presidential candidate have this much bad luck, in such a short period of time, in picking the wrong people to be associated with.