In 2003, Ernie Fletcher became the first Republican to win the Kentucky governorship since 1967. At this rate, he might be the last one for a while.<\/p>\n
Earlier this year, documents, including notes and emails, came to light that showed Fletcher’s hiring decisions were based almost exclusively on partisanship<\/a> and not individual qualifications — you got a job in state government if you’re a Republican, whether you deserved it or not. <\/p>\n Attorney General Greg Stumbo (D) investigated, believing that the practices violated state employment laws. Last month, a grand jury came to the same conclusion. Among those indicted<\/a> this week were Fletcher’s deputy chief of staff, an executive director in Fletcher’s Transportation Cabinet, and Fletcher’s transportation administrative services commissioner. The charges range from violating applicants’ civil rights, to political discrimination, to multiple counts of criminal conspiracy.<\/p>\n Yesterday, in response to the growing scandal, Fletcher issued sweeping pardons<\/a> for all of his cohorts, before formal criminal charges could be brought against them.<\/p>\n On the eve of an appearance before a grand jury investigating his administration’s hiring practices, Gov. Ernie Fletcher granted a blanket pardon on Monday night to current and former aides charged in the inquiry.<\/p>\n Mr. Fletcher also said that although he would appear before the grand jury, he would not testify.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Politically, this isn’t likely to help a governor whose approval ratings have already plummeted<\/a>. As Eastern Kentucky University’s Joe Gershtenson said<\/a>, the pardons “inevitably create at least some perception that there’s some guilt. Why pardon if somebody isn’t going to ultimately get convicted?”<\/p>\n Legally, there’s the specter of impeachment<\/a> to consider. Mr. Fletcher was also criticized by Democratic state legislators, with Representative Kathy W. Stein saying pardons would be grounds to consider impeachment.<\/p>\n “He is showing a broad disrespect for the criminal justice system that every other citizen in the commonwealth must live with,” Ms. Stein said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n And as if that weren’t enough, there’s also the possibility of federal prosecution<\/a>.<\/p>\n Not only will the investigation not be ending, Attorney General Greg Stumbo said, it may expand to include possible federal crimes, a court challenge to the governor’s authority to pardon and give ammunition to two agencies that are also investigating whether the administration bypassed more qualified people to reward political cronies with jobs.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n What is it with Republican governors lately? In addition to Fletcher, former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland (R) is currently behind bars<\/a>; Ohio Gov. Bob Taft (R) was busted on ethics violations<\/a> and is under pressure to resign; California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) is a scandal magnet<\/a>; and Missouri Gov. Matthew Blunt (R) campaign irregularities<\/a> were recently referred to Missouri’s attorney general’s office for an investigation.<\/p>\n Culture of corruption, indeed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In 2003, Ernie Fletcher became the first Republican to win the Kentucky governorship since 1967. At this rate, he might be the last one for a while. Earlier this year, documents, including notes and emails, came to light that showed Fletcher’s hiring decisions were based almost exclusively on partisanship and not individual qualifications — you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5111","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5111"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5111\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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