{"id":5625,"date":"2005-10-25T09:50:18","date_gmt":"2005-10-25T13:50:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=5625"},"modified":"2005-10-25T09:50:18","modified_gmt":"2005-10-25T13:50:18","slug":"delays-fortunes-go-from-bad-to-worse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/delays-fortunes-go-from-bad-to-worse\/","title":{"rendered":"DeLay’s fortunes go from bad to worse"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the last couple of weeks, the Republicans’ drive to distance themselves from Tom DeLay has only intensified. A few weeks ago, Rep. Jeb Bradley (R-N.H.) announced he’d return contributions<\/a> he’d received from DeLay; Rep. Heather Wilson (R-N.M.) did the same. A week later, Rep. Kenny Hulshof (R-Mo.) said<\/a> he was not only giving back DeLay’s tainted money, he would also oppose DeLay’s return as Majority Leader no matter what happened in DeLay’s criminal trial.<\/p>\n

This week, a fourth Republican colleague joined the list<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ohio Rep. Steven LaTourette recently became the fourth GOP lawmaker to return campaign funds received from indicted ex-Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas). <\/p>\n

LaTourette has donated $13,000 that he received from DeLay’s Americans for a Republican Majority Political Action Committee to Hurricane Katrina relief funds. The six-term lawmaker has not commented publicly on his decision to give up the money, but he is informing constituents of his action when they ask about it. <\/p>\n

“As a former prosecutor, I trust that the legal system will work and Tom DeLay, like every American, should have his day in court and should be afforded the presumption of innocence,” LaTourette wrote in a letter to Aurora, Ohio, resident Palmer Peterson dated Oct. 11. “However, in order to remove any questions that may arise about these contributions, I have made a donation in the same amount to the Bush-Clinton Katrina fund, which will help with relief efforts in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And while DeLay’s support continues to erode on the Hill, he’s also suffering in other ways.<\/p>\n

On the legal front, DeLay is demanding a quick trial, but his request for a new judge in his Texas case makes that impossible<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On the financial front, DeLay just got a pay cut<\/a> now that he’s no longer a member of the leadership.<\/p>\n

And on the public relations front, DeLay won a wicker basket at a county fair in Texas recently, which happened to come with a paper shredder inside. It offered DeLay’s opponent, former Rep. Nick Lampson (D), a chance to lampoon DeLay<\/a> just a little more. “Nobody needs a paper shredder more than Tom DeLay,” Lampson’s campaign manager, Mike Malaise, told Roll Call. “This was a very practical purchase, and we’re sure the paper shredder will see a lot of use in the DeLay camp.” He said Houston may just see its second straight white Christmas “when it starts snowing TRMPAC documents this year.” <\/p>\n

Tom DeLay may have been smiling wide for his mugshot<\/a> last week, but he probably won’t be smiling again for quite a while.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the last couple of weeks, the Republicans’ drive to distance themselves from Tom DeLay has only intensified. A few weeks ago, Rep. Jeb Bradley (R-N.H.) announced he’d return contributions he’d received from DeLay; Rep. Heather Wilson (R-N.M.) did the same. A week later, Rep. Kenny Hulshof (R-Mo.) said he was not only giving back […]<\/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-5625","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5625","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=5625"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5625\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}