{"id":7098,"date":"2006-04-10T11:11:17","date_gmt":"2006-04-10T15:11:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=7098"},"modified":"2006-04-10T11:11:17","modified_gmt":"2006-04-10T15:11:17","slug":"delays-k-street-buddies-want-their-money-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/delays-k-street-buddies-want-their-money-back\/","title":{"rendered":"DeLay’s K Street buddies want their money back"},"content":{"rendered":"

One side note to the [tag]Tom DeLay[\/tag] resignation story that didn’t get much attention last week was the fact that [tag]DeLay[\/tag] was poised to step down for quite a while, but had to pretend to be interested in keeping his seat, in part for financial reasons<\/a>.<\/p>\n

An additional impetus for putting off the resignation until now was suggested by John Feehery, a former aide to DeLay and House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). “He needed to raise money for the [tag]defense fund[\/tag]. That was the bottom line,” Feehery said. “He wanted to make sure he could take care of himself in the court of law.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In other words, DeLay was raising money from suckers<\/strike> supporters under false pretenses. He asked contributors for financial support, telling them that he needed the money to help with his campaign, when in reality, DeLay knew he’d have to resign and he wanted the donations for his legal defense. DeLay’s con is legal, but obviously dishonest.<\/p>\n

With this in mind, it’s not terribly surprising that some of these donors would like their [tag]money[\/tag] back<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A few lobbyists who helped raise money for Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas) — all of them outside the inner circle of the former Majority Leader — say they’d like the outgoing Congressman to offer them their money back. […]<\/p>\n

His re-election kitty, probably worth upwards of $1 million, is widely expected to be shifted into a fund to pay his mounting legal bills. While these lobbyists didn’t mind cutting checks to the Majority Leader, or even a member of the Appropriations Committee, they aren’t so energized about spreading their generosity to DeLay’s legal team because, well, what’s in it for them?<\/p>\n

“If I wanted to give to a legal fund, I would’ve done it directly,” snarled one GOP lobbyist who refused to have his name attached to such callous-sounding sentiments, even if DeLay is leaving Congress.<\/p>\n

Another lobbyist who gives to Members on both sides of the aisle said, “It’s nauseating to think about” his campaign contribution going to fund DeLay’s legal team. “I’m realistic about it. He wouldn’t resign for no reason,” this lobbyist said, noting that the timing of DeLay’s departure came awfully close to the announcement of a plea agreement by his former aide Tony Rudy. “That all this money will go to the legal defense fund, it sickens me,” he added. “I have to pay for that?”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Apparently so. As K Street lobbyists should realize by now, sometimes, when you lay with dogs, you get fleas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One side note to the [tag]Tom DeLay[\/tag] resignation story that didn’t get much attention last week was the fact that [tag]DeLay[\/tag] was poised to step down for quite a while, but had to pretend to be interested in keeping his seat, in part for financial reasons. An additional impetus for putting off the resignation until […]<\/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-7098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7098","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=7098"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7098\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}