FBI director James Comey today recommended no criminal charges be brought against Hillary Clinton — though, bizarrely enough, he admitted there was gross negligence involving national security. The FBI’s decision lifted a major legal threat to Clinton’s presidential campaign, but it did not lift the political threat.
It’s even clearer than ever after the release of the FBI’s findings that Clinton is guilty of gross negligence, but she got away with it – despite behavior that the average citizen (or Republican) would have been prosecuted for. And, unfortunately, she isn’t the first Democrat to avoid the consequences of their bad (and even criminal) behavior.
Today, we’re taking a look at three Washington Democrats who recently got away even though they were guilty.
Without further ado:
1. Former Democrat rising star and Snohomish County Executive Aaron Reardon resigned in disgrace in 2013. Reardon conducted a 6-year affair with a county employee. His mistress even accompanied him on an official out-of-state trip where Reardon purchased a hotel “intimacy kit” on a county credit card.
He also used county resources to campaign and raise money, including sitting in his county office during business hours with his campaign fundraiser “dialing for dollars” on his county-paid phone for more than 50 hours. And, he used paid staff on county time and computers to harass officials seen as enemies and dig up dirt on his 2011 opponent, GOP State Rep. Mike Hope.
After a lengthy 3-and-a-half year investigation into Reardon’s corruption, the Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) fined him $4,200. To say the least, Reardon got off easy.
2. Disgraced former Oregon governor John Kitzhaber was brought down by a scandal over the financial ties between extreme “green” groups and his energy advisor and fiancée, Cylvia Hayes. As Shift has reported, this scandal runs deep, touching even Washington State and our very own green governor.
Both Kitzhaber and Inslee had advisors paid for by California billionaire and “green” hypocrite Tom Steyer to influence their green agendas. The Energy Foundation, a Steyer-funded group, was one of the extreme environmental groups behind the Kitzhaber scandal. The group helped foot the bill for Kitzhaber’s fianceé Hayes’ $118,000 fellowship and hired her for “communications work” on a contract worth $50,000, all while she served in an official capacity as his environmental advisor.
The Rockefeller Brothers Fund, one of the organizations involved in the Oregon scandal, paid for work done by Jay Manning, an advisor to Inslee, to develop a fuel mandate for Washington State. Manning had a $150,000 contract. The Energy Foundation underwrote the Skamania conferences where Inslee administration officials, green special interest groups and rich donors got together to assemble Inslee’s job-killing plans.
The ties between the Kitzhaber scandal and Inslee’s administration are rather obvious. Unfortunately, our green governor appears to have gotten away with his sketchy methods to impose his extreme “green” agenda.
3. Most recently, the Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission concluded that Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) Director Scott Kubly violated two serious city ethics rules. First, that Kubly participated in a “city matter in which a prior employer has a financial interest.” And, second, that Kubly failed to file a waiver/disclosure form during discussion and planning of purchasing a “service was unpopular and failing.”
Ultimately, Kubly’s corrupt behavior — his failure to follow clear rules as a public official — only resulted with a slap on the wrist. Kubly was fined $10,000. However, he will only have to pay $5,000 due to the city’s decision to suspended half of the fine long as he doesn’t commit another material violation of the rules over the next two years.
After two years, apparently, Kubly is free to commit more ethics violations… at the expense of taxpayers.
