Without question, most Americans have, at one time or another, often mused about – or anguished over – the ‘phenomenon’ of how people who get elected to Congress as paupers come out the back end at retirement multimillionaires.
It’s one of the biggest open secrets in Washington: Graft happens, and there’s no denying it.
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But one relative newcomer to Congress has managed to make a mockery, even, of the open secret regarding graft: Rep. Ilhan Omar.
Rather than sneaking around doing deals behind closed doors that pad your portfolio or making key investments in the stock market at the right time, the Minnesota Democrat is padding her nest pretty much out in the open: By paying her husband’s political consultant firm millions of dollars in ‘fees.’
Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., has paid nearly $2.8 million to her husband’s political consulting firm so far in the 2019-2020 election cycle, including nearly 70% of her third-quarter disbursements.
Federal Election Commission data shows that Omar’s campaign sent $1.6 million to E Street Group LLC, which is owned by her husband Tim Mynett, from the start of 2019 through Jul. 22, 2020. After that, she reported an additional $1.1 million in the third quarter and $27,000 in the following weeks. That $1.1 million constituted nearly 70% of the $1.6 million that Omar’s campaign spent that quarter.
The expenses covered a range of services, including cable advertising, “digital consulting,” video production and editing.
Omar handily won re-election last week amid criticism surrounding the way she financed her campaign. She married Mynett, a campaign consultant, in March after having funneled more than $500,000 to his firm by that point.
Naturally, Omar has defended this graft by saying her campaign began working with her future hubby’s firm long before she married him.
Okay, got it. But why not switch consultant groups after the fact, so as to dispel the appearance of impropriety?
Because, apparently – if we are to believe her – this sort of inter-family graft happens a lot.
“We consulted with a top FEC campaign attorney to ensure there were no possible legal issues with our relationship,” she wrote in a tweet in response to questions from Talking Points USA founder Charlie Kirk. “We were told this is not uncommon and that no, there weren’t.”
Fox News added:
The payments are possible because of a 1960s federal anti-nepotism statute that prohibits members of Congress from hiring relatives for government jobs but does not block family members from doing campaign work, a former chief ethics lawyer from the administration of former President George W. Bush told The New York Post.
“It should not be allowed,” attorney Richard Painter said. “I think it’s a horrible idea to allow it, given the amount of money that goes into these campaigns from special interests.”
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But it is allowed, apparently, but what do you suppose the chances are Congress changes the law anytime soon?
No doubt Omar ran as a candidate who would come to the nation’s capital and serve as a ‘reformer.’ Turns out she fits in very nicely with the DC Swamp President Trump wants to drain.
