Defenders of President Donald Trump would like us to believe that it’s just a coincidence that a large number of his most prominent associates and supporters have faced criminal charges. That group includes California Congressman Duncan Hunter, who recently pleaded guilty to misusing campaign contributions. Now, the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) has released a report this week through the House Ethics Committee chronicling some details of the stunningly wide corruption that Hunter engaged in. That report had previously been withheld while federal authorities completed their own investigation of Hunter, who’s the second Trump-supporting Congressman to go down on criminal charges. Chris Collins recently announced resignation plans after charges of insider trading.
Overall, Hunter apparently spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign money on personal expenditures. These ranged from expenses associated with extramarital affairs to vacation to Europe to airfare for a pet rabbit. The range rivals the infamous display of the extravagance that disgraced former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort spent his own laundered money on. Manafort is now in jail.
OCE shared:
‘[We] found a pattern of campaign committee outlays for everyday and household expenses such as meals, groceries, gas, and other retail items purchased by Rep. Hunter and Mrs. Hunter… Based on the foregoing information, the Board finds that there is substantial reason to believe that Rep. Hunter converted campaign funds to personal use to pay expenses that were not legitimate and verifiable campaign expenditures attributable to bona fide campaign or political purposes.’
The soon-to-be former Congressman’s wife Margaret already pleaded guilty to her role in the scheme some time ago. As a consequence of his felony criminal charges including conspiracy, wire fraud, falsifying campaign finance records, and improperly using campaign contributions, the House Ethics Committee had just recently demanded that Hunter stop voting in Congress, which he’d apparently done as recently as the day before that demand. Now, he says he will be resigning at the end of the year, after the holiday season — although notably enough, he won a re-election campaign while the scandal against him was ongoing. CNN notes that his campaign was focused on drumming up anti-Muslim racism against his opponent.
None of this is happening before Hunter got a whole host of personal financial kickbacks from his supposed public service. His illegal expenses include an almost $10,000 vacation to Italy, about $7,000 more for family vacations to Hawaii, about $2,900 for still more family vacations to Arizona — and the list goes on. There was even almost $1,100 that the Hunter spent on a family wedding in Idaho. The campaign money even went to more personal expenses, like about $3,150 for cable TV and internet service. The rabbit-related expenses included $625 in fees for bringing the animal in the flight cabin — which the Hunters did repeatedly.
It’s hardly the only financial scandal to rock Trump World. For example, two associates of personal Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani are currently facing criminal charges over a massive federal campaign finance law violation scheme that included the transfer of millions of dollars to U.S. political figures, including large amounts of illegal foreign money from a Russian businessman.
