Duncan Hunter-- Like Father Like Son

Drunkin' Hunter and DJ Trumpanzee

When I started DWT in 2004, one of my goals was to drive a bevy of super-corrupt Republican congressmen out of office-- Richard Pombo up north and 3 thieves from down south: Jerry Lewis, Duke Cunningham and Duncan Hunter, Pombo was defeated by Jerry McNerney, one of the first congressional candidates supported by Blue America. Cunningham went to prison and his two partners in crime, Lewis and Hunter retired before they could be indicted. Hunter left behind a pile of waste though, Duncan Hunter II.

A high-ranking Democrat, an ex-military officer, once told me to lay off Hunter Jr. He was in love with him and was very concerned that Hunter was suffering from both PTSD from his multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan and from severe alcoholism; he once visited me right after spending time with Hunter and told me he was barely functional. This is almost 10 years ago, soon after the crooked father arranged for the drunken son to get his House seat and I assume that Hunter is more... functional.

He represents a very safe Republican seat, CA-50, in eastern San Diego County, much of it rural and sparsely populated. It includes Temecula, Escondido, Santee, Lakeside part of El Cajon and lots and lots of state wilderness parks and reserves. The PVI is R+11 and Trump beat Hillary 54.6% to 39.6%. The thought has been that when the GOP is all but dead and gone in California only Kevin McCarthy's seat and Duncan Hunter's seat would remain red. If that's so, it's no longer likely Hunter will be representing it in Congress.

Everyone on Capitol Hill knows he's a talentless, unserious, drunken ne'er-do-well. He was the second member to endorse Trump, the only thing he's remembered for, aside from vaping and chasing women. Over the weekend, the NY Times ran a sad profile on him, Hard Partying and a Corruption Scandal: Duncan Hunter’s Political Life Unravels. And, clearly, it is more than just his political life that's unraveling. Last week he and his wife were indicted on 60 counts, included wire fraud, falsifying records, campaign finance violations, and conspiracy. They were arraigned and he was ordered to step down from his committees by Paul Ryan, which he refused to do and then did the following day. He also threw his wife under the bus and blamed her for all his problems-- as well as politically motivated prosecutors out to get him. As iff his week weren't going badly enough, the San Diego Union-Tribune called on him to resign from Congress. "Hunter," they wrote, "badly lost his way, seemingly becoming corrupt to the point of caricature... $250,000 in campaign donations for the personal benefit of the couple and their children from 2010 to 2017. The indictment makes the case for a staggering 60 criminal counts ranging from illegal use of campaign funds to conspiracy to wire fraud to falsifying records. Their purchases ranged from the banal-- inexpensive Uber trips-- to the preposterous-- a $14,261 family vacation in Italy in late 2015."

The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board deeply hopes that local and national Republicans do not enable this bogus story line with blind loyalty to Hunter. Instead, we hope their reaction mirrors what happened in 2005 after the Union-Tribune and Copley News Service broke the story of how Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, R-Rancho Santa Fe, had traded lucrative defense contracts in return for millions of dollars in bribes. Cunningham had some defenders, but by and large the most typical response was fury, disgust and disappointment. Within six months, Cunningham tearfully resigned after pleading guilty to corruption.

If he had any honor at all, Hunter would resign as well. He has disgraced himself more thoroughly than his critics ever could. He doesn’t deserve the privilege of representing Californians in Congress.

This weekend's NY Times profile isn't any friendlier, noting that in DC he "was a fixture on the bar scene, and spent lavishly-- over $400 for 30 tequila shots at a bachelor party, and countless fancy dinners. He visited one of his favorite bars sometimes multiple times a day, piling up thousands of dollars in tabs. On occasion, he would get into loud arguments with patrons, once over the choice of music on the jukebox (he hated Celine Dion).

Despite a bullshit right-wing political résumé, he was never fit for Congress. The indictment and "unspooling" of Hunter’s life "has laid bare the reservations among associates and friends who long wondered whether politics was a career path he had ever wanted to fulfill. Now, whatever promise he had has been threatened, with possible far-reaching consequences for the party and his personal life. The indictment, interviews with those who know him and his own personal statements show how a seemingly ideal political life unraveled under personal financial pressure, opening the door to a web of corruption and deception that lasted several years as Mr. Hunter lived a seemingly dual life."

Hunter says he is determined to stay on the ballot. And in a heavily Republican district, running against a first-time Democratic opponent who is the son of an Arab father and Mexican mother, he still maintains a strong chance of re-election.

Still, his voters have this to confront: a 47-page indictment that outlines years of allegations that Mr. Hunter and his wife spent almost a quarter of a million dollars of campaign money on personal expenses, on everything from vacations to fast-food meals, even a plane ticket for their pet, reportedly a rabbit.

And in a district that has many military families, he may have committed the ultimate sin: passing off personal expenses as gifts for “wounded warriors.” For a man who is a veteran and whose political identity is tied to championing the military, this news has been particularly insulting to the veterans community.

“This is a tragic unraveling of someone who should probably never have gone to Congress,” said Nathan Fletcher, a former state assemblyman from San Diego who left the Republican Party in 2012.

...The missteps began not long after he was elected to Congress, prosecutors now say. Mr. Hunter spent little time at home, preferring the high life of Washington to sedate suburbia, and when he did come home he spent a lot of time playing golf.

...As 2009 was coming to a close, the United States was in the teeth of a financial crisis and Mr. Hunter was finishing his first year in office.

With the holidays approaching, Mr. Hunter addressed one of the primary concerns of his constituents: a desire for “greater financial freedom.”

“Most often, I hear concerns from working Americans about the future of their children and grandchildren, and the debt burden they will unfairly inherit,” he wrote.

A few weeks later, Mr. Hunter showed up at an Alamo rental car agency in Reno, Nev., and with his own bank accounts nearly empty, the indictment says, he dipped into campaign funds to pay $351.04 for a rental car to drive to Lake Tahoe for a ski weekend. The document laid out an exhaustive list of expenses between 2010 and 2016 that prosecutors believe were paid for with campaign money.

Days later, there were more charges: $1,008.72, for food, drinks and a room for three nights at the Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe Resort Spa and Casino.

His personal bank account at the time, after he withdrew $20, had $15.02 remaining. From then on, his financial record would show a nearly constant state of depleted funds and overdraft fees.

Those Reno and Lake Tahoe charges, prosecutors say, started a yearslong pattern in which the couple drew on campaign accounts to pay for what were said to be personal expenses. There was a $14,261.33 family vacation to Italy, and $32.31 at Albertsons for milk, apples, beer, chewing tobacco and a pack of cigarettes.

In some cases, the couple tried to falsely claim that personal expenses were actually meant for charitable causes. And in Italy, according to prosecutors, Mr. Hunter tried to arrange a tour of a naval facility so he could classify the trip as work-related.

In veterans’ circles, this amounted to a slap in the face. But many veterans advocates say they were always skeptical of Mr. Hunter’s motives. Many have long referred to him as a “blue falcon,” military slang for someone willing to sacrifice his friends for his own benefit.

They say he would often intervene in newsworthy cases when a veteran was in trouble-- as in one case when a veteran ended up in a Mexican jail. But when it came to supporting military-friendly policies, Mr. Hunter did little, they say.

“It’s clear he was doing it to get on Fox News and call himself a hero,” said Kristofer Goldsmith, who runs High Ground Veterans Advocacy, a nonprofit.

Mr. Goldsmith said he had lobbied Mr. Hunter’s office to support a policy that would prevent the Pentagon from releasing soldiers with less-than-honorable discharges without a mental health assessment, but got nowhere.

“At some point it became clear I shouldn’t be talking to his office,” he said.

The expenses outlined in the indictment were often quotidian-- not the luxurious things that often produce titillating political corruption scandals. There was no $15,000 ostrich jacket, no antique rugs or a mansion in the Hamptons, to mention some of the more headline-grabbing expenses that enlivened the recent corruption trial of Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign chairman. For the Hunters, it was often everyday expenses: the cable bill, the dentist, prescription medication, fast food restaurants like In-N-Out, trips to Walmart.

In one sense, the Hunters’ story is one of financial woe not unlike that faced by countless American families struggling to pay the basics. Yet to many they seem particularly ironic, considering Mr. Hunter’s repeated calls for fiscal responsibility.

“The federal government is like a family that has overspent and racked up too many bills,” Mr. Hunter wrote in an op-ed.

As Ms. Hunter held down the household in California, Mr. Hunter was drawing concern from colleagues in Washington about his partying, which prosecutors allege was often paid for with campaign cash. At one point, John Boehner, then the Republican leader, sat down him and his friends-- known as the “bros caucus”-- and told them to “knock off” their frat house antics, according to a person close to the Republican leadership at the time.

Mr. Hunter has been a regular at a number of bars near Capitol Hill, from the private Capitol Club to the congressional watering hole, Bullfeathers, just next door. There, the congressman could often be found on the patio with colleagues, drinking beer or vodka.

“He was here a lot, some days he was in here multiple times a day,” said Stephanie Connon, a manager at the bar.

Amid the allegations, associates in Washington have raised questions about whether Mr. Hunter was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. When asked about this earlier this year by a television station in San Diego, Mr. Hunter said, “I did three tours. I take my experiences with me, but I never filed for post-traumatic stress. It’s not an issue.”

Ammar Campa-Najjar, Mr. Hunter’s challenger in November, told Fox News after the indictment was issued, “I think that man who served our country never made it back from the battlefield, and I think Washington chewed him up and spat him out and he lost his way.”

Back in Alpine, where the couple lived in a small cul-de-sac-- they sold their house in 2016 after earlier allegations of financial misconduct emerged-- former neighbors said they were shocked when the indictment was released.

Hunter makes $174,000 a year, almost three times higher than the U.S. median income. But it wasn't enough for his lifestyle, so he broken the law to enhance it-- while voting, consistently, to take away healthcare from working people and to deny social safety benefits from people with far less income than his own. You may have pity for him and his wife, but keep in mind that Margaret spent $152 on makeup at Nordstrom and told the campaign it was "gift basket items for the Boys and Girls Clubs of San Diego." While adamantly opposing medical care for his constituents, he and his wife accounted for the payment of their family dental bills as a charitable contribution to "Smiles for Life." Will he be prosecuted? Very unlikely. It's more likely that he'll make a deal to leave Congress and get a slap on the wrist.