Tag: duncan hunter
Marine Corps Orders GOP Politician To Stop Using Its Seal

Marine Corps Orders GOP Politician To Stop Using Its Seal

The Marine Corps is not happy with Rep. Duncan Hunter.

The Marine Corps issued a “cease and desist” letter to Rep. Duncan Hunter, telling the indicted California Republican to stop using the Marine Corps emblem in his campaign, NBC News reported Wednesday.

“It has come to our attention that your campaign is using the official USMC Eagle, Globe and Anchor (Emblem) and the phrase ‘No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy’ (Phrase) as an integral part of your political campaign, namely, on at least one fundraising mailer to your constituents,” the letter states.

Since those images and phrases are protected by federal law and cannot be used without permission, the Marine Corps demanded Hunter’s campaign “immediately remove the Emblem and the Phrase from its mailers, and, without limitation, from all other campaign materials including websites and other instances where the Emblem or the Phrase are being used.”

Just to be sure the campaign follows through, the Marine Corps demanded to know “a timetable as to your compliance with our requests.”

Hunter used the Marine Corps emblem on a racist mailer attacking his likely Democratic opponent, Ammar Campa-Najjar.

“At this point, it’s pretty clear that Congressman Hunter has lost all ability to tell the difference between right and wrong, fact and fiction,” Campa-Najjar said last week about the mailer. “It’s one scandal after another, one embarrassing news story after another, one potential crime after another, one courtroom appearance after another, and one lie after another.”

The Hunter campaign’s unauthorized use of Marine Corps material piles on to Hunter’s existing legal troubles. Hunter is out on bail and awaiting trial after being arrested for using campaign cash to fund a lavish lifestyle. Federal prosecutors accuse Hunter of using campaign funds to take family vacations, pay for his children’s private schools, and even fly the family’s pet rabbit across the country.

Hunter also allegedly used campaign cash to carry on multiple extramarital affairs, including some with lobbyists and one with a staffer. Hunter’s wife, who was also his campaign manager, pleaded guilty and has agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

Hunter came close to violating his parole during a stunt near the U.S.-Mexico border where Hunter claimed to go to Mexico. One of the conditions of his parole is that he not leave the country.

Hunter’s service in the Marine Corps has also been a source of controversy. In a May interview, Hunter bragged that when he served in Iraq, he killed “scores of if not hundreds of civilians, probably killed women and children if there were any left in the city when we invaded.”

The Hunter campaign says it will comply with the Marine Corps request to remove their emblem and other protected material, according to NBC News.

Published with permission of The American Independent.

IMAGE: Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA).

Indicted GOP Rep. Hunter Misused Campaign Funds For Extramarital Affairs

Indicted GOP Rep. Hunter Misused Campaign Funds For Extramarital Affairs

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Republican Rep. Duncan D. Hunter of California has been alleging that his legal programs are politically motivated and that he is being persecuted by “the deep state.” And the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), according to USA Today reporter Brad  Heath, is asking a judge to prohibit the 42-year-old California congressman from offering evidence of alleged political biases in his case.

Hunter became the target of a DOJ investigation for alleged campaign finance violations in 2017, and the following year, he and his wife, Margaret Hunter, were both indicted on campaign finance charges as well as charges of conspiracy and wire fraud. His wife pled guilty to illegal use of campaign donations earlier this month, but the congressman has continued to fight the charges he is facing.

According to Heath, the DOJ is asking a judge to bar Hunter from “offering evidence or argument concerning alleged political biases or motives of the prosecution team” and making public statements that could “poison the pool of potential jurors.”

In a Twitter thread, Heath notes that the congressman considers the DOJ “the deep state” despite the fact that it is presently being run by appointees of President Donald Trump. During an August 2018 interview, he described his legal problems as “modern politics and modern media mixed in with law enforcement that has a political agenda. That’s the new Department of Justice.”

On Twitter, Heath notes, “DOJ basically says @rep_hunter should raise his allegation of political bias properly, in a motion to dismiss, or shut up.” Heath’s thread goes on to note some of the things Hunter is accused of — for example, Heath writes, “the Justice Department filed a notice saying Rep. Duncan Hunter illegally used campaign funds to pay for ‘intimate’ encounters with several women, and prosecutors want a judge’s permission to tell jurors about those romances.”

Prosecutors have accused Hunter of illegally spending campaign donations on a wide variety of personal expenses. The congressman allegedly had a series of extramarital affairs (including affairs with three different lobbyists and a GOP aide), and he is accused of using campaign funds in connection with some of those affairs. He is accused of spending over $200 in campaign money to take one of those aides to the pricy H Street Country Club in Washington, D.C.

Previously, Margaret Hunter was the treasurer for her husband’s campaigns. And according to the indictment against them, he and his wife used campaign funds for personal expenses that ranged from ski trips, hotel stays, tickets to football games and European vacations to golfing and meals in expensive restaurants like Spago in Los Angeles. In addition, the DOJ alleges, they paid for airline tickets for friends and relatives.

 

A DOJ indictment against the couple alleges, “To conceal and disguise these illegal personal charges, the Hunters failed to inform the treasurer that they were for a football game or that a family member was one of the attendees. When asked if the charges were campaign related, Duncan Hunter falsely confirmed, ‘Yessir.’”

IMAGE: Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) and his wife Margaret.

The Scariest Thing About Political Fearmongers Is Themselves

The Scariest Thing About Political Fearmongers Is Themselves

One thing you can say about Rick Perry is that he sticks to his guns. If one of his policy proposals turns out to be dumb, by gollies, he will double down on dumb.

For example, in his current re-run for the GOP presidential nomination, the “Oops” governor has repositioned himself as an expert on border security. As such, he milked a lot of political PR out of this summer’s surge of migrant children crossing our southern border illegally. Never mind that they were desperate to escape the abject poverty, rapes, murders and gang cultures that confronted them every day in their Central American homelands, Perry used their plight as a chance to foment fear and pose as a superhero “seal the border” candidate.

Perry was on Fox News howling for federal troops, declaring that “this is a natural disaster,” and putting himself in front of the Tea Party fear brigade that was screeching about the Ebola virus and the other pandemic diseases these wretched urchins might bring in.

But, darn it, the surge of young migrants was coming to an end… and so was Perry’s dumb rationale for slamming and locking our nation’s southwest door. No problem for Rick, though — he simply reached for dumber. Instead of children, his latest bugaboo is — believe it or not — Islamic terrorists.

In August, Perry warned that murderous militants from ISIS “could be” penetrating the U.S. from Mexico. Could be? Well, he conceded, there’s “no clear evidence” of it — but BE AFRAID, BE VERY AFRAID! The “expert” said that people “from countries with terrorist ties” are crossing into our country. Really? Yes, he said, citing “three individuals from Ukraine” who were caught. Uh, Rick… Ukraine is not a country “with terrorist ties.”

Never mind the facts; he went on to scold President Obama for failing to put more border agents in place and use unmanned drones to bolster security there. Apparently no one told the newly minted border expert that Obama proposed those same measures last year, but Perry’s fellow Republicans killed the bill.

Perry is scary. And what’s worse, he thinks he is presidential material. But he is not the only bonehead on the loose, regurgitating their own paranoia and propaganda to advance their doleful agenda of fear.

Take Duncan Hunter… please! This self-promoting bozo of a congresscritter constantly goes off louder than a car alarm on the fritz, honking and squealing about some bugaboo he’s dreamed up. In a recent Fox News episode, the far-right California congressman was in full-panic mode, wailing that Islamic State terrorists were entering our country from Mexico: “ISIS is coming across the Southern border,” he panted. “I know that at least 10 ISIS fighters have been caught coming across the Mexican border in Texas,” he breathlessly asserted, adding sternly that while the 10 got caught, “you know there’s going to be dozens more that did not get caught.”

Really? How does he know that? Mr. Fearmonger won’t say, refusing to reveal his “sources.” Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security calls his claim of an ISIS intrusion from Mexico “categorically false… not supported by any credible intelligence or the facts on the ground.”

Of course, facts are not a shield against right-wing delusions, and Hunter is not about to believe anything said by Homeland Security officials working in the administration of the man he considers Satan incarnate, Barack Obama. But — oopsy-daisy — the Republican-led Department of Public Safety in Texas also looked into his foaming-at-the-mouth warnings, reporting in an email to state legislators that “DPS does not have any information to confirm [Hunter’s] specific statements.”

It’s embarrassing to learn that boneheads like this are actually taking up space in the United States Congress. No wonder they never get anything done. Duncan shouldn’t be in Congress — he ought to be sitting in a dunking booth at a state fair. Next the Perry-Duncan team will warn us that Ebola-infected Islamic terrorists are sneaking across the border carrying Weapons of Mass Destruction!

To find out more about Jim Hightower, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Web page at www.creators.com.

Photo: Steve Hillibrand via Wikimedia Commons

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