Rangel raided PAC's for $393,000 legal bills

[Chris_]

Rangel raided PAC's for $393,000 legal bills

Congressman Charles Rangel, whose ethics trial starts tomorrow, appears to have improperly used political-action committee money to pay for his defense.

Rangel tapped his National Leadership PAC for $293,000 to pay his main legal-defense team this year. He took another $100,000 from the PAC in 2009 to pay lawyer Lanny Davis.

Two legal experts told The Post such spending is against House rules.

Washington, DC, political lawyer Cleta Mitchell said there is "no authority for a member to use leadership PAC funds as a slush fund to pay for personal or official expenses."

Leadership PACs are typically used by politicians to donate money to other candidates.

But Rangel seems to have run afoul of House ethics rules. Lawmakers are generally allowed to use campaign cash to pay their lawyers, but this is limited to money in their personal campaign committee and they must ask permission first, the campaign-finance lawyer said.

New York Post

[NHSparky]

Lanny Davis--gee, who knew a Clintonista was linked to corruption?

And nice to see my soon-to-be-ex-Congressmoonbat Che-Pelosi never distanced herself from Rangel or the rest of the swamp.  I'll be sure to ask her about that next time I run into her around town.

[true_blood]

Is this man scum still walking the streets and the halls of Congress?! What a disgrace and a slap in the face.
Lock the dirt bag up already.

[Tess Anderson]

Oh yeah, he's still there even though he's around eighty years old and has been in politics most of his life. Rangel has survived this long only because he's a "black" democrat from Harlem but these ethic violations look pretty serious to me and they'll stick. I'll never know what he's been putting in his hair but whatever it is it's gross.

[Doc]

Is this man scum still walking the streets and the halls of Congress?! What a disgrace and a slap in the face.
Lock the dirt bag up already.

Err....he was just reelected by an overwhelming margin........I suppose that will give you an impression of what his constituancy is like.......

For what it's worth, the last black Dem crook that was caught (William Jefferson, D-LA) lost his reelection bid.......one must therefore assume that the denizens of N'Orlns are a step above those in Harlem in the evolutionary scheme of things......

doc