I don’t think it’s advisable to give an interview to media during an allegedly active investigation by the DOJ, even if you think it’s to someone who will go easy on you.
As we reported, Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) admitted she was under investigation by the DOJ, which is looking into her use of campaign funds for security services.
But that didn’t stop her from talking with MSNBC’s Joy Reid. Reid only asked two questions about the investigation, but both of Bush’s answers seemed pretty silly to me.
First, Reid claimed that the independent Congressional Ethics Office cleared this matter. “How did it then proceed to an investigation by the DOJ?” she asked.
So, what happened was there is someone who made a complaint. They sent the complaint, I believe, to the FEC, which that moves really slowly, is what I hear, and so because, you know, nothing had happened, they didn’t see any movement, they decided – there are articles about it – they decided, “Hey, I want the DoJ, I want House Ethics, I want all of these different entities to investigate now.” So they did at one time, just asked all of these different entities to investigate.
That, of course, tries to minimize that the DOJ is investigating — that they think there’s something to investigate. That doesn’t mean she’s guilty, but it isn’t just a random complaint. According to the New York Times, the DOJ inquiry has included subpoenas to members of Bush’s campaign team. The House Sergeant-at-Arms also was reportedly subpoenaed for records. The DOJ has more investigatory ability than does Congress.
Then Reid asked her about the hiring of her then-boyfriend, now husband Cortney Merritts. She claimed there were a lot of issues in terms of hiring competent staff.
Defund-the-police proponent Cori Bush, who is under federal investigation for allegedly misusing money after paying her husband to provide personal security:
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) February 1, 2024
“There were a lot of issues with us just retaining good – good staff.” pic.twitter.com/0DeFXdYNeg
She said they “couldn’t pay the big cost for security like some of my colleagues are able to do, and so we went with what we could afford.” Then she claimed they had trouble “people just not showing up to work, people sleeping on the job, and so it was very hard for me to have security when it was unreliable.”
And so what was happening was Cortney would fill in, he would volunteer, and sometimes he would even, you know, even when he was there and they were working, he would say, “Hey, you should be standing over here and you should be doing that.” And so he was volunteering a lot of his time, and then we had someone who was kind of leading the group, leading the team, who could no longer do it. Just one day called and said, “I won’t be back for three months.” It left me in a position, there was no way I could manage a security team plus the work that I was doing, and so he was able to pick up that slack.
That’s some story — she just had to hire him because everyone else was a mess. What does that say about her hiring ability, even if this were true?
Then, of course, that was on top of her wanting to defund the police for everyone else.
People weren’t going for the excuse.
Hummena hummena yeah, yeah it was staffing! Yeah yeah staffing. pic.twitter.com/nFYWk1BP1d
— Heather Champion (@winningatmylife) February 1, 2024
