Charlie Rangel is retiring. So why is he raising campaign cash?
Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., sure sounds like a man running for re-election.
“Contribute now to support Congressman Rangel’s fight for a deal benefiting everyday Americans!” reads a May 13 fundraising appeal from Rangel’s campaign committee to supporters, referencing a trade deal known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Click the words and a Rangel for Congress donation page pops up.
“Pitch in today to help me enact laws that open trade with Cuba,” another Rangel fundraising message sent May 10 states.
And after President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address in January, Rangel wrote his backers about standing with Obama “against Republican obstruction and opposition.”
Another come-on linking to a donation page follows: “Will you contribute to the fight for middle class economics?”
But these and other recent Rangel campaign solicitations are misleading, at best, because there is no Rangel campaign.
Rangel is retiring after his current term expires.
So whatever cash Rangel’s campaign committee raises this year won't likely promote the 23-term congressman’s legislative agenda, or stymie conservatives, or surreptitiously angle him toward one more Election Day hurrah.
Instead, the money will fill Rangel’s own pockets.
The situation dates to June 23, when Rangel personally loaned his namesake committee $100,000 — immediately before defeating state Sen. Adriano Espaillat in a tight Democratic primary.
Rangel, who easily won re-election in November against token competition, now wants his cash back.
Related: Dershowitz persuaded Rangel to attend Netanyahu speech
There’s more to this story. Click here to read the rest at the Center for Public Integrity.
This story is part of Primary Source. Primary Source keeps you up-to-date on developments in the post-Citizens United world of money in politics. Click here to read more stories in this blog.
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Copyright 2014 The Center for Public Integrity. This story was published by The Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit, nonpartisan investigative news organization in Washington, D.C.
