Ron Paul One Of The Most Corrupt Members Of Congress, Report Finds

[Hexen]

Texas Republican Rep. Ron Paul has been named one of the most corrupt members of Congress in a new report from the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.

The report says Paul "double-billed" his travel expenses a number of times over the last decade, meaning he may have been reimbursed for the same flights both under his official allowance as congressman, and by either non-profit groups under his control or his campaign committee.

The revelation would be ironic in part because Paul made fiscal responsibility a central tenet of his 2012 presidential campaign. The congressman celebrated a major victory in July when his bill to audit the Federal Reserve for greater transparency passed the House.

Paul's possible double-billing has been in the public eye since Roll Call first reported it in February, but CREW says there is no evidence Paul has repaid the money since.

A request for comment from Paul's office was not immediately returned.

One of the most troubling cases of the congressman's possible double-billing revolves around reimbursements he received for flights from both his official allowance and the libertarian group the Liberty Committee. At that time, the Liberty Committee's finances were overseen by a relative of the Paul family.

"It's extremely disappointing," Liberty Committee President David James told Whispers of the double-billing.

James says he first noticed a red flag in 2004, after the committee asked Paul for copies of his travel tickets, and the congressman did not provide them. Paul stopped billing the committee shortly after they asked for the tickets, according to James. By 2005, James says he was aware of possible double-billing. But it wasn't until the Roll Call story that he saw how far the problem extended.

The committee conducted its own audit of Paul's finances shortly after the story, and found that 60 percent of the travel Paul had billed to the committee had been doubled-billed.

"We have contacted Congressman Paul to look at the records and repay the amount," James told Whispers. "But our last communication was not even responded to."

James said the committee parted ways with the congressman in 2006 for "a number of reasons."

The committee has not, however, stopped vocally supporting Paul.

James called his policies "just what this country needs." "The message is great," said James. "It's the messenger that is the problem."

Update, 3:13 p.m.:

Paul’s office says it declines to comment on the CREW report, and referred Whispers back to the comment given to Roll Call in February.

At the time, Paul’s spokesman Jesse Benton denied the congressman was reimbursed multiple times for the same trips, saying "absolutely zero taxpayer funds were ever misused." Benton also said it was "possible that wholly inadvertent errors were made in a handful of instances.”

Source: http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/was...s-report-finds

I knew something was up about him.....

[Ocean Seal]

Guys this is obviously the statist media lying. Ron Paul ReLOVEution. He's not an opportunist at all. It's a conspiracy.

[Positivist]

I would send this to my paultard friend of he didn't just move and I didn't actually miss him. Damn this story could have been great for me a month ago.

[Susurrus]

Double-billing hardly makes him one of the MOST corrupt. He'll really have to step it up to make it that high.

[Comrades Unite!]

Clearly a conspiracy, you guys are all traitors to the US constitution.

Fascists.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Ha, you mean the guy who spends millions trying to win a government position because he says government is awful... is a hypocrite?

[ВАЛТЕР]

Some of the comments on the story are mindbogglingly stupid. Sure enough, the accusations of the author being paid to write this story are being thrown around.

These people are fucking morons. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I have as much contempt for libertarians as I do for fascists. I can't stand these people.

[Os Cangaceiros]

+ YouTube Video

go get 'em Ron

[Drosophila]

If there were less regulations then this never would have happened!

[Fire]

If you think double dipping on travel expenses is makes him the most corrupt member of congress, you're not looking at what all the other members are doing that counts as perfectly legal.

[CryingWolf]

So... a grand total of $15,000...

I bet Mitt Romney loses more in a single bet.

[CryingWolf]

You know it's kind of funny, these libertarian types will laugh at you for suggesting the capitalist media is biased towards the interests of capitalists, and yet their first hypothesis was that the Koch brothers paid her to write this.

[Red Commissar]

Double-billing hardly makes him one of the MOST corrupt. He'll really have to step it up to make it that high.

That's why he's a "dishonorable mention" on the list, not in their actual shortlist of senators and representatives. USNews I guess embellished that last part.

Still, they are right- for all his talk about smaller government and wasteful spending by the government, he pretty much did the textbook thing.

I also notice on the same dishonorable mention list that Darrel Issa is there. I remember the name from all the opposition to SOPA/PIPA and similar bills- Issa has generally tried to present himself as fighting for transparency in the government and has really been pushing that angle in his inquiries on Operation Fast and Furious. Though it's not of a financial matter- rather they seem to be fingering him out for disclosing "sensitive" material from a wiretap.