Whoa, that’s a lot of counts:
A federal grand jury has indicted Republican U.S. Rep. Richard Renzi of Arizona on 35 criminal counts including conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering and official extortion, according to court papers unsealed on Friday.
The indictment stems from plan by Renzi and an associate to benefit from a land-exchange plan in order to receive Renzi’s support for necessary federal legislation, court documents said.
Wonder if he’ll have to bail early ala DeLay and Ney.
Update (Trent): Boehner is encouraging Renzi to resign.
Shadegg will “benefit” from the negative press surrounding Renzi.
The two core charges against Renzi are that he took bribes to get an interchange build for developers and that he used $400,000 in insurance premiums to fund his original campaign (rather than buying insurance).
The first charge is a poor man’s Denny Hastert. Hastert hung around in the House to get an interchange built for his property. Of course, Denny being a big shot and all gained over $1.5 million from his maneuver (and no jail) while Renzi got only $773,000 and also got indicted. In the words of the infamous Tammany Hall stalwart and author George Washington Plunkitt, “There are two kinds of graft. Honest graft and dishonest graft.” Honest graft was when a politician benefited from circumstances created by government action; dishonest graft was a straight bribe. Holy moly, the same “standards” apply 100 years after Plunkitt.