Embattled Bolger Rejects Calls To Resign

[+EdwardGlen]

Embattled Bolger rejects calls to resign

 

http://www.detroitne...0405/1022/rss10

 

The revelation Bolger and Schmidt hatched a plan to deceive voters to ensure Schmidt's re-election as a Republican

 

a conspiracy "hatch a plan" is an agreement between two or more persons to break the law at some time in the future.

 

 

Lansing— House Speaker Jase Bolger rebuffed calls for his resignation Wednesday in the wake of a prosecutor's report showing he plotted to plant a fake Democratic candidate in a Grand Rapids district. But the most powerful Republican lawmaker in the 110-member state House of Representatives acknowledged mistakes were made as he secretly helped state Rep. Roy Schmidt defect from the Democratic Party.

 

"The motivation was political to recruit a candidate," Bolger told The Detroit News. "I'm personally disappointed that we allowed ourselves to get distracted and get involved … in political gamesmanship."

 

The revelation Bolger and Schmidt hatched a plan to deceive voters to ensure Schmidt's re-election as a Republican is the latest political brouhaha to bog down House Republicans in recent months — troubles Democrats may exploit as they seek to win back control of the House in November.

 

In April, Democrats sued the majority party, claiming the Republicans are violating the constitution by not recording votes to make new laws go immediately into effect. Last month, House Republicans drew national criticism for banning two female Democratic legislators from speaking for a day after they said "vagina" and "vasectomy" on the House floor.

 

Democrats and abortion rights groups said they turned in 115,000 signatures from an online petition calling on Bolger and House leaders to apologize to Reps. Lisa Brown of West Bloomfield Township and Barb Byrum of Onondaga.

"He's got a lot going on today — this just adds to the pressure," Byrum said Wednesday of Bolger as she led a group of protesters with petitions to the speaker's office.

 

No apology was extended Wednesday as lawmakers met for their lone work day this month. "No matter how hard they seek to distract, we're not going to be pulled off solutions for Michigan's taxpayers," said Bolger, R-Marshall.

About 10 supporters of Byrum and Brown sang for a few minutes from the gallery a spin-off of the Beatles' "She Loves You." Their chorus: "Vagina, yeah, yeah, yeah ... "

 

Around noon, more than 100 people gathered for a rally outside the Capitol to promote women's issues.

The session was dominated by discussion of Tuesday's revelations about the extent to which Bolger and Schmidt went to line up a fake opponent.

 

Part-time college student Matthew Mojzak, 22, was offered $450 by Schmidt's son — later boosted to $1,000 — to run against the father, but not launch a campaign against him, according to a report by Kent County Prosecutor Bill Forsyth, a Republican, who could find no charge to level against Bolger or Schmidt.

 

The elder Schmidt was in the House on Wednesday morning, but staying near his desk and out of reach for reporters to ask him questions about the investigation and political fallout.

Bolger's mea culpa was met with swift rebuke by top Democrats who pointed to the prosecutor's condemnation of the attempt to defraud voters.

 

"I knew they were partisan, but I didn't know they were corrupt," said Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer, D-East Lansing, who called for Bolger to resign his leadership post. "Speaker Bolger has lost all credibility in this town, if you ask me."

 

Bolger continued to assert he and Schmidt did nothing illegal.

 

House Republicans were tight-lipped Wednesday about whether the GOP caucus would still support Schmidt's re-election.

State Rep. Dave Agema, the GOP caucus chairman, called Schmidt's foiled attempt to recruit and pay his son's friend "unethical."

 

"Nothing illegal was done. Was it unethical? Yup, probably," said Agema, Michigan's new Republican National Committeeman from Grandville. "The people put him in, the people can take him out."

 

House Minority Leader Richard Hammel, D-Mount Morris Township, on Wednesday called for the House ethics committee or an independent panel to investigate the incident. But Hammel said he did not think Bolger or Schmidt should resign.

"I don't believe in that," Hammel told reporters.

 

Most House Republicans were staying on message Wednesday, deflecting questions about their leader's involvement in the imbroglio.

"I'm not going to comment about that (because) I want to stay focused on things we're doing to turn Michigan around," said state Rep. Deb Shaughnessy, R-Charlotte, who faces a tough re-election race in a suburban Lansing district. "I'm not going to bite."

 

Forsyth said Tuesday he would forward his report to the Secretary of State's office and recommend further investigation into whether Schmidt violated campaign finance laws by trying to pay Mojzak with campaign funds. Schmidt held a fundraiser with Democratic donors five days before switching parties.

 

Secretary of State Ruth Johnson's office had not yet received the report Wednesday, a spokeswoman said.

Larry Dubin, a law professor at University of Detroit Mercy, noted the U.S. Justice Department occasionally gets involved in monitoring federal elections or investigating possible violations of voting rights, but not state matters.

 

"In this instance, it doesn't seem to me to be something that would grab the attention of the feds," he said.

 

clivengood@detnews.com

(517) 371-3660

 

 

From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitne...5#ixzz214R3MvUU

[Wild Bill]

"Nothing illegal was done. Was it unethical? Yup, probably," - State Rep. Dave Agema, GOP caucus chairman

 

The Republican attitude in a nutshell.

Edited July 20, 2012 by Wild Bill

[cristinew]

"Nothing illegal was done. Was it unethical? Yup