More Trouble for Tom DeLay

Posted on April 5, 2005

Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's troubles show no sign of ending any time soon. The New York Times reports on further information that has come to light about Mr. DeLay's fundraising and lobbying activities.

The wife and daughter of Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, have been paid more than $500,000 since 2001 by Mr. DeLay's political action and campaign committees, according to a detailed review of disclosure statements filed with the Federal Election Commission and separate fund-raising records in Mr. DeLay's home state, Texas.
Although several members of Congress employ family members as campaign managers or on their political action committees, advocacy groups seeking an overhaul of federal campaign-finance and ethics laws say that the payments to Mr. DeLay's family members were unusually generous, and should be the focus of new scrutiny of the Texas congressman.
Mr. DeLay, whose position as majority leader makes him the second-most-powerful House member, has offered a vigorous public defense in recent weeks to a flurry of ethics accusations from Democratic lawmakers and campaign watchdog groups, including charges that he violated House rules on travel. The executive director of Americans for a Republican Majority and a major fund-raiser for the committee were indicted in Texas last year on charges of illegal fund-raising, and prosecutors there have refused to rule out the possibility of charges against Mr. DeLay in the continuing inquiry.
In recent weeks, public interest groups have called on the House ethics committee and the Justice Department to review lavish, privately financed overseas trips for Mr. DeLay and his aides, including a 1997 trip to Russia that was underwritten by a conservative education group closely linked to a powerful Republican lobbyist who often boasted of his influence with the majority leader.

DeLay's poll numbers in his home district appear to be in a freefall after his grandstanding in the Terry Schiavo case, and his recent statements threatening to hold judges to account for their actions in the case. The fact that the so-called "activist trial judge" in the Schiavo case - Judge Greer - is a Conservative Republican Baptist apparently has yet to register with Mr. DeLay. Recent polls show that most Americans greatly disapprove of Congress' meddling in the Schiavo family's private tragedy. Add in a few more ethics violations, some shady fundraising allegations and suddenly the House Majority Leader's political future doesn't look quite so bright.