CREW Posts List of 20 Most Corrupt Congressmen

**Lemur** · 09-20-2006, 22:50

CREW RELEASES SECOND ANNUAL MOST CORRUPT MEMBERS OF CONGRESS REPORT

September 20, 2006

2006 Edition Includes Five Members to Watch in 109th Congress

Washington, DC – Today, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) released its second annual report on the most corrupt members of Congress entitled Beyond DeLay: The 20 Most Corrupt Members of Congress (and five to watch). This encyclopedic report on corruption in the 109th Congress documents the egregious, unethical and possibly illegal activities of the most tainted members of Congress. CREW has compiled the members’ transgressions and analyzed them in light of federal laws and congressional rules.

Two members have been removed from last year’s list of 13. Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-CA) is now serving an eight-year jail term for bribery and Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH) has agreed to plead guilty to crimes that will likely result in a minimum two-year prison term.

CREW has also re-launched the report’s tandem website, www.beyonddelay.org. The site offers short summaries of each member’s transgressions as well as the full-length profiles and all accompanying exhibits.

The actual list has hyperlinks for each winner, but here's a plain text version:

Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT)
Sen. Bill Frist (R-TN)
Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)
Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO)
Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA)
Rep. John Doolittle (R-CA)
Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL)
Rep. Katherine Harris (R-FL)
Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA)
Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA)
Rep. Gary Miller (R-CA)
Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-WV)
Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-CO)
Rep. Richard Pombo (R-CA)
Rep. Rick Renzi (R-AZ)
Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX)
Rep. John Sweeney (R-NY)
Rep. Charles Taylor (R-NC)
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA)
Rep. Curt Weldon (R-PA)

Dishonorable mentions:

Rep. Chris Cannon (R-UT)
Rep. Dennis Hastert (R-IL)
Rep. J.D. Hayworth (R-AZ)
Rep. John Murtha (D-PA)
Rep. Don Sherwood (R-PA)

**Crazed Rabbit** · 09-20-2006, 23:05

What? No Maria Cantwell? I guess earmarking projects for your ex-campaign manager's, now lobbyist, clients doesn't cut it. Even when said lobbyist owes you tens of thousands of dollars.

Crazed Rabbit

**Lemur** · 09-20-2006, 23:07

We'll have to wait until the site isn't getting bombed (Digg picked the story up); then we can compare the misdeeds of the Glorious Twenty to Maria Campbell. For now, we'll just have to classify her as a wanna-be.

**Xiahou** · 09-21-2006, 03:06

Hmmm... is that Don "I get off by strangling my mistress while cheating on my wife" Sherwood? It's a real shame that I'm only one district away from being able to help vote that turd out.

Nice to see he's also corrupt in addition to being a perverted philanderer.

**Samurai Waki** · 09-21-2006, 03:15

Does anyone else see a pretty clear pattern here?

EDIT: Oh and I'm glad to see the man representing my home state in Congress is their #1 Pick

**Lemur** · 09-21-2006, 03:30

Originally Posted by Wakizashi

Oh and I'm glad to see the man representing my home state in Congress is their #1 Pick

I think the list is in alphabetical order, so there's not really a #1 pick to be had. As for the pattern and accusations of partisanship, please note that the Top 20 are for the 109th Congress, and no more should be made of it than that. If Republicans dominate the list, that's because Republicans have held all the levers of power. One does not bribe a Senator/Congressman who can't get you what you want. Ergo, you slosh your dirty cash on the party in power.

**ICantSpellDawg** · 09-21-2006, 03:16

ridiculous and partisan

**Xiahou** · 09-21-2006, 19:59

Originally Posted by TuffStuffMcGruff

ridiculous and partisan

It is worth noting that CREW is considered a left-leaning pro Democrat group.

A Delaware native and University of Chicago Law School graduate, Sloan worked as a Democratic Hill aide in the 1990s. She was prosecuting sex crimes at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District when, in 2002, she was approached by Washington lawyer Norm Eisen to discuss heading up a new liberal-watchdog and legal-advocacy group.

CREW began as a one-woman shop with a shoestring budget in early 2003, but Sloan’s big mouth and flair for publicity quickly made CREW’s reputation and garnered it sufficient resources to expand. Last year Sloan hired a deputy director, Naomi Seligman, from Media Matters for America; this year she hired a counsel and two more staffers. The board of directors consists of Louis Mayberg, president of a mutual-fund firm, Donna Edwards of the Arca Foundation, Philadelphia-based attorney and Democratic fund-raiser Dan Berger, and pollster Mark Penn.

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