OPINION:
“The Squad” enjoys preaching to the masses from the altar of radical leftism.
Unfortunately for the rest of America, the Squad is by no means ostracized, despite representing the most left-wing contingent of House Democrats in U.S. history. On the contrary, Squad members are celebrated by Democrats and their media allies.
Take Rep. Cori Bush, the Missouri Democrat, Black Lives Matter activist and media darling. According to Ms. Bush, the critics of student debt cancellation are “rooted in racism, sexism and classism.”
Squad members like her, you see, are the enlightened ones. They are purportedly perfect, enlightening the ideological plebs who dare to oppose them or their left-wing policies. According to Ms. Bush, they can’t be radical because they’re on the right side of history, whereas the rest of us are just bigoted laggards.
But dig deeper, and you’ll find a host of skeletons in the Squad’s closet. Preach as they may, Squad members like Ms. Bush have routinely contradicted their public stances with their own actions, giving a new name to liberal hypocrisy.
Ms. Bush, a defender of the “defund the police” platform, was recently exposed for paying her now-husband $62,359 for private security last year. Despite not having a private security license, Ms. Bush’s husband, Cortney Merritts, was one of several bodyguards on her payroll, which has hypocritically included hundreds of thousands of dollars in private security payments despite Ms. Bush’s anti-police rhetoric.
Dig a little deeper and it gets even worse for Ms. Bush. By subsidizing Mr. Merritts’ lifestyle, Ms. Bush may have repeatedly violated federal campaign finance laws, using campaign funds for personal use. According to a recent Committee to Defeat the President complaint filed with the Federal Election Commission, Ms. Bush broke the law by falsely reporting the purpose of her disbursements to her current husband. She essentially pocketed campaign contributions by paying her then-lover for alleged work he is legally prohibited from doing in the first place.
Now, the FEC is investigating Ms. Bush’s utter disregard for the law, and for good reason. The Department of Justice and the Office of Congressional Ethics should similarly take a hard look at the activist congresswoman, determining where and how her campaign funds were spent — and to what extent the expenditures were unlawful. Perhaps more skeletons will come out of the closet — a safe bet, knowing the Squad’s self-righteousness.
In any case, the voters deserve to know where their hard-earned money is going when they support Squad members like Ms. Bush. They deserve accountability, and the committee is determined to demand it. What good are federal regulators if they won’t speak the truth to the Squad’s power?
There will be a reckoning. In recent years, the Squad’s lies have been aired for all to see and hear. Violation after campaign finance violation, Squad members are proving that they are not just part of the problem with the government; they are the problem. Fewer and fewer Americans now trust left-wing Democrats to represent them, and Ms. Bush’s latest scandal will only further erode that trust.
Therein lies the silver lining: The Squad is on notice. Accountability will win the day as long as millions of good-faith Americans keep fighting for it.
• Ted Harvey serves as chairman of the Committee to Defeat the President.
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