{"id":99770,"date":"2024-02-03T00:25:02","date_gmt":"2024-02-03T06:25:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=99770"},"modified":"2024-02-03T00:25:02","modified_gmt":"2024-02-03T06:25:02","slug":"99770","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=99770","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Democrat Cori Bush Funnels Another $17,500 in Campaign Cash to Husband, Docs Show<\/a><\/p>\n

Radical Democrat Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) has funneled another big chunk of campaign cash to her husband, bringing the total to $120,000 so far, new filings have revealed.<\/p>\n

Bush paid her husband an additional $17,500 from her committee in recent months.<\/p>\n

The payments are for private security for the congresswoman, who leads the \u201cdefund the police\u201d movement and campaigns for fewer police officers to protect the public.<\/p>\n

The Democrat \u201cSquad\u201d member\u2019s new filings, submitted to the Federal Election Commission late Wednesday night, show that her campaign made seven additional payments for $2,500 each to her husband, Cortney Merritts.<\/p>\n

The payments were made between October 1 and December 31.<\/p>\n

The new payments maintained the steady flow of checks to her husband over the past two years.<\/p>\n

After it emerged that Bush and Merritts secretly married in February 2023, her office admitted they had been together since before she entered office in 2021.<\/p>\n

Merritts initially gathered money for security services starting in January 2022.<\/p>\n

However, Bush\u2019s committee switched their description to \u201cwage expenses\u201d in April 2023 as they continued to bring headaches to the campaign.<\/p>\n

The latest payments have emerged as the Justice Department launched a criminal investigation into Bush earlier this week over the use of campaign funds, as Slay News reported.<\/p>\n

Merritts has now collected $120,000 from Bush\u2019s campaign coffers.<\/p>\n

Politicians can pay family members from their committees as long as they provide \u201cbona fide\u201d services at fair market value.<\/p>\n

He pocketed the money as Bush\u2019s campaign simultaneously spent significantly more with St. Louis-based companies such as PEACE Security for private detail.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s spent over $770,000 on private security services, despite demanding fewer police officers to protect the American people.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Merritts, whose online accounts and posts have indicated he worked at a railroad company for years before starting a moving company, did not have a private security license as of late February 2023.<\/p>\n

He also did not appear in a Washington, D.C., database of licensed security specialists.<\/p>\n

The ordeal triggered at least two complaints from watchdog groups in the following weeks.<\/p>\n

The first complaint, filed to the FEC in March 2023 by the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, is still pending.<\/p>\n

The ethics committee has since cleared Bush in a second complaint from the Committee to Defeat the President.<\/p>\n

In October, Merrits was confronted by a Fox News reporter as the couple left a D.C. fundraiser for California Democrat candidate Derek Marshall.<\/p>\n

During the exchange, Merritts appeared to backtrack about his role on the campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a question for you,\u201d the reporter said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s your role on the campaign right now?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t have a role in the campaign, man,\u201d Merritts responded.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t have a role at all?\u201d the reporter countered.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were reporting you had wages on the campaign for security, and then it was a general wage.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just wondering what you\u2019ve been doing on the campaign?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I mean you can Google what it is,\u201d Merritts replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can also Google what happened with the FEC report came back 5-0, that it was all completely above board.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you\u2019re not doing any more work with her campaign?\u201d the reporter asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cAm I doing work with the campaign?\u201d Merrits said.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, I am. I\u2019m still [inaudible], right?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re still a part of it?\u201d the report pressed.<\/p>\n

\u201cAm I still employed with it? Yes, so obviously, I\u2019m going to work with it,\u201d Merritts said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s this whole \u2018gotcha\u2019 s\u2014? I\u2019m not a politician, man, so ask me a question, man-to-man, and I\u2019ll answer.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo what\u2019s your question?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was it, about the campaign,\u201d the reporter responded.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m still in the campaign; I still do security with the campaign,\u201d Merritts said before getting into the car with Bush.<\/p>\n

\u201cHave a good night, man. Be safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Earlier this week, Bush confirmed the Justice Department is investigating her campaign spending on security services and said her office is \u201cfully cooperating.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSince before I was sworn into office, I have endured relentless threats to my physical safety and life,\u201d Bush said in a Tuesday statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a rank-and-file member of Congress, I am not entitled to personal protection by the House, and instead have used campaign funds as permissible to retain security services.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThese frivolous complaints have resulted in a number of investigations, some of which are still ongoing,\u201d Bush said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Federal Election Commission and the House Committee on Ethics are currently reviewing the matter, as is the Department of Justice.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are fully cooperating in all of these pending investigations.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Democrat Cori Bush Funnels Another $17,500 in Campaign Cash to Husband, Docs Show Radical Democrat Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) has funneled another big chunk of campaign cash to her husband, bringing the total to $120,000 so far, new filings have revealed. Bush paid her husband an additional $17,500 from her committee in recent months. The … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,9,50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-99770","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-corruption","category-enemies-foreign-domestic","category-goobermint"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=99770"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99770\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":99771,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99770\/revisions\/99771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=99770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=99770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=99770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}