Letters: End 'pay to play' in Congress
ISSUE | CORRUPTION End 'pay to play' The Supreme Court's vacating of former Virginia Gov. Robert McDonnell's conviction will only proliferate the practice of "pay to play." McDonnell and his family received $175,000 in loans and gifts from a businessman he helped.
ISSUE | CORRUPTION
End 'pay to play'
The Supreme Court's vacating of former Virginia Gov. Robert McDonnell's conviction will only proliferate the practice of "pay to play." McDonnell and his family received $175,000 in loans and gifts from a businessman he helped.
Lawyers for former U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah (D., Pa) are trying to draw a parallel to that case ("Judge pushes back on new Fattah trial," Saturday). Arguing on behalf of Herbert Vederman, a former fund-raiser convicted with Fattah, a lawyer said that by allowing his client's conviction to stand based on harmless favors, the judge risked making "nearly every member of Congress a felon." These are not harmless favors. It is time to pass a law prohibiting gift-giving of any kind to members of Congress during their course of business.
|Stephen Dalton, Ambler, smd11150@gmail.com