The Republican National Committee recently conducted an?online straw poll?identifying 32 candidates who could get its nomination in the 2016 presidential race. Each of the 32 has quite a questionable history, though, that contrasts with the GOP’s consistent claim of it being the ?moral? option for voters.
Philander, racism, thievery, bribery, and combinations of these and other?sins?are?found across the slate, in fact.?In this series on the 32 potential candidates (updated every other day), Liberal America will offer a quick rundown on the hypocrisy clouding each one’s ?holier than thou? claims.
Susana Martinez
Governor of New Mexico
It seems like Susana Martinez wants to paint herself to be the new Sarah Palin, but maybe?in a Southwest style. She’s a working mom. Fair-minded and easy-going. She shops at discount clothing stores. She’s pro-kids, pro-guns, and ? gosh darnit ? she just cares about all the little people.
She’s very similar to Palin in many ways, too, in her stances and even campaign activities. But this governor of New Mexico carries a lot more baggage than the ex-governor of Alaska, though. She’s viler ? even dumber ? according to a recent, much-detailed expos? in Mother Jones. Records and recordings from her last campaign show she doesn’t know much about her own state, investigative reporter Andy Kroll found. She was completely unaware of New Mexico’s nuclear waste storage site, for example, even though it’s been controversial and scandal-linked for decades. Despite her former role as an elected district attorney, she knew nothing about her state’s status on illegal immigrants and their rights. Audio recordings from her last campaign caught her discussing methods of misleading voters on her true positions and even referring to her?opponent as ?that little bitch.?
She has plenty more to cover up than Palin, too. Known as a vengeful prosecutor in her days with the state’s Third Judicial District Attorney’s office, she detained a mentally-ill man in jail awaiting trial for drunken driving charges, blocking his release. When the detainee showed signs of distress from this wait, she had him?moved to solitary confinement, where he was held for 22 months and without receiving needed medical attention. (When he finally got a trial, he was found not guilty. He later accepted $15.5 million in settlement for the abuse he suffered.)
When first running for governor, the odds looked bleak because she lacked funds. A hookup with Bob Perry ? the same man who funded the ?Swift Boat Veterans for Truth? in the 2004 presidential election and who holds the record for PAC donations ? landed her $450,000 just from him and his wife alone. Then came role model Sarah Palin, who endorsed Martinez. And then came a 53-percent win in the November 2010 election.
And maybe she should have followed Palin’s example and resigned mid-term, because since taking the office, Martinez has been regularly criticized, especially for hiding public information. Only under public pressure, and from a New Mexico newspaper citing the state’s new Inspection of Public Records Act (along with FOIA filings), did Martinez finally instruct her staff in 2012 to cease use of private emails for official state business.
That wasn’t soon enough, though, especially since the improper communication may have been used in illegal ways. A recent ?whistleblower? lawsuit, filed in February 2014 by two former state employees, alleges Martinez and her top staff stifled reports of contracting violations by the state’s economic development agency. Sexual harassment charges by senior staff are being covered up, too, complainants say, and by Martinez’s and others? method of communication on these subjects: private emails to keep the public from learning this information. And just last month her campaign manager, Jamie Estrada, pled guilty to 14 counts of hacking the computer system to read, filter, and download emails from and to the governor and her staff.
And also like Palin, Martinez now hobnobs with big political names, attending the Koch Brothers? secret get-togethers, and offers endorsements to other questionable candidates like Chris Christie.
Far worse than Palin, though, are the results of her actions as governor. Martinez instituted tax cuts on businesses claiming they’d attract new businesses to New Mexico. Since then, her state ranks last in job growth, actually losing over 4,400 jobs in just the last year.
This poor record won’t hold her back with Republican voters, though, and not even if she doesn’t do well in the 2016 primary. Why’s that? Because (furthering her similarity to Sarah Palin) Martinez was recently listed?as the odds-on favorite to be the GOP’s VP candidate.
Visit Liberal America for future updates on?the other?GOP 2016 hopefuls.
What’s your take on these?hypocritical Republicans? State your case on?Liberal America’s Facebook?page.
See previous posts on GOP 2016 hopefuls:
Kelly Ayotte??|?Haley Barbour?|??John Bolton?| ?Jeb Bush?|?Hermain Cain? |?Ben Carson?|??Chris Christie??| ?Ted Cruz??|?Mitch Daniels??| ?Newt Gingrich??| ?Nikki Haley?|?Mike Huckabee?|??Bobby Jindal?|?John Kasich?| Peter King?|
