On February 24, 2016, U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter of California endorsed Donald Trump for president.
Hunter at the time of his endorsement was best known for showing his support for the Big Tobacco’s electronic cigarette manufacturers by vaping during Congressional testimony, earning him the nickname “the Vaping Congressman.”
It may be slimy to accept money from e-cig manufacturers, but it is not illegal.
The same goes with committing adultery with multiple women.
If only he had been satisfied with being an awful person.
In August 2018, however, Hunter was charged with 60 counts of using more than $250,000 in campaign cash to cover extramarital “encounters” with “girlfriends,” luxury family vacations in Italy and Hawaii and airfare for his family’s pet rabbits, Eggburt and Cadbury.
Hunter did not do as another onetime California congressman, Richard M. Nixon, and deliver a Checkers – or Eggburt – speech to save his butt.
Hunter’s wife, who was also charged, testified against her husband.
Hunter, like Trump, claimed to be a victim of a political witch hunt.
On December 3, 2019, however, he pleaded guilty to a single charge of conspiring with his wife to illegally spend campaign funds on personal expenses.
He resigned on January 7, 2020. This made him the second congressman who endorsed Trump to resign from office after pleading guilty to committing a crime.
In October 2020, he was sentenced to 11 months at a federal correctional institute in Texas.
https://rollcall.com/2020/10/16/duncan-hunter-to-serve-prison-sentence-at-west-texas-camp/
President Trump granted a pardon to Hunter two weeks before the former congressman was scheduled to begin serving his sentence.
California Republicans criticized Trump’s pardon of Hunter.
Jon Fleischman, former state GOP vice chair, said, Trump “set the standard that there’s a different set of justice for the friends of the president than there is for everyone else.”
