A futile fight

It's obvious by now that House Reps. Todd Courser and Cindy Gamrat have made some terrible decisions: Their all-too-public affair, the misuse of their offices to hide it, the looney pay-for-gay-sex email sent to fellow Republicans and the firing of staff.

And it's clear that they still don't get it. Rather than acknowledging the mess they've made of their lives and trying to repair the damage, they are doubling down on their defense, brushing aside, at times indigently, the well documented web of lies and findings that they tailored their elected offices for personal, political and business gains.

I keep thinking of their families — spouses and children — back home enduring the humiliating spectacle as it unfolds in Lansing. Courser has four kids; Gamrat has three. There is his wife, Fon; her husband, Joe. Can they possibly want anything more than for all of this to go away?

As often happens with politicians' scandals, Courser and Gamrat profess regret, even shame, for what they've done to their families. But not so much regret or shame that they are willing to resign and shield those back home from the humiliation brought on by 24-7 news coverage. Rather, they are fueling the scandal with attacks on fellow legislators, former staff members and, of course, the media.

It isn't working because the moral and legal case against them is compelling. As a result of its lightning-quick investigation, the House is considering whether to oust both representatives for “deceptive, deceitful and outright dishonest conduct.” Another option is censure, or the House could do nothing. And while personal conduct related to their affair doesn't technically matter, in the minds of many, it does. Even for the tea party supporters who voted them into office, the whiff of hypocrisy from the two self-professed Christian conservatives is too much.

The affair, which was widely known in political circles (City Pulse months ago decided that their personal conduct wasn't newsworthy), was going to be exposed. In fact, they did little to hide the relationship. It was the reason Courser and Gamrat concocted the email gaysex blackmail story, thinking it would somehow inoculate them when the story broke. That they even considered this sort of bizarre plan might actually work illustrates their disdain for, well, just about everyone.

What the House panel outlined in the sanitized report it released to the public (the Legislature exempted itself from the from page 6 Freedom of Information Act so the full report is secret) were seven core violations of House rules and state law. In essence, the panel determined that Courser and Gamrat engaged in official misconduct, misused state funds for political advantage and wrongfully discharged staff members who challenged their actions.

It found that “both misrepresented themselves on several occasions during their testimony to the Business Office.” This misrepresentation is made clear in the testimony of both Keith Allard and Ben Graham (former staff members), as well as the audio recordings substantiating that testimony. In short, the case against the two is overwhelming. Except to them.

Courser, an attorney, is mounting the longest, though not particularly convincing, defense to retain his $71,685 a year job. In a rambling 4,000-word Facebook post, he grudgingly acknowledges some culpability, but mostly he attacks his former staff members and House leaders. His complaints about former staff members' “egregious work performance,” if they were believable, suggest that he is both a terrible judge of staff talent and a incompetent manager allowing the “issues” he cites to fester in his office.

His Facebook post cited staffers’ “Lack of attendance, their failure to come to the office, their habit of showing up late to work and leaving early, their refusal to complete tasks, their refusal to answer every phone call, their neglecting to inform me of invitations, their multiple failures in constituent follow up, their refusal to deliver tributes to ceremonies of a local business and Eagle Scout ceremony, their telling the constituent services in the house (sic) that I had no wish to develop activities for the district (I was unaware that these services were available to me), their refusal to complete projects with the schools, (one staffer left the office early to deliver a project to the local libraries, a project that should have gone out at least a month earlier, only to not deliver them and simply take them home and not say anything), a refusal to account for when or where they had been spending their time while employed and supposedly working as state employees and a refusal to discuss what they accomplished during the day.”

Next, Courser asks whether he is being targeted as a form of political retribution by the mainstream Republican Party and suggests a double standard. In fact, he frames many of his complaints as questions, high school deb ate club style.

“Is this an investigation? Or is it only offering evidence that fits a desired outcome?

“Does the alleged misconduct arise to the level of expulsion?

“Or should there be a censure?

“Or should the people decide in either a recall effort or in the next election?” Gamrat favors news conferences for her defense. In mid-August, with her poor husband at her side, she disavowed involvement in the email scam. The House committee disagreed.

“Representative Gamrat unconditionally stated in her interview that she did not know about the false email before it had been sent. She also stated at her August 14th press conference that she "did not author nor assist in sending the email in question" and was "unaware that this email was sent and also the content until a reporter pointed it out to me." However, t his statement is refuted by both audio recordings and staff testimony.

No surprise, the House committee found that neither Courser nor Gamrat were “credible witnesses.” The full House could decide what to do about them this week. Even if its merely censures them both, their political careers are over. They may be able to reconstitute their personal lives, and it will have to start some time. Why wait to be shown the door. It's open. Use it.