Congressman Messer listed by RNC as member of national leadership
INDIANAPOLIS – Congressman Messer, listed by the RNC as a member of its national leadership, has yet to say whether the committee should give back contributions raised by former Finance Chairman Steve Wynn in the wake of Friday’s shocking Wall Street Journal report detailing Wynn’s history of sexual harassment.
The casino mogul and longtime Republican donor resigned from his post as RNC’s top fundraiser Saturday after the article’s publication, but RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel’s only response so far has been to acknowledge Wynn’s resignation. While multiple GOP senators have publicly brought up the idea of the RNC returning Wynn’s money, the committee so far has done nothing to address the allegations of sexual abuse nor made clear if it will do anything with the contributions Wynn has raised or made.
Congressman Messer made it clear this fall that he believes political contributions from public figures accused of sexual harassment should be disposed of immediately, but he has so far ignored calls to take a stance on the RNC’s situation. Given the opportunity on Friday to live up to the guidelines he himself set out, Congressman Messer did not address what the RNC should do with Wynn’s contributions and the money he raised. Instead, his campaign punted and sought to answer unrelated questions about Wynn and his own Senate campaign.
Congressman Messer’s campaign also pushed back by saying that he didn’t have a direct role in the RNC, even though he is clearly listed as a member of “national leadership” on the committee’s website.
“Congressman Messer’s failure to answer real questions about Steve Wynn is politics at its worst,” said Michael Feldman, spokesman for the Indiana Democratic Party. “Instead of living up to his own words and demanding on Friday that the RNC return all of its Wynn-tainted money, he spent the weekend trying to answer questions that no one was asking and ignoring the one he has leverage on. That just begs an additional question: does he think that Hoosiers aren’t paying attention, or that they don’t care about his hypocrisy?”
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