Rep. Lauren Boebert in front of Shooters Grill in Rifle.
Chase Woodruff at Colorado Newsline reports on a potentially explosive new angle on the story of Rep. Lauren Boebert’s dubiously large reimbursements from her campaign accounts for mileage, racking up more such expenses in one election season than her predecessor did in a decade:
Less than two weeks before being elected to represent Colorado’s 3rd District in Congress, Rep. Lauren Boebert paid off the last of nearly $20,000 in state tax liens that had accumulated on her restaurant since 2016, records show…
On Feb. 13, 2020, three of the liens, totaling $553.50, were satisfied and released, records show. The remaining five liens, totaling $18,999.36, were satisfied on Oct. 22, 2020, according to Garfield County records.
Boebert did not respond to multiple requests for comment on what led to the liens being filed on Shooters Grill, or how they were paid off.
The state tax liens filed against Shooters Grill in Rifle reportedly stemmed from nonpayment of unemployment insurance premiums. Hopefully that delinquency didn’t result in hardship for any of Boebert’s employees last year, particularly during Boebert’s ill-advised battles with the Garfield County Health Department to keep her restaurant open during the height of the stay-at-home order last spring.
So, there’s that. But the more pressing question for Boebert to answer could be the timing of the repayment of these liens on October 22 in the amount of $19,000, followed by the huge $22,000 reimbursement for “mileage” just a couple of weeks later. Unless Boebert can fully account for the 38,000 miles of reimbursement she pocketed, it sure looks like the campaign was reimbursing Boebert for the consequences of her own flaky business practices.
Tax liens the motive, mileage reimbursement the opportunity? It adds up a bit too well, folks.
So, by Republiqan standards, she's a successful businesswoman with this lien.
Casper Stockham paid himself a salary. Lauren Boebert uses her campaign account as the Shooters Grill slush fund. Sounds about right! Grifters gonna grift.
Not quite sure if you’re hitting Stockham for the salary (then again, I don’t know how big of a salary it was) but this whole breaking the law thing with Boebert could’ve been avoided if she just took the proper, legal course of paying herself a salary from her campaign fund. Then she could’ve earned the money to pay off her multiple debts for her poorly run business. Instead she chose to defraud her donors and break the law, but there’s really no surprise there, as you said.
Loved when the noise shattered the dude's glasses lenses. This may have helped me reach the point in the week where I no longer care about politics and just want to crank the Priest!
Hell Yeah! Glad I could help
Personally I think if you're paying yourself a salary you should have a hope in hell of winning. Otherwise you're just skimming a con job.
Seems like there ought to be a financial timeline … showing what can be figured out about the restaurant, the smokehouse, Boebert Consulting, JLB 903 LLC, Top Gun Catering LLC, Shooters Gear L.L.C., and of course, the campaign.
Her campaign started in December 2019. (~11 months of campaigning)
For those that think this is a scandalous amount of mileage reimbursement this is directly from FEC data files:
2019-2020
MILEAGE REIMBURSEMENT BY AMOUNT:
1. BOEBERT, LAUREN (R-CO) | 21199.52
2. MCCORMICK, KAREN (D-CO) | 17300.42
3. HAMILTON, TAMIKA (R-CA) | 14999.45
4. COLLINS, DOUGLAS ALLEN (R-GA) | 12623.5
5. GINN, ASHLEY R. MS. (R-CA) | 8956.8
2017-2018
MILEAGE REIMBURSEMENT BY AMOUNT:
1. TRAUNER, GARY (D-WY) | 20704.32
2. COLVIN, JESSE SHUGER (D-MD) | 14758.14
3. COLVIN, JORDAN KAYE (D?-MD) | 8669.1
4. WEAVER, KIM (D-IA) | 8500
5. THRONE-HOLST, ANNA (D-NY) | 6050
Note – party affiliations were inserted by myself and might not be 100% accurate.
I didn't immediately recognize the name Karen McCormick, so went to Ballotpedia to find her. Listing there says she's from Longmont, CO.
Karen McCormick defeated Mark Milliman in the general election for Colorado House of Representatives District 11 on November 3, 2020. While CO-11 does cover a fair amount of ground west of Longmont, $17,300 works out to 30,086 miles, if I'm doing the math right (always a question at this time of day).
She ran against Ken Buck in 2018 … did some of the mileage reimbursements "roll over" from that cycle?
Dr. Karen McCormick is a wonderful person and will represent HD11 well. She did better against Ken Buck in CD4 (39.4 %) than any Democrat before or since. CD4 is huge, and any candidate there would put plenty of miles on campaigning. I doubt if mileage reimbursements could carry over between elections.
McCormick will be a fine addition to the legislature. I still own a small farm in Phillips County and contributed to her CD 4 race.