Post prison, ex-congressman Grimm running for old seat

NEW YORK » He came to Congress with the law-andorder image of a former FBI agent and left as an admitted tax evader headed for prison. His tenure was shadowed by a campaign fundraising investigation and punctuated by a threat to hurl a reporter off a Capitol balcony.

But former U.S. Rep. Michael Grimm says voters want him back in Washington, and on Sunday, he announced he’s going for his old job.

Grimm told a crowd of about 100 supporters: “Together we’ll go to Washington and have our president’s back.” He attacked the man he’s trying to unseat for the Republican nomination, Dan Donovan, a former prosecutor who won the Staten Island-based district after Grimm resigned in 2015.

Grimm chastised Donovan, saying, “The swamp still needs to be drained. Let’s start right here with my opponent.”

In a country with a history of political comebacks, Grimm isn’t following the script of asking for second chances. He’s all but challenging anyone to stop him.

“I’m gonna win,” Grimm, 47, recently told Fox News. “When I go out and I shake these hands, and people hug me, and they tell me in my ear, ‘You have no idea how many people are behind you,’ I just know it.”

A Marine and Gulf War veteran, Grimm has long styled himself as a scrappy fighter for New York City’s “forgotten borough.”

The thrice-elected congressman says his prosecution and eight-month prison term were politically driven and unfair. He casts himself as a political warrior ready to defend President Donald Trump’s agenda against congressional Republicans with a “weak spine.” And he counts the support of Staten Island political patriarch Guy Molinari, a Republican former congressman and borough president.

But Grimm would face an incumbent with a long history in Staten Island politics, including 12 years as district attorney (his office didn’t prosecute Grimm).

Donovan has the backing of the local and state Republican parties and a $300,000 campaign war chest; Grimm’s old campaign coffer has $52,000 but bears $420,000 in legal debt, according to the latest filings in July. Both camps claim the other candidate is too liberal.

“We’re not really worried about a challenge from a felon,” Donovan campaign spokeswoman Jessica Proud says. “The voters won’t be duped by him again.”

KEVIN HAGEN — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE In this file photo, former U.S. Rep. Michael Grimm, center, leaves following his sentencing at federal court in the Brooklyn borough of New York. Grimm, who went to prison for tax fraud and once threatened to throw a TV reporter off a balcony, is set...