Former staffers for Schweikert detail unrest
Ethics probe: No brakes on top aide’s spending
U.S. Rep. David Schweikert presided over a slipshod office operation with financial oversight so weak that his former chief of staff managed to take home improper, extra pay that violated House ethics rules for years, a newly released investigation found.
Oliver Schwab may have collected $60,000 in outside pay over three years above what House rules permitted, and attended the 2015 Super Bowl in Glendale — with Schweikert, R-Ariz. — as part of a taxpayer-paid trip that was reported as official business, the report said.
There were other possible sources of income Schwab had that investigators could not examine during the probe that has dogged the five-term Republican congressman and his operations for more than a year.
Neither Schwab nor Schweikert cooperated with the probe, the report by the Office of Congressional Ethics said.
Beyond them, numerous congressional staffers, Schwab’s wife and others also refused to participate in the probe.
Apart from the alleged wrongful spending, the 424-page report released Wednesday paints the image of a congressional office simmering with discontent as Schweikert pondered a Senate run — he publicly considered in 2015 a primary challenge to then-U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. — and as Schwab took out his frustrations with Schweikert on other staffers.
“David was putting increasing pressure on (Schwab) to raise money because David wanted to run for the Senate,” a former deputy chief of staff unnamed in the report who did cooperate, told investigators. “David was basically telling him, ‘I need a million dollars if I’m going to run for the Senate.’ I think that was weighing on him.”
The former staffer said Schwab said: “I hate David and I hate this job,” according to the report.
Schweikert is currently under investigation by the House Ethics Committee. The committee’s probe is believed to overlap significantly with the matters outlined in the report on Schwab, who resigned last summer, ending the Ethics Committee’s jurisdiction over him.
It is unclear when the investigation into Schweikert will conclude.
Chris Baker, a Schweikert campaign consultant, said the report confirms their view that Schwab had effectively gone rogue.
“Congressman Schweikert admittedly trusted him,” Baker said. “That trust was grossly misplaced. … David trusted Oliver as the senior staffer in his congressional office to provide oversight of the staff.”
Baker maintained that Schweikert never personally signed for Schwab’s reimbursements, and that delegating such duties is common on Capitol Hill.
Schwab was not available for comment.
Beau Brunson, who was Schweikert’s deputy chief of staff at the time referenced in the report, declined to discuss any involvement in the probes. “No comment. I have moved on with my life,” he said Wednesday.
In the past, Schwab and Schweikert have cast the ethics investigations as bookkeeping matters, not scandal.
“It’s almost wonderful because this is the process we needed so we could present,” Schweikert said last year of the Ethics Committee’s decision to form an investigative subcommittee to probe his case. “There’s really no mechanism to say, ‘Look, here’s our clerical screw-up and here’s how we fixed it.’ You need the subcommittee because that’s the way you get to present what you’ve taken care of.”
“Most of what I have seen reported in the press on this matter is unfortunate and inaccurate speculation,” Schwab told The Arizona Republic in May 2018. “While I am not in a place to speak publicly with any further specificity, what I can share with The Republic is that when the campaign became aware of an unintentional reporting mistake, we immediately set to rectify the situation.”
The House’s Office of Congressional Ethics report on Schwab notes that Schwab made no secret to other staffers of his desire to make more money than his congressional salary offered and he had “full carte blanche” to manage Schweikert’s office expenditures.
Schweikert seemed at least passingly familiar with the system that had little oversight from him, investigators said.
A former financial administrator for Schweikert told the congressional ethics office “that Rep. Schweikert would jokingly ask her if Mr. Schwab was spending too much money on office supplies and she would jokingly ask Mr. Schwab whether he ‘(had) Amazon on speed dial.’”
The report is at odds with Schweikert’s efforts since late 2017 to cast the issues as accounting discrepancies.
His campaign has spent heavily on legal fees during the probe, and despite saying in interviews that he welcomed a chance to explain his account to investigators, the report says he balked, along with about a dozen other Schweikert staffers tied to his congressional office or campaign committees.
That left unanswered questions about income, travel and other expenses related to Schweikert’s office and campaign.
Schwab allegedly attended the 2015 Super Bowl in Glendale as part of a trip billed to Schweikert’s office.
The trip clearly included official business, such as meetings with thenHouse Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif.
But there were other events that weekend, such as the Waste Management Open, a Phoenix Suns game, Super Bowl festivities and shopping jaunts, that seemed more recreational or campaign-related, the report found.
Schwab did not appear to adjust his official expenses to reflect unofficial activities that should have been at his expense or the expense of the Schweikert campaign, the report said.