Criminals in their midst: Will state GOP ever clean up its mess?

As Republican loyalists hit the road, heading to Lansing for this weekend's state GOP convention, the overriding question is: Will anything change in the next two days for a party plagued by officials and candidates for party offices who harbor pasts mired in criminal activity or bigotry?


The newest GOP activist with a skeleton in his closet may be Michael Bancroft of Thompsonville (located near Traverse City), who will be a candidate for the Republican State Committee when the 1^st Congressional District convention-goers hold their caucus tonight.
According to public documents and Genesee County Circuit Court records, a Michael Bancroft was charged in 2001  with sexually assaulting his babysitter. He eventually had the 2^nd- and 4^th-degree criminal sexual conduct charges bumped down to a simple assault and battery. He served 30 days in jail and one year of probation, then moved from Flint to Thompsonville.

Now, a Michael Bancroft from Thompsonville, formerly of Flint, is running for a State Committee seat representing the 1^st District. I made several attempts to reach the candidate, by phone and by email, telling him that I wanted to ask about the criminal conviction outlined in court documents. He never responded.
One Republican insider tells me that he’s convinced that the 1^st District’s Bancroft is the same guy who tried running for a State Committee seat in the 5^th Congressional District a decade ago while living in Flint -– until his criminal record for assault was exposed and his reputation among Genesee County Republicans was ruined.
Another GOP source says that Bancroft is known in northern Michigan political circles for telling tasteless jokes about gays.

Will the 1^st District GOP delve into this matter at their caucus?

And what will happen at the full convention on Saturday, when Darwin Jiles, Jr., currently on probation for shooting a man (an incident that he insists was accidental), is up for election as the party’s vice chair for the ethnic/minority bloc of the state GOP?

L to R: Doug Sedenquist, Darwin
 Jiles, Trucker Randy Bishop

Jiles was originally charged with a 10-year felony for assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than murder due to an incident a year ago in the Auburn Hills trailer park where he lives.
According to police, after Jiles became engaged in two heated arguments with an acquaintance, the pistol he was carrying discharged and the bullet struck the other man in the lower leg. The victim suffered a serious, but not life-threatening injury.

Jiles initially went to trial but, according to Oakland County Circuit Court records, he secured a plea bargain for a lesser misdemeanor charge of discharge of a firearm without malicious intent, but with injury.

Not all of his story added up, according to the prosecution, but the deal he struck allowed him to avoid prison time. He was placed on probation for one year last November.

Meanwhile, Jiles’ crime seems like a minor incident compared to the eye-popping tale of the state GOP’s $285 million con man, William Rauwerdink, who is a State Committee member from the 14^th Congressional District.

William
Rauwerdink

Party leaders were “shell-shocked” to learn earlier this month that Rauwerdink, of West Bloomfield Township, was the mastermind behind one of the biggest accounting frauds in U.S. history, until it was upstaged by the Enron and WorldCom scandals.
After facing a 16-count criminal indictment for cooking the books at Troy-based Lason Inc., federal court records show that Rauwerdink pleaded guilty to several charges, served nearly four years in prison, and was ordered to pay $285 million in restitution to a long list of victims.

It’s unclear if Rauwerdink plans to attend the convention or if he will seek re-election to his State Committee seat.

As mortifying as that whole secret-past episode is for the GOP, the highest-profile headache tormenting the party is the hate-mongering of Republican National Committee member Dave Agema, whose penchant for posting racist, homophobic and Islamaphobic commentaries online has made him the scourge of Republicans nationwide.

The RNC, at its recent meeting, embraced the calls coming from far and wide for Agema to resign. But Chairman Reince Priebus & Co. opted to put the matter back into the laps of the Michigan State Committee members, urging them to find a procedural way to oust Agema.
But the State Committee, which has dodged the issue in the past, will apparently take no action again this weekend, as the heavy favorite to become the new party chair, Ronna Romney McDaniel, continues to walk the fence between the GOP establishment and the tea party types. Romney McDaniel, Mitt Romney’s niece, is apparently determined to keep all Agema-ouster plans under wraps until long after she has settled in as the party boss.

A former state representative from western Michigan, Agema has many supporters who don’t seem to mind that their revealing defenses of his bigotry – blaming it on squishy “political correctness” -- and their steadfast association with the RNC’s bad boy taints them too as preachers of intolerance. One of Agema’s outspoken backers is Romney McDaniel’s main opponent for the chairmanship, Norm Hughes.

Overall, the MIGOP’s biggest black mark may be the recent history of its representatives on the RNC. RNC Committeeman Saul Anuzis, once labeled a contender for the national party chairmanship, was bounced by a wide margin – in favor of Agema -- a few years ago when the new tea party factions flexed their muscles and caught the establishment off guard.

 

L to R: Mary Sears, Dave Agema, Sedenquist

Next, RNC Committeewoman Terri Lynn Land quickly smacked up against the Peter Principle, stepping down from the national committee to launch a disastrous U.S. Senate run that was eventually labeled by some as one of the worst 2014 congressional campaigns in the nation.
Romney McDaniel was elected last year by the party faithful to fill Land’s RNC seat, but not before she had to fend off a competitor, Mary Sears of Houghton County in the 1^st District, who said that all gays should be purged from the GOP because they are perverts doing the devil’s work by “preying on our children.”

Overall, the MIGOP still tries to shake off a 2-year stretch when it saw several skeletons come out of the closet.

“Trucker Randy” Bishop remains as the Antrim County GOP chair (an ex-officio State Committee member) despite being exposed as a two-time felon during his days in Macomb County.

Trucker Randy

He declared bankruptcy, lost his builder’s license, was accused of not paying his federal and state taxes and, after fraudulently claiming in writing that he had never been convicted of a felony, lost his real estate broker’s license in 2001.
A judge declared that Trucker Randy’s fraudulent behavior “illustrates his inability to serve the public in an open and honest manner, and his lack of good moral character.”
As an aside, Trucker Randy -- the GOP “oaf,” as one party activist labeled him -- begins to look more and more like Santa Claus as he lets his white beard grow. This comes as the eccentric Kerry Bentivolio, Michigan’s accidental congressman and Santa impersonator, fades from memory after a one-and-done term in the House.

And, finally, we have the sordid tale of one of Trucker Randy’s best buddies, Doug Sedenquist of Escanaba, a fellow trash-talkin’, GOP-bashing, talk-radio commentator who wanted to see the tea party “patriots” overtake the GOP and toss out the establishment, including Gov. Rick Snyder.

Sedenquist, who is even more obnoxious than Trucker Randy, resigned promptly from the State Committee last summer after he was convicted and later sentenced to three years in prison for engaging in extortion and a computer crime while terrorizing his ex-wife.

The irony of all this is that the party loyalists are not focusing on any of the tainted characters within their midst. Instead, the gnashing of teeth heard as the convention approaches centers on the insistence that Republicans should never speak ill of fellow Republicans.

A plea for unity? I’m not so sure. That kinda sounds like: We will all go down together.