Chicago Congressman Bobby Rush (D-IL) is being investigated by the House ethics committee for somehow getting his Chicago South Side congressional offices rent free for 20 years, a violation of state and federal laws not to mention House ethics standards.
A new House ethics report finds that Rush escaped from having to pay upwards to $365,040 for about 20 years of rent.
The Office of Congressional Ethics report concluded that there was “substantial reason” to assume that the free rent was an in-kind contribution that violates House ethics rules.
The OCE has referred the investigation to the House Committee on Ethics, the group that has the power to issue any rebukes. The committee now must decide if it will initiate a full investigation.
In the 1960s, Bobby Rush made a name for himself as a vocal member of the Black Panther Party serving as the Chicago-based group’s “defense minister.”
In 1969, after Black Panther militant leader Fred Hampton was killed by Chicago Police, Bobby Rush rallied the extremist group by urging them to arm themselves and go kill “the pigs.”
Rush spent six months in jail in 1972 on a weapons charge but earned a degree in political science from the University of Illinois in 1974. He was first elected to Congress in 1992 and has been serving since he took office in 1993. Rush was elected to a seat on the Chicago City Council in 1983 and served for nearly ten years.
The committee has yet to ascertain why Chicago landlord, Draper & Kramer, has never asked for any rent.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.