Since 1971, Democrat Charles Rangel has been an often disgraceful U.S. House member from the Harlem district in New York City. Now he has been censured by fellow House members for serious misdeeds.
Representatives voted 333-79 to give Rangel the worst punishment it could short of expulsion. It was the 23rd time in U.S. history for a House member to be punished in this way.
What had he done? Here is The Associated Press’ account:
“Rangel shortchanged the IRS for 17 years by failing to pay taxes on income from his rental unit in a Dominican Republic resort. He filed misleading financial disclosure reports for a decade, leaving out hundreds of thousands of dollars in assets he owned. He used congressional letterheads and staff to solicit donations for a monument to himself: a center named after him at City College of New York. The donors included businesses and their charitable foundations that had issues before Congress and, specifically, before the Ways and Means Committee. Rangel also set up a campaign office in the Harlem building where he lives, despite a lease specifying the unit was for residential use only.”
Last March, he gave up his chairmanship of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee. Recently, the House Ethics Committee found him guilty on 11 counts involving ethics rules.
Condemned by fellow House members, Rangel expressed remorse: “I brought it on to myself.”
He certainly did, but there is no pleasure in seeing someone brought low, even when he deserved it.