Why Congressmen Alan Mollohan and William Jefferson Should Step Down

Two Democratic Congressmen who are under intense scrutiny and investigation have the duty to step aside from Congress and re-election. The Democrats cannot claim to be the party of the ethics if we have people like Alan Mollohan and William Jefferson in this party.

On April 25, 2006, The Wall Street Journal reported that Mollohan cooperated with CEO Dale R. McBride of FMW Composite Systems Inc. of Bridgeport, West Virginia for the joint purchase of his 300 acre farm along West Virginia's Cheat River. Mollohan had directed a $2.1 million government contract earmarked to FWM composite systems to develop lightweight payload pallets for space-shuttle missions. Federal Bureau of Investigation agents have started asking questions in Washington and West Virginia about Mollohan’s investments and whether they were properly disclosed, according to the Journal. Mollohan had previously admitted he may have made "inadvertent" mistakes on financial disclosure forms.1

While this is pretty bad, Mollohan still has the duty to step aside from Congress and not run for re-election we do not need these kinds of people in the Democratic Party because that gives the republicans ammo to fire at us and claim the Democrats are hypocrites.

Mollohan still however doesn't hold a candle to William Jefferson of New Orleans, who is insanely corrupt.

On July 30, 2005, he was caught on video tape by the FBI accepting a $100,000 dollar bribe in $100 dollar bills in a leather briefcase at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Arlington. Jefferson told an investor, Lori Mody, who was wearing a wire, that he would need to give Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar $500,000 "as a motivating factor" to make sure they obtained contracts for iGate and Mody's company in Nigeria.

A few days later, on Aug 3, 2005, FBI agents raided Jefferson's home in Northeast Washington and, as noted in an 83-page affidavit filed to support a subsequent raid on his Congressional office, "found $90,000 of the cash in the freezer, in $10,000 increments wrapped in aluminum foil and stuffed inside frozen-food containers."

Late in the night of May 20, 2006, FBI agents executed a search warrant at Jefferson's office in the Rayburn House Office Building. The New Orleans Times-Picayune has received details of the allegations and published them on Monday, May 22.2

Jefferson has no right anymore to be a member of congress, he has the utmost duty to resign from congress immediately, Mollohan may have been steering contracts, but both ethically-charged congressmen hurt the democratic argument about corruption when they tolerate two kinds of people like this. They have no right to be members of the party anymore.

So please, Howard Dean force these criminals to resign immediately.