No Law Stopping Disgraced Former Lawmaker Cindy Gamrat From Running Again
LANSING (WWJ/AP) -Top state election officials say there is no legal method to block former Rep. Cindy Gamrat from running for her legislative seat that she lost earlier this month.
The State Elections Director, Chris Thomas, has concluded that there is no law on the books nor an Attorney General's Opinion that would allow the state or the county clerk to block Cindy Gamrat from appearing on the ballot in a special election to regain her legislative seat reports WWJ's lansing Bureau Chief Tim Skubick.
On September 11, Gamrat became just the fourth legislator to be kicked out in state history shortly after 4 a.m. An hour earlier, GOP Rep. Todd Courser resigned when it became clear majority Republicans had secured votes from enough Democrats for his expulsion in exchange for the House asking the attorney general and state police to investigate the lawmakers.
Both were immediately escorted out of the chamber.
"I put everybody through a whole bunch — across the state, my own family, the constituents, the people in this room," Courser told reporters. "Whether it was the third vote or the fourth vote or the fifth vote, they were going to eventually get me."
Gamrat, who was tossed on a 91-12 vote, declined comment that day while leaving the Capitol.
Some have raised the legal question asking -- since she was expelled from the legislature -- how can she run for her seat?
[Criminal Police Probe Planned In Lawmaker's Affair Cover-Up]
Thomas says on the surface it seems like a perfectly reasonable conclusion. But, he says, there is no law that addresses this type of situation.
The CindyGamrat.com website touts her strong ties to family and religion - helping her to shape her Tea Party political philosophy.
"In 2009, Cindy became concerned with the moral and fiscal direction of our nation and government. That year, after feeling called and compelled to do what she could to protect our freedoms, she held her first TEA Party rally. Cindy has been a TEA Party leader since that time and is currently the founder and leader of the Plainwell Patriots TEA Party. " -- notes the site.
In August, Todd Courser, 43, of Lapeer in Michigan's Thumb region, admitted sending an "outlandish" phony email to GOP activists and others in May claiming he was caught with a male prostitute. The email was intended to make his affair with the 42-year-old Gamrat appear less believable if it were exposed by an anonymous blackmailer who Courser said was demanding his resignation.
[Criminal Police Probe Planned In Lawmaker's Affair Cover-Up]
The self-smear email called Courser a "bi-sexual porn addicted sex deviant" and "gun toting Bible thumping … freak" and Gamrat a "tramp."
Gamrat, from Plainwell in the southwestern part of the state, said she discussed the plot with Courser but did not know the email's sexually explicit content before it was sent.
The bottom-line is that the unflappable Gamrat has the green-light to run for re-election and appears ready to do so.
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