Linda Pence Fundraises in Chicago, Rakes $$$ in from Jack Abramoff’s Lobbying Firm

Oh boy.

Just when you thought that Linda Pence couldn’t get herself into any more trouble…

First Pence denounced Attorney General Steve Carter for hiring outside counsels to help with important cases.

It turned out that the lead item on her resume (going after a polluter of the White River) was done as an outside counsel for the state of Indiana during the O’Bannon administration, work for which she was quite handsomely paid.

Then Pence demurred on whether she would continue the RICO case against former East Chicago Mayor Bob Pastrick, saying that she did not know much about the case and would have “to examine” it before deciding whether to continue it.

Not only did Pence’s statements show her as soft on corruption in Lake County, but they were shockingly accompanied by a failure to disclose one important fact.

That fact was that Linda Pence had spent more than a year as a litigator in the Pastrick “sidewalks for votes” case representing one of Pastrick’s co-defendants.

Better still, her client settled out of court for so much money that the settlement paid for the fees of the case’s outside counsel (which she had earlier attacked) twice over.

(Read more after the leap)

Linda Pence has spent much of the time since her announcement repeating over and over again that she’ll be tough on corruption; this despite her lengthy history of defending folks involved in corruption cases.

It takes a special kind of campaign to get in so much trouble on the very first day.

And now, it appears that Linda Pence has gotten herself into even more trouble.

Her campaign has made much of its fundraising ability, having raised over a quarter of a million dollars before the Republicans even settled on a nominee.

It’s no wonder why.

Monday evening, Linda Pence is holding fundraiser at the Chicago offices of Greenberg Traurig.

First of all, let’s wrap our heads around that for a moment, shall we?

What is a candidate for Attorney General of the State of Indiana doing raising money at a law firm in Chicago?

Is there something from Chicago she wants to bring to Indiana?

As far as I’m concerned, a little bit of Chicagoland politics has spilled over into Indiana in the form of corruption in Lake County, and we don’t want any more of that; getting rid of what’s there has been hard enough.

We’ve also seen where Linda Pence stands on prosecuting the bad guys in Lake County.

Second of all, Greenberg Traurig is not exactly a place that someone seeking to bring and create the image of a high standard of conduct to the attorney general’s office would even want to raise campaign cash.

Greenberg Traurig, you see, was the law firm of a certain convicted corrupt lobbyist by the name of Jack Abramoff. (And their Wikipedia page lists a lot of other trouble that the firm has gotten into in the past.)

Linda Pence has already shown herself to be soft on corruption in Lake County and has a record of defending folks in those sorts of corruption cases.

Now, she’s raising money from her campaign out of state, and at the former firm of Jack Abramoff to boot.

Just what sort of change is she trying to bring to the Office of the Attorney General of the State of Indiana anyway?

(This post is also available at the Hoosierpundit)