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| Fazio |
The story in the Hartford Courant -- Where has CT GOP’s Fazio worked? What to know as governor’s race comes to vote – may be much ado about nothing, to quote Shakespeare.
The governor’s race will “come to a vote” in less than a
month and so, from the point of view of loyal opposition, it is well timed. The
opposition research folks who are paid for turning over political rocks –
always selectively -- probably should be given a raise on this one.
The Courant tells us Ryan Fazio’s professional background
includes roles in commodities trading, growth equity, and energy/agriculture
sectors, but he has not publicly named the companies he worked for — a fact
highlighted by the Hartford Courant as a point of political scrutiny.
All political politicians come from somewhere and, at the
end of their political confinement, much too long in many cases, they go
somewhere to cash in on their political service. Republicans generally come and go from the
business community, and leftist Democrats, borrowing a page from socialist
economist Karl Marx, have more than adequately portrayed multi-millionaire
business owners and executives as greedy, predatory capitalists.
Democrats, once their term in office have ended, usually are
deposited in revenue bearing public sector jobs. Former Democrat Hartford Mayor Pedro Segarra,
the first openly gay mayor of a major city, was amply rewarded upon leaving
office by appointment to a variety of judicial offices. Segarra’s non-service
in Connecticut‘s judicial department has recently been examined by the Hartford
Courant. See: “Former mayor leaves bench. Segarra, often
absent from work as judge, allowed to take disability retirement, pension.”
Fazio has not yet been accused by Connecticut Democrats of
using his political office for personal enrichment. According to the Courant,
“Fazio’s campaign website, state Senate page, and LinkedIn résumé do not list
any company names. His LinkedIn states he began work at a ‘growth equity firm’ nearly
seven years ago without naming it, and before that he was a commodity trader
for ‘trading houses’ from June 2012 to January 2020. His résumé describes
trading and transporting physical commodities — especially dry bulk shipping,
grains, and renewable fuel products — but again omits firm names. Democrats
have questioned the omission, citing alleged ties to companies with
connections to China (emphasis mine) one of which collapsed after its
stock price fell 99%, and another co‑founded by Fazio’s father that led a $20 million investment in an international
money transfer start‑up.”
In the same story, Fazio responded to charges that, not at
all oddly, seem as if they had been fed to the media by a Democrat Party
opposition research team. Fazio told the
Courant “he rarely talks about his business background on the campaign trail
because he is not a ‘bio candidate’ who emphasizes the details of his personal
history. Instead, he is a ‘policy candidate’ who emphasizes how he will cut
electricity rates and taxes, among other high-profile issues. He says he has
one of the most detailed policy platforms on multiple issues of any candidate
running for office.”
Fazio is quoted in the Courant story: “I have generally not
run on biographicals. Some candidates are very biographical, and some
candidates are very issue-focused. I have always been a policy and
issue-focused candidate for office. I’ve always been someone who is running to
change policy and never one who said, ‘Look at my resume. I think I should be
in office.’ Not to say that there’s anything wrong with that. I have friends
who are more that way, and I have friends who are more like me who are ‘Here’s
what I want to do, and here are the issues to be solved.’ I have mostly always
run my campaigns oriented to the policy.”
Former Office of Policy and Management (OPM) Deputy
Secretary Kosta Diamantis, currently facing federal corruption charges, claims
he has been targeted with “thuggish and inconsistent” legal tactics by the U.S.
Attorney’s Office to divert attention away from Gov. Ned Lamont’s involvement
in COVID testing contracts awarded to Sema 4, a company that was funded by
Annie Lamont’s venture capital firm.
“Attention was diverted to Mr. Diamantis, one of the state’s
top officials in monitoring state spending, at or about the time serious
questions emerged regarding the governor’s wife, who is a partner of a powerful
hedge fund,” Diamantis’s attorney Norm Pattis wrote to United States Acting
Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove, III in a February 14 letter. “That hedge
fund invested in a company called Sema 4 on at least two occasions during the
COVID 19 pandemic in 2020. Under the guise of a public health emergency
declared by the governor, Sema 4 entered into two contracts with the state, one
of which was a no-bid contract for COVID-19 testing products.”
“Mr. Diamantis raised concerns about the propriety of the
contracts, after being alerted to them by members of his staff,” the letter
continues. “Gov. Lamont hired a man who had previously been a beneficiary of
Mrs. Lamont’s hedge fund investments to serve as chief operating officer; this
man had oversight over the Sema 4 contracts.”
At the time, Josh Geballe served as Chief Operating Officer
for Lamont. Annie Lamont’s venture capital firm, Oak HC/FT, had previously
invested in Geballe’s company, Core Informatics.
These are the outer boundaries of a tangled web. “What a
tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive,” Walter Scott tells
us. The easiest way out of any political tangle is to distract pursuers by dangling
before them a tempting, complex diversion.
It is doubtful that Governor Lamont, the principal economic beneficiary
of his wife Annie Lamont’s energetic exercises in perfectly legal enterprises,
could benefit politically by party opposition research that merely hints at the
supposed irregularities of his
Republican gubernatorial opponent, whose out of office employment
resembles closely that of Democrat U.S.
Representative Jim Himes, referred to in
his political biography as “an American businessman and politician serving as
the U.S. representative for Connecticut's 4th congressional district since
2009. Born in Peru and raised in Peru, Colombia, and New Jersey, he is a
Harvard graduate and Rhodes Scholar with a background in banking at Goldman Sachs
and nonprofit affordable housing. He is Ranking Member of the House
Intelligence Committee, serves on the Financial Services Committee, and
previously chaired the New Democrat Coalition.”
Lamont, so far, has steered clear of the moral tar pit. He
may be more familiar than his opposition researchers with forbidding Biblical
injunctions: “Why do you look at the
speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in
your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of
your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite,
first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to
remove the speck from your brother’s eye.” -- Matthew 7:3–5
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