MA Democrat Denise Andrews one-ups Harry Reid with seemingly bogus, un-sourced cocaine allegation against opponent
This is beyond dirty politics. It’s just bizarre. Read the whole thing. She went the whole nine yards, including to the police. But it doesn’t appear to hold up at all.
Politics is a dirty game but one Massachusetts Representative appears to have really upped the ante in the run up to elections.
Denise Andrews, a Democrat representing the the 2nd Franklin district, went to the police accusing her Republican opponent of buying cocaine.
Andrews claims she was acting on behalf on a concerned constituent who had called her with worries that GOP candidate Susannah Whipps Lee was buying drugs.
According to a police report, Andrews turned up at the station on August 14 and said someone within the Police Department had phoned a constituent and told them that police had received a telephone call from a cocaine dealer who claimed to have sold drugs to Lee.
Andrews refused to name the constituent who allegedly received the police phone call, reported the Boston Herald.
Andrews then told Timothy Anderson, the chief of police in her rival’s hometown of Athol, that one of his officers had gone to Lee’s home, confiscated the cocaine and brought it back to the station.
Originally, Andrews could not remember the name of the officer who went to Lee’s home.
Hoping it’ll blow over: Police say they found no basis for Andrews’ allegations that the GOP candidate bought cocaine
She then returned to the station and named the narcotics officer, Jarret Mousseau, as the person who confiscated the drugs.
However, Mousseau was not on duty the day she was alleged to have gone to Lee’s home and there was no cocaine in the police station’s drug locker that day either. Mousseau denied any knowledge of a drug sale.
This isn’t just about dirty politics, this is a woman who many not be sufficiently stable to hold the job. Either she tried to pull off something that even a child would know was near impossible – did she perhaps have some bizarre level of trust in this “source” if they really existed? The other option is that she has some ‘issues’ which compelled her to fabricate such an obviously false plan. ….Well, the last option is that she is basically a simpleton of the highest order. Either way, it means she is not fit. But being a Democrat in that part of the state means she could still win hands down. It’s a depressed, dying post-industrial area highly reliant of redistribution of eastern MA money and federal dollars. So, she only has to promise more of other people’s money to win.
Sounds like a clear-cut defamation case against this alleged constituent, should s/he turn out to exist, or against Andrews should s/he not. Even as a public figure, Lee should be able to clear the Sullivan hurdle. She should start with a subpoena on Andrews to divulge her source’s name; as soon as Andrews refuses, which she will, launch a barrage of ads accusing her of making the whole thing up, and simultaneously file a suit against her alleging defamation with malice.