Aimee Belgard in Hot Water Over Fake Pledges
Aimee Belgard’s history of fake, hypocritical political pledges and campaign stunts is now earning her the public derision she deserves. She’s been caught touting the same hypocritical campaign rhetoric about declining public service pay – this time while peddling the DCCC’s cut-and-paste talking points against congressional “perks”.
After CLF exposed Aimee Belgard’s hypocrisy with evidence that she broke her previous campaign promise and pocketed the pay, the Burlington County Times reported yesterday:
A Republican super PAC is calling out Democratic congressional candidate Aimee Belgard for accepting a salary for her position as a Burlington County freeholder after previously promising not to during a 2010 campaign.
The Congressional Leadership Fund, a super political action committee dedicated to maintaining and expanding a GOP majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, issued a release attacking Belgard for accepting a freeholder salary after she pledged last month to not use taxpayer-funded travel allowances to pay for first-class airfare or transportation in luxury vehicles if elected to Congress. (David Levinsky, “Super PAC Accuses Belgard of Breaking Campaign Promise,” Burlington County Times, 7/7/14)
Now the Burlington County Times editorial board is taking Aimee Belgard to task, calling her out for “foot-in-mouth disease.” Full editorial pasted below.
We realize honesty is a challenge for Aimee Belgard, but is it asking that much for her to demonstrate a little regard for New Jersey voters and provide some basic policy positions instead of just political hypocrisy?
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As the words turn
Burlington County Times
Editorial
“Mission accomplished.”
Those words, on a banner behind former President George W. Bush as he announced “the end of combat operations in Iraq” back in 2003, barely had time to register with Americans watching on television when the situation in Iraq intensified. His administration spent a lot of time explaining that phrase, and it has come to symbolize the irony of the war in Iraq.
It certainly would not be the first time a politician has had his or her words come back to haunt them.
Democrat Aimee Belgard, a Burlington County freeholder campaigning for Congress, has come down with a similar strain of foot-in-mouth disease.
The Congressional Leadership Fund, a powerful Republican political action committee, has come after Belgard, who is vying to replace Republican Congressman Jon Runyan of Mount Laurel in New Jersey’s 3rd District, for accepting a Burlington County freeholder salary in 2013 when she said during her 2010 campaign that she would not.
Belgard did not dispute the PAC’s claim, but responded by slamming MacArthur’s status as a millionaire businessman.
To be clear, Belgard did not repeat her vow to forgo her $13,000 salary when she campaigned for freeholder again in 2012, but it’s likely many voters were left with the impression that she was continuing to serve on the board without pay.
Belgard has made another public pledge and challenged her opponent, former Randolph Mayor Tom MacArthur, most recently of Toms River, to do the same.
If elected, Belgard said, she will not accept taxpayer-funded perks offered to members of Congress, such as free gym memberships, allowances for campaign-style mailers, first-class air travel or the use of luxury vehicles.
Voters will have to decide if they believe her, and if such perks and pledges really matter to them.
We doubt it. A promise was made and perhaps, broken. But back in the real world of the 3rd District, there are thousands without job prospects or an affordable place to live. Thousands more are struggling to pay their property taxes or to put their kids through college. How does any of this help them? Where are either candidate’s solutions to those problems?
We believe we speak for the majority of the voters in Burlington County when we ask that both candidates spend more time focusing on the issues affecting county residents and less time making unrealistic pledges that impress no one.