Arizona Congressman Rick Renzi has just been indicted for allegedly profiting from a crooked land deal.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Rep. Rick Renzi was indicted Friday on charges of extortion, wire fraud, money laundering and other matters in an Arizona land swap scam that allegedly helped him collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in payoffs.
A 26-page federal indictment unsealed in Arizona accuses Renzi and two former business partners of conspiring to promote the sale of land that buyers could swap for property owned by the federal government. The sale netted one of Renzi’s former partners $4.5 million.
Renzi is also the Arizona co-chair of the presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain, who probably has enough on his plate this week as it is.
Of course, this isn’t the first guy on the McCain campaign to have some trouble with the law. But it is the first federal indictment, so that’s something.
This might be the end of McCain’s squishy love affair with the press.
Then again, it might not.
