Lt. Gov. Michael Fedele today opened a two-front assault against frontrunner Tom Foley in the race for the GOP gubernatorial primary.
First he launched a TV ad aimed against Foley’s business record, pointing out that while Foley claims he had thousands of employees at the Bibb Corp. in Macon, Georgia, ultimately the firm went bankrupt, as reported recently by the Hearst Connecticut Newspapers and the Hartford Courant.
Fedele also criticized Foley for failing to dislcose his arrests for a traffic collision in 1981 and breach of peace involving his former wife about eight years ago, prior to his being appointed to posts supervising the privatization of Iraqi businesses, then ambassador to Ireland under President George W. Bush.
Jon Lender in the Courant’s Capitol Watch blog reported yesterday that Foley answered “No” on federal background applications to questions whether he had ever been involved in anything more than minor traffic violations, “even though he’d been arrested, but not convicted, on charges of first-degree attempted assault and breach of peace.”
Lender’s article continues:
“Foley was charged in 1981, at age 29, with attempted first-degree assault, and kept in a cell overnight, after occupants of a vehicle complained that he had rammed their car with his in Southampton, N.Y., on Long Island. But he said it was really only a minor, low-speed traffic incident and the charge was later dropped — and he said “nobody ever told me it was a felony offense.” Under current New York penal laws, attempted first-degree assault is a felony, and New York officials were doing research Thursday to verify if it also was in 1981.
“It certainly wouldn’t have been in my mind that it would have been classified as a felony,” Foley said. He said his answer was “accurate to the best of my knowledge at my time. If it turns out that this was a felony charge, then I would answer it differently today, knowing that.”
Foley served as Bush’s ambassador to Ireland, from October 2006 to January 2009, after serving in Iraq from August 2003 through March 2004 as director of private sector development for the Coalition Provisional Authority.”
Fedele, far behind in the polls, blasted Foley.
Earlier today, Fedele announced his latest TV ad. “Jobs?” It questions Foley’s claimed success with the Bibb Corp.
“You have to question the judgment of someone who falsified his national security clearance documents,” Fedele said in a statement. “This is part of his pattern of shading the truth, not disclosing details, refusing to open sealed arrest documents and dodging tax questions.”
Commenting on Foley’s assertion that “if he’d known it was a felony he would have answered differently,” Fedele asked, “What world do you live in where you consider 1st degree assault a “minor traffic violation” or a domestic breach of peace a “traffic-related” incident?”