Group calls for Cunningham's immediate resignation

18 Aug 2005 // A North County group closely aligned with the Democratic Party delivered petitions signed by 700 residents to U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham's Escondido office, calling for his immediate resignation from his 50th Congressional District seat.

"After his egregious, unethical and likely unlawful conduct, we do not believe he can ably fight impending corruption charges and perform his duties as U.S. Representative to the 50th District of California. We, the undersigned, ask that Congressman Cunningham resign," the petitions read.

Spotlights ablaze, news camera crews trailed North County Unity Coalition communications director Matt O'Connor as he walked into Cunningham's office on West Valley Parkway on Thursday afternoon.

"How are you today?" O'Connor asked a startled receptionist, before handing her the signed petitions. After saying that Cunningham was not in the office and accepting the signed petitions, she added that she would have no comment.

Cunningham recently declared that he would not seek re-election to Congress in 2006, citing the growing stress that a federal investigation into his financial ties to a Washington defense contractor is having on his family.

Before delivering the petition, O'Connor held an outdoor news conference just across the street from Cunningham's office in the Escondido Transit Center.

On Thursday, a Washington-based member of Cunningham's staff, Mark Olson, sent an e-mail to the North County Times, saying: "It's kind of ironic that they are holding (the news conference) at a facility which received $500,000 in an appropriations earmark secured in (fiscal year) 2004 for bus maintenance upgrades."

At the conference, O'Connor said that about a week and a half ago, coalition volunteers began circulating petitions calling for Cunningham's resignation. The volunteers succeeded in getting about 300 people to sign those petitions, O'Connor added. Then three days ago, the coalition began using a newly launched Web site called ResignRandy.org on which visitors were asked to fill out a form that also urged his immediate resignation. More than 400 people filled out those forms, O'Connor said.

The head of the Washington-based congressional watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington also addressed reporters at Thursday's news conference. She said that she had decided to come to Escondido for two reasons: to support the call for Cunningham's immediate resignation and to appeal to voters to pressure their Washington representatives into calling for a House Ethics Committee investigation into Cunningham.

"Mr. Cunningham's conduct is so beyond the pale that nothing less than an immediate resignation will suffice," said CREW Executive Director Melanie Sloan. A formal federal prosecutor, Sloan had worked for several Democratic House members prior to joining the U.S. attorney's office in Washington, D.C.

Although his group is closely tied to the Democratic Party, O'Connor said Thursday that the Cunningham story goes beyond red and blue.

"This is about ethics, about holding our elected officials to a higher standard, be they Republican or Democrat," he said.