SD-61: Baby Joe Mesi’s Own “War Kids” Scandal?
Tags: Baby Joe Mesi, Fight for Organ Donation Foundation
A reader of The Buffalo Bean has informed me that “Baby” Joe Mesi has what could be described as his own “War Kids Relief” scandal with his Fight for Organ Donation Foundation.
According to the reader, “from 2003 to 2006 Mesi’s charity, Baby Joe Mesi’s Fight for Organ Donation paid Mesi’s father Jack Mesi at least $16,500 while giving out only $13,500 in grants.” He also noted that the charity’s biggest expense “has been professional services, all to undisclosed sources, except for some paid the husband of Mesi’s cousin.” Those professional services were for things such as legal fees and accounting, which were apparently all done by Mesi’s cousin, Julie Bargnesi.
Here are the Form 990’s for Mesi’s charity for 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006.
UPDATE: Buffalo Pundit suggests that the information I received must have come from a rival campaign of Mesi’s, but most certainly not by one of the Democrats. So, I would like to throw out there that I a) do not know if the source of the information came from someone affiliated with a campaign or not, b) that since this was sent to be before the primary, I suspect it is someone aligned with one of Mesi’s primary opponents, and c) as far as the 61st Senate District race is concerned, only one campaign has ever contacted me directly (and by phone, suprisingly) on behalf of the campaign and it was one of the Democrats’ campaigns. I won’t say which, I think Buffalo Pundit is jumping to politically convenient conclusions, especially since there’s clearly enough fighting going on in the Democratic primary.
Matt Margolis is co-author (with Mark Noonan) of Caucus of Corruption: The Truth About The New Democratic Majority. He also blogs at Blogs For Victory. Follow Matt on Twitter.
[...] Buffalo Bean received a tip that a charity founded by State Senate Candidate Baby Joe Mesi amounted to a “war kids [...]
[...] This isn’t a bold move as Robert Harding suggests. This is an absolutely necessary thing for Baby Joe to do. Underdogs in campaigns are known to “challenge” their opponent to debate, because they have nothing to lose from the exposure. Baby Joe may have won the Democratic primary, but Mike Ranzenhofer is extremely popular in the district, and has an actual record to run on. All Baby Joe has to run on is his boxing career… and a charity that increased awareness about organ donation as much as it increased the bank accounts of…. [...]