Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (Mich.), a passionate defender of her scandal-plagued son, Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, now has to defend herself against two formidable Democratic primary opponents.
State Sen. Martha Scott and former state Rep. Mary Waters are challenging the Congressional Black Caucus chairwoman in the Aug. 5 primary. And while Scott might have the higher name identification because of her office, Waters is making waves with a potent ad that attacks the Congresswoman over the mayor’s scandal and uses her own words against her.
In connection with his alleged affair with his former chief of staff — and his attempts to cover it up in a whistle-blower trial — Mayor Kilpatrick has been charged with eight felony counts that could add up to decades in jail.
Through this and other controversies the mayor has weathered over his six years in office, Rep. Kilpatrick has defended her son.
But it is her spirited defense of the mayor during the kickoff of his 2005 re-election campaign that is particularly well-known among Detroit voters and political insiders.
“He didn’t just get up in here by just coming,” the Congresswoman yelled at the campaign rally — a speech that has been disseminated on YouTube and political Web sites. “Y’all sent him up in here. Don’t let nobody talk about yaw’s boy. Too many people died for us. We’re here to fight. That’s what I’m talking about.”
Waters’ TV spot quotes the Congresswoman at her son’s 2005 rally, while naming all eight felony counts alleged against her son and showing his mugshot.
“Sorry Congresswoman, but we deserve much better than ‘yaw’s boy,’” an announcer says in the ad.
The felony counts against Mayor Kilpatrick stem from a 2007 whistle-blower trial in which a jury ruled that former police officer Gary Brown and the mayor’s former bodyguard, Harold Nelthrope, were dismissed unfairly after investigating the mayor’s administration. Not only did the city have to spend $8.4 million on the trial, but a January news report unearthed a series of text messages that showed evidence contrary to the mayor’s testimony and revealed that he had been in a personal relationship with his chief of staff.
The situation is ironically similar to the way Kilpatrick took her Congressional seat in 1996. She defeated then-Rep. Barbara-Rose Collins, 52 percent to 31 percent, in a seven-way Democratic primary.
Collins was under investigation by the House ethics committee at the time, but she also had family problems: Her son served jail time for armed robbery during her first years in Congress.
Michigan pollster Steve Mitchell, who did work for Mayor Kilpatrick earlier in his tenure, said he thought Waters’ ad might backfire given the composition of the district. The 13th district is an urban area and the majority of the voters are women, a high percentage of whom are older than 50.
“It’s still a mother defending her son,” Mitchell said. “And I’m not sure strategically ... to attack a mother for defending her son is a smart political move with a constituency [that is] very heavily mothers who have sons who have gotten into trouble.”
However, Waters said she thinks Rep. Kilpatrick’s actions are fair game for the ad.
Rep. Kilpatrick’s campaign did not return calls for comment.
Lois Lerner, director of exempt organizations for the IRS, arrives for a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on the investigation of the IRS' targeting of political groups. Lerner invoked her Fifth Amendment right to not testify and caused a protest from some committee members when she offered an opening statement and engaged in dialogue with members before invoking the right.
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