Scott Kubly and Hillary Clinton’s ‘shockingly’ similar email problems

One controversy took place in Washington state, the other in Washington D.C., but KIRO Radio’s Dori Monson sees “shocking” similarities between the faces of two major scandals unfolding on both sides of the country.

“Has anybody noticed the similarities between the Seattle Director of Transportation and Hillary Clinton?” Dori asked. “Sleazy actions getting excused; absolutely no repercussions.”

Related: Kubly shows up late for ethics meeting to discuss his violations, fine

Clinton faces the aftermath of the FBI’s investigation into the emails she sent from a private email setup while serving as Secretary of State. SDOT Director Scott Kubly will pay a $5,000 fine for an ethics violation related to his relationship with Motivate, the company that operates Seattle’s bike share Pronto! Kubly says he inadvertently emailed a conflict of interest statement to himself rather than through the proper channels. Kubly then lead the charge to have the city purchase the bike share that has a contract with Motivate.

“Nothing is his fault, everything is just an email gaffe,” Dori said. “He made mistakes, he didn’t understand the system. Lies to the taxpaying public. It’s shockingly similar (to Hillary Clinton).”

Dori describes Kubly’s violation as “illegally funneling” $160,000 from the taxpayers to his former employer. Dori alleges that Kubly will have a lucrative private sector job in the bike-share industry waiting for him once his days in the public sector are through. That’s why he’s been funneling them the taxpayer dollars, Dori argues.

“Unbelievably, in all the documents that are out today, the head of the ethics commission say, ‘Well he didn’t have any financial ties to that company,’” Dori said. “But of course it has always been my contention that he wasn’t doing this because of past ties, but because of future benefits.”

A settlement agreement between Kubly and the city had suggested a fine of $10,000. The ethics commission suspended $5,000 as long as Kubly doesn’t violate any more ethics codes within two years.

Kubly apologized for the “distraction” and said he hopes to refocus the public’s attention on the work SDOT is doing to help with transportation needs.

Dori believes Kubly’s “mistake” was either incompetence or that he is covering up for not submitting the conflict of interest form. And that, Dori says, reflects badly on the department he runs.

“If you have sleazy or incompetent people running a department, inevitably, those qualities trickle down to the entire department,” he said. “If you have excellence at the top, you have a good chance of an organization being excellent. So it does reflect on the department of transportation. It reflects on Mayor Ed Murray, who hired this guy to run the department.”

The biggest similarity between the two, Dori says, is the worst of all.

“He gets off Scott-free. Just like Hillary,” he said. “Zero repercussions for lying to the people, lying to the taxpayers.”

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