The indictment of seven Philadelphia labor officials, including power broker John Dougherty, has Pennsylvania Democrats worried about the near future of the Philadelphia political machine and its outsized impact in the Keystone State. (The Daily Caller)
John Dougherty, the business manager of Philadelphia’s branch of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), and six other labor officials were indicted on 116 charges related to lavish misuse of union funds and buying influence with corrupt politicians, Philadelphia’s The Inquirer and CBS Philly report.
The 159-page indictment was released by the federal court in Pennsylvania Friday. It details more than two years of FBI and IRS operations and raids launched against IBEW Local 98 offices, union officials and their homes.
Dougherty used union funds as his “personal bank account and as a means to obtain employment for himself, his family, and his friends,” the indictment says, according to The Inquirer.
“I got a different world than most people ever exist in,” Dougherty says according to the transcript of a 2015 FBI wiretap put in the indictment.
Pennsylvania Democrats fear to lose Dougherty, and his uncanny ability to mobilize voter turnout in the state’s most liberal precincts would diminish their chances at winning the critical state back in 2020.
AAN Staff
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