Bilbray Under Investigation by Grand Jury

Maybe this is why Republican lobbyist, turned carpetbagger, turned member of congress; Brian Bilbray (CA-50) is hiding out from his constituents in the North County. According to this Bilbray is the subject of a grand jury investigation into allegations of perjury and voter fraud relative to his place of residence. Please remember that Bilbray never lived in the 50th district and only claimed residence here after the initial story about Randy "Duke" Cunningham's real estate deals broke.

The San Diego Democratic Party requested an investigation of Bilbray's multiple and conflicting residency claims and it appears that that investigation has reached the level where evidence of potential wrong doing is being presented to a grand jury. Here is the essence of the complaint against Bilbray:

Our original letter to the San Diego District Attorney (5/17/06) refers to Bilbray's signed voter registration -- days after the Cunningham story broke -- declaring a Carlsbad address to be his "residence and domicile" under penalty of perjury (6/21/05).

Less than two months after re-registering, he signed a new deed of trust for his home in Alexandria, Virginia (8/25/05). He did not indicate that the home was anything other than his "principal residence," which the deed would have explicitly forbidden.

In December of 2005, Bilbray's children testified under oath that they lived in Virginia with their father. The context was a lawsuit in which Bilbray claimed his children were out-of-state residents who deserved to pay the same tuition as undocumented immigrants who lived in-state. A few months later, he signed a formal declaration of candidacy to run for Congress (2/23/06), citing his mother's house on Unicornio Street in Carlsbad as his residence.

Throughout this entire period, he was receiving a homeowner's tax exemption on his property in South County's Imperial Beach, where neighbors had spotted him in the community ever since he began to run for the North County seat.

If Bilbray is the subject of a fraud investigation, he certainly doesn't want to have to answer that question in a public forum. That explains why he is avoiding debates and public appearances.

Once again Republicans in the 50th district have decide to allow themselves to be represented by a man to whom the truth is a complete stranger. At some point you would think that they would get tired of having their congressional representative under threat of indictment.