I’ve written about my current useless House representative, Riley Moore. But before Riley nepo-babied his way to DC, I was represented by a lump of shit who answered to the name Alex Mooney. Mooney was possibly the laziest and least effective member of any legislative body.
Alex didn’t actually move to West Virginia until after he won his seat—see, he’s actually from Maryland, but he couldn’t get elected there, so like the WV’s current loser governor Patrick Morissey, he carpet-bagged his way into an out-of-state seat for personal gain. He sat on one committee, the House Committee on Financial Services, and over a House tenure of 10 years he sponsored exactly one bill, the Supporting Transparent Regulatory and Environmental Actions in Mining Act, which passed the House and then died.
Yes, you read that right: he served 10 years in the House, he sponsored 1 bill, in 2015, and then he spent his time committing ethics violations:
Rep. Alex X. Mooney and his family vacationed at a Ritz-Carlton resort in Aruba mostly on the dime of HSP Direct LLC — a company to which the lawmaker has significant personal ties — likely constituting an impermissible gift under House rules, according to an Office of Congressional Ethics report.
Mooney also likely violated federal law by enlisting congressional staff to plan that trip on official time and using official resources, OCE said.
The nonpartisan office’s report on its examination of the West Virginia Republican, which was released Monday, says Mooney and his family enjoyed that Aruba vacation on HSP Direct’s tab to the tune of over $10,800 for travel, lodging, meals, amenities, entertainment and activities.
It details findings from the OCE’s second inquiry into Mooney’s conduct. The first ethics inquiry into Mooney concerned his campaign spending. The House Ethics Committee, which received both of those reports from the OCE, also is investigating Mooney.
The second report offers a sprawling array of evidence that OCE says establishes Mooney, his family and staff used a house associated with HSP Direct on Capitol Hill at no cost for lodging, as a workspace and to host events. Further, Mooney regularly diverted official resources and staff time from his constituents and official duties in favor of his and his family’s personal needs, and sometimes for campaign activities, according to the report.
The OCE also said it is “likely” Mooney impeded the first OCE investigation into him by providing false testimony and withholding evidence.
And he ate a bunch of fast food on the taxpayer dime, and either lied or was too stupid to know it violated ethics rules:
An excerpt in the report from Mooney’s interview with OCE investigators illustrates how he spent campaign money on meals.
OCE: When do you charge the campaign for a meal?
Rep. Mooney: Generally when I’m visiting with constituents.
OCE: Okay. So for — when you say visiting with constituents, what do you mean? Do you mean a planned meeting?
Rep. Mooney: Not necessarily, no, as I described earlier a lot of site visits I do, I just walk in and say “hi.”
…
OCE: So if you — let’s say you go to Chick-Fil-A and you charge that to the campaign, the justification for that, being that there are constituents at the Chick-Fil-A that you spoke to?
Rep. Mooney: Yes. Yeah, I was meeting with constituents.
The OCE noted that although some of these fast food purchases could have been related to a campaign purpose — and thus, allowable — Mooney’s “clear conviction that individual day-to-day meals can be paid for by the campaign indicate that a large portion fall within the prohibited category.”
The GOP House let him off the hook before his term ended so he got away with it.
And then he spent the end of his lame duck term traveling across the state on boondoggles to accept participation trophies:
So I was very surprised when I read Judd Legums Popular Information newsletter on Tuesday:
On January 3, 2025, Congressman Alex Mooney (R-WV) ended his tenure in Congress after representing the Mountain State for a decade. On February 27, Mooney participated in a webinar with the Christian Employers Alliance (CEA), a business group “whose policy positions are prayerfully established directly by its members, grounded in faith and guided by Scripture.”
In a recording of the webinar obtained by Popular Information and Source Code, CEA President Margaret Iuculano said that Mooney had joined the lobbying firm Capitol South. According to Iuculano, Mooney and Capitol South founder Marty Irby would soon be “lobbyists representing Christian Employers Alliance on the Hill as we finalize our legislative agenda.”
One issue with the narrative presented by Iuculano is that federal law prohibits a former member of the House of Representatives from lobbying Congress, directly or indirectly, for one year. Violators may be subject to up to one year of incarceration and a fine of up to $50,000.
I’m not surprised Alex is breaking the law—he’s never respected it, as his history shows. But I am surprised anyone hired him for his expertise in agriculture, because he doesn’t have any. But he seems a perfect fit for Capitol South because they don’t seem to do much, either. Their press release page hasn’t been updated in 7 months, and their Facebook page hasn’t been touched since April 2024.
It makes me wonder what else is going on.
It also makes me wish there were fewer unqualified weirdos running for office in West Virginia. I’ll leave you with this: