House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., endorsed incumbent Rep. Dan Donovan, R-N.Y., in the race for his Staten Island seat over former congressman and convicted felon Michael Grimm.
Ryan, when asked at a press conference if he thought it was appropriate for Grimm, convicted in 2014 of felony tax evasion, to seek his former seat, the speaker answered: "I support Dan Donovan, plain and simple," The Hill reports.
Donovan was one of only 20 in the GOP to vote against the House bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Grimm, who has the support of former White House strategist and current head of Breitbart News Steve Bannon, was first elected in 2010 as part of the tea party movement, before his conviction in 2014 for underreporting the income from a restaurant he owned and paying workers under the table. He was released from prison in May 2016 after serving an eight-month sentence. He announced his campaign for his old seat representing New York's 11th District last week.
Grimm told The Wall Street Journal in an interview released Wednesday that Bannon "shook my hand, looked in my eyes and said, 'I'm going to support you.' How exactly he decides to express that is his business."
When asked if President Donald Trump should speak with Bannon and ask him to stop supporting primary challengers, Ryan said: "It's a free country, people can do what they want to do. I think the best thing for the Republican Party is to stay unified and focus on our shared agenda. The best way for us to help people and advance our principles is that we stay unified and advance this agenda that we're working on, like tax reform."
Before his career in politics, Grimm served in the U.S. Marines and as an undercover FBI agent. Prior to his conviction for tax fraud, the former congressman gained national attention after threatening to throw a reporter off a Capitol Hill balcony for asking a question about an inquiry into Grimm's campaign finances.
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