Consultant: Kilpatrick lied in 2005 by disavowing campaign attack ad
3:08 PM, January 19, 2012
A new story has emerged about fibbing by former Detroit Kwame Kilpatrick, a convicted liar.
The latest is from the mouth of veteran Detroit political consultant Adolph Mongo, who admitted to WDIV-TV’s Kevin Dietz that, back in 2005, the Kilpatrick Civic Fund paid for a very controversial newspaper advertisement some credited with helping Kilpatrick win re-election.
This despite Kilpatrick’s statements at the time that he had nothing to do with it.
The full-page ad, which ran in the Michigan Chronicle, proclaimed that Kilpatrick was the victim of a “media lynching” in Detroit, and prominently featured an historic photo of an actual lynching. No one could be found who would claim credit for launching the attack ad.
But now Mongo, while admitting the advertisement was over the top, has told Dietz he created the ad to help Kilpatrick’s 11th-hour comeback bid against Freman Hendrix.
Mongo said he already has testified about the ad to a federal grand jury that has charged Kilpatrick and others with multiple counts of racketeering, bid-rigging and conspiracy. Grand jurors wanted to know whether Kilpatrick’s nonprofit civic fund, which was supposed to benefit children in Detroit, paid for that ad.
Back in 2005, Kilpatrick issued a public statement, saying his campaign had nothing to do with it. “Detroiters are very passionate people, and while I appreciate the spirit of some of the content, I do not condone the images in this advertisement,” his statement said.
But Mongo told Dietz, in a story that aired Wednesday, that not only did Kilpatrick OK the ad, he financed production of it with money from his civic fund.
Contact Jim Schaefer at 313-223-4542 or jschaefer@freepress.com.
