Scathing Letter: GOP Leader Pushed Candidate ‘Over The Edge’ In Suicide

A prominent Missouri Republican this week called on the state’s GOP heavyweights to replace their party chairman, whom he accused of pushing gubernatorial candidate and state Auditor Tom Schweich (R) “over the edge” toward suicide.

The matter of whether Missouri Republican Party Chairman John Hancock keeps his job became a messy affair this week, as GOPers began to speak out about the alleged anti-Semitic “whisper campaign” Schweich had told people that Hancock was carrying out against him.

In a letter obtained by St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial page editor Tony Messenger and published Thursday, Republican stalwart Paul DeGregorio suggested Hancock had told people that Schweich was Jewish even though he knew the late auditor was a Christian.

“John Hancock had no business implying that Tom Schweich was Jewish, whether he knew it or not (and I believe John knew that Tom was a practicing Christian, no matter what he may say, for John has made millions the past decade or so to find out everything he can about candidates, especially those he is opposed to,” DeGregorio wrote in the letter noting Hancock’s experience as an opposition researcher.

Hancock, for the record, has acknowledged that he previously believed Schweich was Jewish and may have off-handedly told someone as much. But he’s strongly denied allegations of a whisper campaign.

DeGregorio has deep ties to Missouri’s former U.S. Sens. John Danforth, John Ashcroft and Kit Bond, and spent the latter half of his career in election administration. He acknowledged his own personal relationship with Hancock in the letter, from helping him run for state representative to having his daughter babysit Hancock’s children.

“I don’t like who John Hancock has become,” DeGregorio wrote. “To me, he now represents the worst of our political system. To me, his actions helped push Tom Schweich over the edge.”

He called on the addressees to replace Hancock with Danforth, who used his eulogy at Schweich’s funeral to deliver a scathing indictment of campaign politics and an implicit rebuke of Hancock’s denials of the alleged whisper campaign.