This year’s Golden Dukes winners are following in the footsteps of some giants. So it’s only fitting that we take a moment to honor a few past victors.
But for these illustrious performers, life has gone on — even after their acceptance speeches were given, the klieg lights went down, and their names faded from the headlines. So below, we let you in on what these Golden Dukes legends are doing today…
Sara Taylor:
In 2007, Taylor, the former White House political director, emerged from a crowded field to win the “Best Testimonial Trainwreck” award for her testimony on the US. Attorney firings. “I took an oath to the president, and I take that oath very seriously,” she declared, prompting a surprised Sen. Pat Leahy (D-VT) to ask: “Did you mean, perhaps, you took an oath to the Constitution?”
Taylor’s star turn in front of Congress seems to have served her well. After leaving the White House that year, she founded a Washington-area communications firm, Blue Front Strategies. She’s appeared on Fox News and NPR as a “GOP strategist,” and is now advising Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty, a top 2012 Republican presidential hopeful.
Bradley Schlozman:
Schlozman, a former Bush DOJ official and interim U.S. attorney, took home the 2007 prize for “Outstanding Achievement In Improbable Forgetfulness,” for his masterful performance during testimony on his role in the U.S. attorney firings and the broader politicization of the Justice Department.
Since then, the Schloz has been laying low, handling employee-benefits cases at a Wichita, Kansas law firm. But he’s been dogged by his controversial tenure at DOJ. A department report released in January found that he had violated rules against politicized hiring, and had lied to Congress about it when questioned under oath. The U.S. attorney’s office announced it wouldn’t prosecute Schlozman, and in September the Justice Department upheld that decision.
Bob Allen
Allen dominated the 2007 “Best Scandal, Local Venue” contest with a bravura performance in which he brilliantly managed to leverage a humiliating sex scandal into accusations of racism as well. The Florida GOP state rep, and Sunshine state co-chair for the McCain campaign — who once co-sponsored a bill to crack down on “offenses involving unnatural and lascivious acts” — was convicted that year of soliciting sex from an undercover police officer in the bathroom of a public park. But the real moment of genius came when Allen explained the incident to police this way: “This was a pretty stocky black guy, and there was nothing but other black guys around in the park,” he said, adding that he was afraid of becoming “a statistic.” So as a diversionary tactic, Allen said, he offered the cop $20 for the privilege of fellating him. Hey, isn’t that what you’d do in that situation?
Allen said after his arrest that he still planned to run for the state Senate in 2010. “I’m waiting for the politics to say it’s OK to hug Bob Allen again — and they will,” he declared at the time. He didn’t respond to a request for comment, but his lawyer, Greg Eisenmenger told TPMmuckraker that Allen is now “self-employed” in the private sector, and has no plans to get back into politics.
Larry Craig
Craig, the former Idaho GOP senator, won top honors in 2007’s “Outstanding Achievement In Corruption-Based Chutzpah” category, after announcing his resignation in the wake of his own public bathroom gay sex sting, then reversing course to proclaim his innocence – just a “wide stance,” you see — and say in fact he’d soldier on.
Craig did ultimately step down after his term came to an end this January, and quickly founded a lobbying firm with offices in Idaho and Washington D.C., which is helping to fight global warming legislation, among other issues. The work seems to keep the former senator occupied. Addressing a group of cattle ranchers recently, he shared a line he said he had given his wife when she wondered why they were so busy in retirement: “I said ‘No, hon, we didn’t retire. People who retire die.”
Kwame Kilpatrick
The former Detroit mayor won last year’s “Best Scandal, Local Venue” award after pleading guilty to obstruction of justice and admitting he lied under oath, in part to conceal an extra-marital affair with a top aide. The subsequent release of steamy sexts (“can I get some sugar later?”) exchanged between Kilpatrick and the aide, Christine Beatty, added fuel to the fire.
Kilpatrick served 99 days in prison, which he called “incredibly purifying.” Upon his release, he boarded a private jet and flew to Texas, where he joined his family and began work as a salesman for a subsidiary of a Michigan company, Compuware. The ex-mayor’s lawyer has cited monthly expenses of $2700 in rent and $900 to lease a Cadillac Escalade, in explaining why Kilpatrick can’t afford to pay the $1 million-a-month restitution he owes the city of Detroit. “I don’t think he was ordered to live a more modest lifestyle,” said the lawyer, Michael Alan Schwartz. “Is it better Mr. Kilpatrick drives a beat-up Yugo?”
