Ronny Jackson and Wesley Hunt are under investigation for membership in a private club over campaign ethics issues – Houston Public Media

WASHINGTON — U.S. Reps. Ronny Jackson (R-Amarillo) and Wesley Hunt (R-Houston) are under investigation for using campaign funds to pay for memberships in private clubs, a possible violation of campaign finance rules, according to reports released Monday by congressional investigators.

Jackson spent nearly $12,000 on memberships at the posh Amarillo Club since 2020, and Hunt spent over $74,000 at the Post Oak Hotel between April 2022 and January 2024, including membership fees for its exclusive Oak Room club, according to reports. Federal campaign finance rules allow campaign funds for certain events at private clubs, but typically not for memberships or unlimited access.

The Office of Congressional Ethics approved the reports in March and sent them to the House Ethics Committee for investigation. The OCE is made up of bipartisan professional staff who recommend ethics investigations to the House Ethics Committee. The committee is made up of five Republican and five Democratic members of Congress and can recommend sanctions for the full House to vote on. Democratic U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar of Texas is the only Texan on the committee.

The House Ethics Committee announced separate investigations into Jackson and Hunt in May, but details of the allegations did not become known until Monday, when the committee released the OCE reports as part of a procedural requirement to expand its investigations.

Jackson said in his written response to the OCE investigation that he had not violated any ethics rules. Hunt provided documents related to his Oak Room spending, but they were heavily redacted, according to the OCE. He declined an interview with the office, but his lawyers said he had done nothing wrong.

The OCE and the Ethics Committee launched a nearly identical investigation in 2022 into Jackson’s use of campaign funds to pay membership dues for the Amarillo Club. The Ethics Committee never released its findings on that investigation – a sign that Jackson apparently took to continue using campaign funds for the club.

In a 2022 email to the Ethics Committee, Jackson’s lawyers said club membership included event space for fundraising that cost less than the cost of renting meeting space individually. His lawyers said Jackson and his wife never personally benefited from club membership.

“This baseless complaint from the OCE brings to light no new information and is still under investigation despite more than two years of investigation by the Ethics Committee,” a spokesperson for Jackson said in a statement when the Ethics Committee announced the investigation earlier this year. “Once again, Congressman Jackson has nothing to hide and he and his team have fully complied with the Ethics Committee’s instructions from the beginning. This is unfortunately not the first time that the leftists at the OCE have decided to waste taxpayer money to prosecute public officials for absolutely nothing.”

The spokesman referred to the May statement for comment on the OCE reports released on Monday.

The OCE report states that the Amarillo Club refused to disclose information that could confirm that Jackson used the club exclusively for campaign purposes.

The Amarillo Club offers fine dining, wine tastings, views of West Texas and a private gym. It also offers partnerships with other exclusive clubs across the country, including the Capitol Hill Club in Washington. The Capitol Hill Club is a popular hangout for Republicans and hosted a meeting with President Donald Trump and Republicans in the House of Representatives earlier this month.

Hunt’s expenses include membership fees and other expenses at the Post Oak Hotel, which houses the exclusive Oak Room club. His campaign finance disclosures show that he spent $2,706.25 at the club in 2022 for “membership.” In another disclosure a year later, an expense for the club of exactly the same amount was reported as “food/beverage.”

Hunt’s lawyers point to an earlier Federal Election Commission opinion that said membership fees for social clubs could be permissible if they were solely for campaign-related activities and not for lifestyle changes, such as at a sports or country club. Unlike the Amarillo Club, the Oak Room has no sports facilities and is primarily a meeting and dining room. The expenses cited in the OCE report were for Hunt’s campaign party, his lawyers said.

“Consistent with the stated purpose of the Oak Room, the Congressman has used his membership in the Post Oak Club exclusively for meetings in the Oak Room with campaign donors, supporters, consultants and vendors,” Hunt’s lawyers said in a letter to OCE. “We have provided OCE with numerous emails, text messages and calendar entries that demonstrate the Congressman’s use of the Oak Room and the hotel’s other facilities for such purposes.”

The more intimate Oak Room is frequented by Houston celebrities and has a strict camera ban. According to The Houston Chronicle, Peyton Manning, Jon Bon Jovi and Kendall Jenner have hosted events there.

Hunt and Jackson are not the only Texas lawmakers being investigated by the committee. Republican Rep. Troy Nehls of Richmond is also under investigation after his campaign paid more than $25,000 in rent to a company registered in his name. Nehls’s attorney said the company was connected to the campaign and the expenditures were legitimate.

US Representative Henry Cuellar is also being investigated by the committee for allegedly accepting bribes, working as a foreign agent and money laundering. The committee’s investigation follows his indictment in federal court in Houston on the same charges. Cuellar is due to go on trial next year.

Jackson was also investigated by the Department of Defense’s inspector general over allegations of inappropriate conduct while serving as White House physician. The inspector general found in a 2021 report that he bullied subordinates and made sexually inappropriate comments while in office. The Navy subsequently demoted him from admiral to captain.

Jackson was White House physician to Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump. He dismissed the inspector general’s report as retaliation for his support of Trump.

“There is no nice or polite way to say this: It is a completely fucked-up political assassination,” Jackson wrote in his 2022 memoir, “Holding the Line.”

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