Brent Wilkes

The Washington Post today has a pretty good profile on Brent Wilkes, the man implicated in convicted Rep. Duke Cunningham (R-CA). It looks like that as Wilkes influence with other republicans increased, he needed Cunningham less and less, which caused Cunningham to start demanding money, rather than just accepting it. From the Post:

Business was so good for Wilkes that he allegedly gave Cunningham $100,000 in 2000, according to the former congressman's recent plea agreement. And the following year he expanded his business by setting up his own lobbying firm, Group W Advisors, in the Washington suburbs, to pursue earmarks.

He became an active supporter of leading House Republicans and began flying Cunningham and several others around on a corporate jet. As he cultivated new political friends, he became less dependent on Cunningham to win him earmarks.

[snip]

In a court filing Friday, prosecutors in the Cunningham case said that in May 2004 the congressman demanded that Wilkes give $525,000 to pay off a second mortgage on Cunningham's new home in Rancho Santa Fe. Wilkes agreed, the document said, on the condition he receive an additional $6 million in government funding, which he did through a Pentagon subcontract.

So, once he didn't need Cunningham, who was benefiting from Wilkes largess? Tom Delay, Roy Blunt, and John Doolittle received most of Wilkes' campaign donations. Doolittle received $85,000 in campaign cash for which Wilkes received $37 million worth of earmarks. Seems like a pretty straight forward pay to play to me.

Look for more indictments to come from this investigation.