Dem Rep Gets $1M In Taxpayer Funding For Children’s Mental Health Asylum She Defended In Child Rape Case
The omnibus bill is full of taxpayer money going to the personal wants of elected members of Congress.
$1 million in taxpayer funding is in the bill for a KidsPeace, a children’s mental health asylum.
Dem Rep Susan Wild requested funding for KidsPeace earlier this year.
Wild had previously represented KidsPeace in a child rape lawsuit.
She argued that KidsPeace shouldn’t be on the hook for a settlement after a counselor raped a former patient.
That same counselor was charged earlier in the suffocation death of a patient.
Rep. Susan Wild (D., Pa.) is poised to secure $1 million in taxpayer funding for a children’s mental health asylum she defended in a molestation case.
The $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill has $1 million earmarked for renovations for KidsPeace, a Pennsylvania nonprofit Wild represented in a 2005 lawsuit filed by a former patient who was anally raped by a counselor. Wild, who requested funding for KidsPeace earlier this year, argued in the lawsuit that KidsPeace should not be on the hook for a settlement payout to the patient because the rape was a “medical incident” that should be covered by its insurance plan, the Washington Free Beacon reported. She said KidsPeace did not have a “crystal ball” to prevent the counselor’s “malfeasance,” though the counselor was charged years earlier in the suffocation death of a 12-year-old patient.
The earmark for KidsPeace is listed in the 4,155-page omnibus bill that senators are expected to approve this week. The bill includes $772.5 billion in non-defense discretionary spending on earmarks like the KidsPeace renovation. The bill includes tens of millions more on spending on other pet projects, including $477,000 in spending at Equity Labs for “antiracism virtual labs” and $3.6 million on the “Michelle Obama Trail” in Georgia.
Wild’s ties to KidsPeace came under scrutiny during her campaign, which she won by roughly 6,000 votes over Republican Lisa Scheller. A Republican group, citing the Free Beacon‘s reporting, detailed Wild’s advocacy for KidsPeace in a TV ad and asserted that “Wild is pushing for a million dollars in taxpayer money for the hospital, the same hospital that paid her.”
Why is this in the omnibus bill?
