Grimm pleads guilty; Dems call for resignation
Rep. Michael Grimm, R-N.Y., pleaded guilty Tuesday to one count of tax evasion, prompting new calls for his resignation.
Grimm, who won re-election this year despite a pending 20-count criminal indictment, faces a maximum of three years in prison. Sentencing is scheduled for June 8.
The former FBI agent and Marine was initially charged with failing to report more than $1 million in restaurant sales and wages as a former owner of a Manhattan fast-food business.
Grimm's plea prompted Democrats to press Republican leaders for the congressman's ouster.
"It's past time for Michael Grimm to go and it's (Republican House Speaker) John Boehner's responsibility to make it happen,'' said Josh Schwerin, a spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. "Speaker Boehner and Republican leaders' continued complicity in letting Michael Grimm stay in Congress despite his guilt of felony tax evasion is a disservice to the people of Staten Island and Brooklyn and a stain on the institution of the United States House of Representatives.''
Grimm easily defeated Domenic Recchia, a former New York City council member, in November to win a third term despite the criminal charges.
The congressman stepped down from the House Financial Services Committee while his legal case ran its course. The House Ethics Committee launched its own investigation of Grimm, who was first elected in 2010, but suspended its proceedings while the Justice Department conducted its investigation.
Grimm has long maintained his innocence. But in an interview with Geraldo Rivera on WABC radio in October, he conceded that he had thought about what would happen if he had to give up his House seat. "If things don't go my way, and I had to step down in January, then there will be a special election," Grimm said in that interview. "At least the people of Staten Island and Brooklyn would have qualified people to choose from."
The 114th Congress is sworn into office on Jan. 6.
Grimm is often remembered for threatening to throw a TV journalist off a balcony for trying to ask him about the Justice Department probe following President Obama's State of the Union Address in January. Grimm had also threatened to withhold his vote for Speaker Boehner during maneuvering last year for federal aid to Hurricane Sandy victims.