Former Congressman JD Hayworth is reportedly considering a primary challenge to John McCain. In explaining his rationale recently, he made a serious allegation about McCain’s loyalty to party:
Hayworth charged that in 2005 Salter tried to “blackmail” him into stopping his public criticism of McCain’s comprehensive immigration-reform bill. Hayworth said his chief of staff got an e-mail from Salter indicating that McCain might retaliate by commenting in the media about Hayworth’s links to the then-unfolding Jack Abramoff lobbyist corruption scandal.
Hayworth further suggested that Salter was responsible for planting false information in the Washington Times that said Hayworth was the “target” of an Abramoff-related Justice Department investigation. The Abramoff scandal helped Democrat Harry Mitchell upset Hayworth in 2006.
