🍻 In This Week's Hill Spill Newsletter: Nancy Mace’s Living-With-Staff Ban Hits a Few Awkward Details, a Maine Nominee’s Decades-Old Report Surfaces and Lawler & Lis Smith Turn an X Spat Into Bloodsport

🍹 Welcome to this week’s Hill Spill — it’s Thursday, so you know what that means! The tea is piping hot and we’re pouring it out!

This week we’ve got Nancy Mace trying to ban living with staff while former aides raise an eyebrow about her own basement “crash pad,” a Maine Senate nominee whose decades-old police report is suddenly in the mix, Wisconsin’s youngest GOP candidate dealing with some very awkward old Venmo memos and a Hudson Valley Twitter feud between Mike Lawler and Lis Smith that got personal fast. There is a lot to cover, so grab a drink and let’s get into it! 🍸

SCOOP: Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) has a new rule she’d like to impose on her colleagues — don’t live with your staff. Former Mace aides had one question: where, exactly, is she drawing the line?

Last month, Mace introduced a pair of resolutions — one barring House members from sexual relationships with their employees, the other from living with them, married couples excepted. The pitch was tidy: “a boss and a roommate should never be the same person,” she said, adding that “no staffer should ever be coming home at night to the person who signs their paycheck.”

The resolutions came amid reports of improper sexual relationships between members and staffers — including those involving Reps. Eric Swalwell, Tony Gonzales, and Chuck Edwards — and questions raised over living arrangements with staff, including reports that Rep. Abe Hamadeh (R-Ariz.) had lived with a senior staffer at his Capitol Hill residence.

Fair enough. But several people who worked for Mace say her own history makes that line harder to draw than her bill lets on.

Multiple former staffers tell us that during Mace’s first campaign, a senior campaign aide lived in an apartment above the garage at her home on Daniel Island.

Then there’s Washington... In the spring of 2022, a second former staffer — a senior aide at the time — was flying up to D.C. from the district each week and, rather than expensing a hotel, was put up at Mace’s townhouse. “Rather than spend money on the hotel, they basically forced me to stay at her place,” the former aide told us. Mace, the aide said, “wanted me in the district when she was in the district and then in DC when she was in DC” — so they crashed in the basement.

By the aide’s telling, it was close quarters. “There was a curtain, there wasn’t even a door, which was really weird,” they said. Three people close to the office corroborated their account. The coffee maker was down there too, so most mornings the congresswoman would come make coffee a few feet from where the aide had slept, the two of them separated by that same curtain. “The workday would start for me at like 6:30 when I would hear the coffee maker going off,” the aide said. “It’s like, oh, shit, that’s my boss.”

“It was way too much contact with the boss for a work week,” the aide said.

To get out of the house when they weren’t put up at a hotel, the aide said, they briefly crashed with another staffer while hunting for a permanent place after moving up from the district.

Mace’s office rejects the premise. In a statement, a spokesperson for the Office of Congresswoman Nancy Mace said: “The suggestion that Rep. Mace lived with her staff, directed her employees to stay at her home, or maintained a ‘crash pad’ for federal employees is false. Rep. Mace did not and has never lived with her staff, and her home was never a crash pad for federal employees. Official travel and lodging records are maintained in accordance with applicable reporting requirements. Publicly available records include multiple examples of the office paying for hotel lodging for staff travel to Washington, D.C.”

One source pushed back on the curtain account, arguing it was a separate private space in an English-basement set up and that the 2019 campaign stay was a brief arrangement for an aide who needed a place since they had previously lived out of state.

And a proponent of the Mace bill made the case that there is a sharp distinction between allowing a staffer to stay in a pinch versus living with a staffer and partaking in predatory behavior that creates improper power dynamics — and that the bill was written to target the latter, not last-minute platonic stays in a separate residence.

Mace wants a clear rule against living with staff. Whether her own basement would have cleared it may come down to whether you remember a door or a curtain. ̄\_(ツ)_/ ̄

Is vetting just no longer a thing? We mean this sincerely, on both sides of the aisle, given some of the things that have emerged early this election cycle across the country.

Maine had a candidate in Graham Platner who suspended his campaign amid a rape allegation. They somehow replaced him with a candidate who was openly banging his second cousin and now faces allegations of a past violent outburst. We are not endorsing anyone here — we are a nonpartisan news outlet and have no dog in this fight — but we are confused about how that happened. “I mean, where the f*** do they keep finding these appalling men,” one GOP operative told us.

The latest comes from the Bangor Daily News, first flagged by News Center Maine, which obtained a 1988 Fort Kent police report alleging Jackson pushed his then-partner Lana Pelletier nearly 40 years ago, when he was 19.

According to the police report, Jackson showed up at a man’s home just before 2 a.m. on March 12, 1988, forced his way inside and got into a physical altercation that left the man’s face cut. The report also documented Pelletier telling an officer that Jackson had “pushed her around” during the same incident. The matter was resolved with a $50 misdemeanor assault agreement. Jackson does not have a criminal record.

Jackson, now 58, acknowledged the fight but denied any violence toward Pelletier. “Nearly forty years ago, when I was 19-years-old, I got into a fight with another man. I took responsibility for it then, and I take responsibility for it now,” he said. “But let me be clear: I have never been violent with my partner, Lana, or any other woman.”

Pelletier backed him up, saying she does not recall making the statements attributed to her in the police report and calling them inaccurate.

“Troy and I have built a life and family together, and I know the person he has been through the decades since, both as a caring partner and father,” she told the publication.

We will note that some sources we spoke to pointed out that people change, and that behavior as a teenager should not necessarily define someone decades later. That is a fair point. Jackson was 19 at the time, paid a $50 fine and has no criminal record. His backers are already calling the decades-old report a non-issue that will not factor into the race.

Republicans are, however, feeling increasingly optimistic.

Jackson was nominated July 25 to replace Platner as the Democratic Senate nominee. He will face Republican Sen. Susan Collins on the November ballot as she pursues a sixth term.

This week we’re joined by Ally Sammarco — former Republican turned Democrat, author of Common Sense with Ally Sammarco and a prominent political voice on social media — who suddenly found herself thrust into the very news cycle she usually analyzes.

We dive into what most would think should be common sense (spoiler: no woman wants unsolicited d*** pics, especially from an elected official) before Ally breaks down how reaching out to Rep. Eric Swalwell at 24 for career advice escalated from Twitter to texts to Snapchat, and ultimately, an unsolicited explicit photo. Swalwell denies the allegations.

But the story goes way beyond her experience with one congressman. Ally opens up about her journey leaving the GOP, how similar misconduct allegations are playing out across the aisle in races involving figures like Chuck Edwards and Cory Mills.

Plus, we break down D.C. whisper networks, the glaring absence of HR on Capitol Hill and her advocacy work with Reckoning Action to stop candidates from using campaign funds to silence accusers. Grab a drink and tune in!

Old Venmo receipts with some eyebrow-raising descriptions are resurfacing following 26-year-old Michael Alfonso's recent win in the Wisconsin Republican primary, as Democrats eye what has traditionally been a safe GOP seat.

Alfonso — the son-in-law of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Fox News host Rachel Campos-Duffy — won the GOP nomination for Wisconsin's 7th Congressional District after emerging from a crowded five-way primary field. He is set to face Democratic nominee and former state representative Fred Clark in November. If elected, Alfonso would become the youngest member currently serving in the House of Representatives.

While Alfonso has anchored his campaign around strong traditional Catholic values, two Venmo payments from 2018 with the description "The strippers" and a 2020 payment labeled "High supplies" have made their way into the campaign narrative. Alfonso was an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin–Madison at the time the transactions occurred.

A spokesperson for Alfonso's team downplayed the paper trail, stating the payments were simply a joke between college friends, that the combined total was under $30, and that the descriptions are the kind of humor that fails to translate out of context.

Unearthing old Venmo feeds is becoming an increasingly familiar headache for modern candidates — most notably former Rep. Matt Gaetz, whose public Venmo memos triggered major scrutiny during a House Ethics investigation. But for Alfonso, Democrats aren't passing up the opportunity to highlight the contrast.

"Michael Alfonso is an unemployed nepo baby, but turns out he's also an idiot," one Democratic operative said. "I'm surprised daddy-in-law didn't advise him to make his accounts private, but Sean Duffy isn't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed either."

While $30 inside jokes among college kids don't necessarily indicate a wild night out, they pose an awkward timing challenge for a candidate framing his platform around traditional morality, leaving voters to decide whether undergraduate Venmo humor is a non-issue or a test of candidate maturity.

Written by Elisabeth Carroll.

Things up in the Hudson Valley just got very messy!

Here over at Sources Say, we enjoy watching other people’s drama like a spectator sport, so naturally we love a good Twitter feud, and today did not let us down!

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.), fighting to retain one of the most competitive House seats in the country, spent Thursday locked in a spirited online brawl with Democratic strategist Lis Smith after she slammed him over $10,000 in donations he received from embattled Ohio Rep. Max Miller.

Miller is facing abuse allegations from his ex-wife, sparking calls for his resignation from a number of senators. Miller vehemently denies wrongdoing. Lawler has declined to give the money back, saying the claims haven’t been proven in court.

Smith, who has been aggressively backing Lawler’s Democratic challenger Cait Conley, was not having it.

She called Lawler “a weak, weak man” then went after his past, bringing up the time he flew to Michael Jackson’s trial as a teenager and got kicked out for muttering in Jackson’s defense during testimony, and later wore blackface as Jackson for a college Halloween party. Lawler has previously owned the college Halloween costume as a dumb teenage decision and noted the Jackson trial trip was more than two decades ago. (Lawler and I previously discussed this phase when he came on the pod, which you can catch here!)

Lawler opted to clap back by taking aim at Smith over her ex — former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer who is no stranger to scandal — arguing she was being hypocritical and has no ground to stand on.

“You literally dated a man who trafficked young women for the purpose of sexually abusing them and he admitted to it,” Lawler posted, referring to her relationship with former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer. “Sit this one out.”

Smith shot back that it was “creepy” for him to dredge up a relationship from more than a decade ago and asked how he felt about Miller allegedly posting nude photos of his daughter.

She later added: “So you’re saying you’re ok w/cashing a check from a guy who allegedly posted naked photos of his child, broke her collarbone, and held a gun to her mom’s head? Your constituents are gonna love that. Hope the $10k was worth it!”

Lawler kept swinging, accusing her of hypocrisy for working for Spitzer and Cuomo and later returned to the Mann Act line.

His campaign account also jumped in, posting: “Correct, Cait Conley kept money from a serial sexual abuser, who trafficked young women across state lines for the purpose of prostitution. Disgusting that you all are ok with that.”

For those who need the refresher: Spitzer resigned in disgrace in 2008 after being outed as “Client 9” of the Emperors Club VIP, a high-end prostitution ring. He arranged for women to cross state lines for paid sex (potential Mann Act territory), though federal prosecutors ultimately decided not to charge him. Smith worked on his failed 2013 comeback campaign and dated him from 2013 to 2015 while he was still married. The relationship cost her a job in the de Blasio administration when the tabloids found out.

Republicans have been quick to argue that Smith has zero standing to lecture anyone about sexual misconduct.

Smith told us that “Mike Lawler spent his day crashing out on the Internet defending a guy who allegedly abused his wife and young daughter. He’s a loser and Cait Conley is going to crush him in November.”

Lawler has said he will not return donations based on unproven allegations, a stance several members of both parties have taken in similar situations.

The district, NY-17, is a classic swing seat that flipped in 2022 and remains a top target for Dems. Should be a spicy race to watch.

The internet has been on a journey this week. Reports say AOC and her longtime fiancé Riley Roberts quietly split and called off their engagement — reportedly about two years ago. Neither AOC nor her office has confirmed it, so file this one under "reportedly" and keep your torches down. But that hasn't stopped social media from doing what it does best: launching a full-blown investigation. Turns out the pair hadn't been photographed together since the 2021 Met Gala (shoutout to TMZ for catching that detail), and the sleuths have Notes.

So in honor of the redheaded web developer who managed to dodge the D.C. spotlight, we’re pouring a Ginger Paloma this week. I have to tip my hat to anyone who can sit on a breakup for two years — I complain to literally anyone who will listen the second things go sideways. Here's to keeping your personal life personal, even when the entire internet is trying to crack the case.

That's the last pour for this week! Next week we're keeping an eye on some of the wild Florida primaries, from the beach, naturally. Keep an eye out. 🏖️🍹

In our very limited free time, we're re-reading a book we haven't touched since high school — The Last of the Mohicans — fully unassisted, no AI! We love reading entire books! IYKYK.

Until next week, y'all! 🥂