Gingrich group withdraws invite to adult entertainment exec
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/images/09/30/art.gingrich.gi.jpg caption="Gingrich group withdraws invite to adult entertainment exec."]
(CNN) - For the second time this month, Newt Gingrich's 527 has decided that it made a mistake inviting an adult entertainment industry entrepreneur to attend a "private dinner" with the former House Speaker.
Dawn Rizos, owner of Dallas topless club The Lodge, received a letter earlier this month from Gingrich's American Solutions inviting her to dine with Gingrich at a Capitol Hill club next week. She was also told she had been selected to receive an Entrepreneur of the Year Award. "Dawn - Newt is looking forward to finally meeting you face to face" to talk policy, read a handwritten note on the missive.
Lodge spokesman Michael Precker says they were told the group would need $5,000 to confirm her attendance, which they promptly paid.
On Tuesday, Rizos - who Precker said had laid out the funds for her own travel to the event - was informed by a marketing company working for American Solutions that the invite had been mistakenly extended, and was being rescinded.
Precker said he was told the invitation had been intended for another company with the same name - DCG - as the club's corporate parent. He also says he was told the full $5,000, and the non-refundable travel expenses incurred, would be returned - "so I guess they really don't want us around." No funds have yet been received, he said.
The latest cancellation comes just weeks after porn executive Allison Vivas - who received the same invitation to a dinner with Gingrich, with a nearly identical handwritten note - received her own cancellation notice.
Vivas' invite was rescinded shortly after she released a statement promising to make sure the Georgia Republican left their sitdown "educated about the realities of the online porn market."
An American Solutions spokesman said at the time that the notice to Vivas had been mistakenly sent, and that the group "regret(ted) the error."
The group said Tuesday that the notice Dawn Rizos received "was sent at the same time as the other mistake for the same reason." It did not specify what that reason was.
Follow Rebecca Sinderbrand on Twitter: @sinderbrandrcnn
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Newt, in a nutshell, is nothing more than a PROVEN, corrupt, hypocrit, disgraced, FORMER GOP House speaker who thinks that there's one set of rules for him and another set of rules for everyone else! Why does anyone care in the least what this maggot has to say about anything? He's a washed up, irrelevant, nobody! Let him stay that way CNN!!!!!
Newt is a fraud, a huckster and a con.
Why rescind the offer? Sounds like they were supporters. They aren't doing anything illigal.
What's the problem, it's just one sleaze merchant greeting another sleaze merchant. I suspect . The problem is which of the two sells a more sleazy product. Newt gets my vote.
And they go by the label conservatists!
Sounds like to me they got some one who would supply the girls chaeper for the republicans do not spend their own money. It is either borrowed from foreign countries or from the lobbyist and CE0'o of our biggest corporations, oil companies, or the military/industrial complex.
The invitation should stand.
Come on now, American Solutions, don't be so self-righteous.
After all, it is only money you are after.
Gingrich. What a dope.
Am I missing something here? I didn't realize that owning a topless club was against the law.
Republicans and hypocrisy go hand-in-hand so well.
Newt, still have the mojo !!!!
by the way, $5000 wins you an award. i did not know that.
Poor Newt he has been caught again.
Well this is really a switch. Don't politicians normally have to pay the money up front instead of the other way around? As a former Washingtonian I've decided that nothing these people do surprises me anymore.
Time is catching with the Republicans and they want to make as much money as they can, before the Repugnant Party is dismise.
sounds like gingrich was using obama's donor list.
Holy cow!!! Who in their right mind would want to dine with the Newt anyway? The thoughts of it, turn my stomach. He a pompus, washed-up windbag. The hypocrisy is never ending with this slim bag.
How could that possibly have happened by an organization of someone so righteous?!!!
Typical GOP: Who cares where the money comes from? We are all about values when people are watching.
Oops!! Last sentence should read: He's a pompous, washed up windbag.. The hypocrisy is never ending with this slime bag.
He sure enjoys the women....OH MY!
His adulterous affair, his adult entertainment friends......he is such a good role model for the PARTY OF FAMILY VALUES...wow!
it's about time CNN reports a feel good story!
so funny!
Maybe they were worried about Dawn Rizos entourage.
Heck they will just blame it on the President . Everything is his fault anyway according to the wingnuts.
Newt is just another backwards, Republican liar. Shame on all of them!
LOL family values.