It is hard to stand out as a craven conman in a political party made out of conmen, but Tennessee’s newest Congressman Andy Ogles is giving animal rescue shelter grifter George Santos a run for his everyone else’s money. New revelations are surfacing as Tennessee reporters dig into his life and more tips begin coming in debunking the mythology Ogles created for himself.
No, the new revelations are not simply that he doesn’t seem to have any shred of economics training, as he has claimed when calling himself an economist at various times. No, it’s not his lies about majoring in “International Relations,” or his lies about having psychology training, or the unverified claim that he is a “trained police officer and international sex crimes expert,” as opposed to the very verified claim that he lost a volunteer position with the Williamson County Sheriff’s Office “for not meeting minimum standards, making no progress in field training and failure to attend required meetings.”
No, the new revelations come from a much darker place. It seems that there is about $23,575 of missing money from a GoFundMe that Ogles created back in 2014. The money was supposed to be used for a children’s burial garden.
RELATED STORY: Move over, George Santos! Yet another questionable Republican résumé has emerged
The GoFundMe was created by Andy Ogles and his wife Monica, just days after their newborn child died. They raised tens of thousands of dollars to create a ”burial garden” that would “feature a life size statue of Jesus watching over the children, benches for families to sit while surrounded by flowers in the special garden for little ones who left us too soon.” NewsChannel5 has been doing much of the investigative reporting on Rep. Ogles and was tipped off anonymously about the garden.
George Santos: I will steal money intended for sick pets.
Andy Ogles: Hold my beer
Donors didn’t want to give their names but they did want to know what happened to all of that money. In fact, The Tennessean did a report one year later that explored what happened to the promised garden. At the time, Andy Ogles told the newspaper, "What we found out over the past year as we have been going through this process is that burials are heavily regulated.” NewsChannel5 could not find anything in the way of government regulations that might have impeded the Ogleses if they wanted to do what they said they wanted to do.
They also spoke with the manager at the cemetery where Ogles had promised the garden would be built, who said they had met with the Ogleses a couple of times but that the couple never came back to follow up. As for the money?
NewsChannel 5 Investigates did speak with one donor, who said he asked Ogles directly what he did with the money. When he couldn't get a straight answer, he insisted on getting his money back and he got it.
When the news crew caught up with Ogles on Wednesday, he wouldn’t answer and ducked into a waiting vehicle. The Republican Party, everyone.
UPDATE: Rep. Ogles has released a statement saying that he shouldn’t have to answer this question.
RELATED STORY: New lies from Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles’ past come to light