Cooley

Congressman Wes Cooley, repeatedly hounded by controversy for the last two decades of his life, died Wednesday in Bend. He was 82.

Linda Carlin, Cooley’s stepdaughter, confirmed the death Thursday. She said her mother, Cooley’s wife, Rosemary, is preparing a public statement.

Elected to Congress to represent the sprawling 2nd District covering Central and Eastern Oregon in 1994, Cooley served out his two-year term, but he dropped his re-election bid in midcampaign because of allegations he’d lied about his military record and academic credentials. In retirement from politics, Cooley’s business practices attracted similar scrutiny, earning him a prison term of one year and one day for his participation in a scheme that defrauded investors out of $10 million.

Born in California, Cooley served in the Army, then worked as a pharmaceutical executive before moving to Central Oregon in the 1980s. From his ranch near Alfalfa, Cooley raised cattle and ran a small vitamin and nutritional supplements business.

Cooley joined the Deschutes County Farm Bureau and eventually became its president. In 1992, he mounted a campaign for a state Senate seat.

Questions about Cooley’s truthfulness marked his first campaign in Central Oregon. His home in Alfalfa was a few miles outside the boundary of the Senate district, but Cooley set up a trailer on a friend’s property inside the district and claimed it as his home. Despite the questions about his residency, Cooley defeated Hood River Democrat Wayne Fawbush and won the seat.

Dennis Luke served with Cooley during his tenure in Salem. A Republican representing south Bend and parts south in the House, Luke said Cooley showed talent as a legislator.

“Just from what I observed, I think he represented his district well when he was in the Legislature,” Luke said. “He had some good support over there and tried to help his constituents when they had a problem with government.”

With Republican Congressman Bob Smith opting not to run for re-election in 1994, Cooley decided to run for the seat.

Though Cooley won with little difficulty, questions began emerging about the truthfulness of statements in the Oregon Voters’ Pamphlet. Cooley acknowledged he had not been a member of the elite academic honor society Phi Beta Kappa, as he’d stated in the Voters’ Pamphlet, claiming instead he’d been a member of a separate, similarly named honor society.

In Congress, Cooley was part of the first Republican majority in 40 years and was a voice for ranching and timber interests.

Cooley’s 1996 campaign for re-election got off to a rocky start, with the congressman reading an April Fool’s Day gag column as though it were true at a gathering of timber executives. Questioned about the episode by an Oregonian reporter, he threatened to assault her — she claimed he threatened to punch her in the nose, whereas he said he would “whip” her were she not a woman, according to news reports at the time.

Not long afterward, Cooley’s statements in the Voters’ Pamphlet were again questioned. He had claimed he’d served in the Army Special Forces during the Korean War, but a review of his military files indicated otherwise, and soldiers who’d served with him claimed Cooley never left the country during his Army service.

Cooley claimed the records supporting his version of events were destroyed in a fire, but the revelations about his military service opened the floodgates to further scrutiny.

It was revealed that Cooley’s wife, Rosemary, had for years collected military widow’s benefits on behalf of her deceased first husband even though she lived with and then married Cooley, and that the Cooleys had not sought county building permits before constructing various buildings on their ranch.

Luke said Cooley’s downfall illustrates how quickly one lie or misstatement can destroy a career in politics.

“You need to be as truthful as possible. Some things you forget, but forgetting you weren’t in Korea, that’s probably a little difficult,” Luke said “Once that starts, people start looking for other things, and that’s a problem,” he said.

Former Deschutes County District Attorney Mike Dugan was the Democrats’ nominee in the 1996 race for the 2nd Congressional District. As Cooley’s troubles mounted and his chances for re-election slipped, polling showed Dugan with a 3-to-1 lead in the strongly Republican district. Summoned to Washington, D.C., to meet with top Democrats in Congress, Dugan found himself in the midst of a circus atmosphere, surrounded by national political reporters eager to ask him about Cooley’s unraveling campaign.

“What I remember mostly about that time is, I walked out and there were more microphones and television cameras out there than there were in the whole 2nd Congressional District, and they were all pointed at me,” Dugan said.

Greg Walden, then a state senator and Cooley’s 1994 campaign manager, launched his own third-party candidacy for Cooley’s seat in July. Maintaining his innocence, Cooley bailed out of the race the next month under pressure from his fellow Republicans.

Smith, who represented the district for 12 years before declining to run for re-election in 1994, was nominated to take Cooley’s place on the ballot and easily defeated Dugan in November.

In 1997, Cooley accepted a plea deal on charges he’d lied in the Voters’ Pamphlet, and he was given two years’ probation, ordered to perform 100 hours of community service and fined $5,000.

In 1998, Cooley attempted a comeback, running in the Republican primary in the 2nd District. He tallied 9 percent of the vote, finishing a distant third behind Walden and Christian broadcaster Perry Atkinson.

Later that year, Cooley was nominated as the candidate of the Reform Party but was blocked from appearing on the November ballot under the state’s “sore loser” law, which bars the loser of a major party nomination from seeking the same seat under a different party banner.

Walden won the seat and continues to represent the 2nd District today.

Thursday, Walden’s office issued a brief statement marking Cooley’s passing.

“My thoughts and prayers are with the family of Wes Cooley during this difficult time of loss. Despite his various legal issues over the last 20 years, I know he cared deeply about the rural West and the country,” read Walden’s statement.

Finished with politics after 1998, Cooley’s business ventures landed him in new trouble.

In 2005, a federal jury in St. Louis found Cooley had defrauded investors by persuading them to buy stock in a startup online auction company called Bidbay.com. Investors were wrongly told eBay was buying the company, and Cooley was ordered to pay $1.1 million of a $2.1 million settlement awarded to 11 plaintiffs.

In 2009, Cooley was indicted in federal court for money laundering in connection with his involvement with Bidbay.com and other companies. Prosecutors agreed to dismiss the money laundering charges in exchange for a guilty plea on charges of tax evasion. In his plea agreement, Cooley admitted to transferring more than $1.7 million in investor money to his own accounts for personal use.

In December 2012, Cooley was sentenced to a year and a day in prison.

Cooley was released from federal custody in November 2013, according to Federal Bureau of Prisons records.

Survivors include his wife, Rosemary, and stepdaughter, Linda Carlin.

— Reporter: 541-383-0387,

shammers@bendbulletin.com