Accused consultant to $680,000 Bilking Vallas campaign says allegations shameful and baseless NBC Chicago

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A political consultant who was sued last week for allegedly defrauding Paul Vallas’ mayoral campaign out of hundreds of thousands of dollars threatened on Monday to file a libel suit against the defeated candidate he once counted as a close friend associated.

In the end, I will be vindicated and Vallas’ claims will be considered for what they are without merit, said Chimaobi Enyia.

Vallas says Chimaobi Enyia raised $680,000 from the campaign to coordinate get-out-the-vote efforts in black neighborhoods. But in his lawsuit filed last week, Vallas said the work was fabricated and Enyia was unable to provide documentation showing what he did.

Enyia called the lawsuit shameful and baseless, adding that he intended to vigorously defend my character and integrity.

In a text message to the Sun-Times, Vallas declined to comment beyond saying, The lawsuit speaks for itself.

Enyia, the brother of failed mayoral campaigner Amara Enyia, would have been in the running to take over as Vallas’ chief of staff if the former public schools chief wins the April 4 runoff election. He had described Vallas as a trusted friend who had desperately asked for his help in building relationships in the city’s African-American community.

Vallas asked for my help, I provided my help, I billed my help, the invoices for my help were approved and I got paid for my help, Enyia said, noting that the campaign manager de Vallas, Brian Towne, and campaign finance chairman Peter Jeon signed off on the big payouts.

I have fully fulfilled my obligations to the campaign, he added. Now that I’ve helped, Vallas wants my compensation back. It is absolutely unfair.

In four payments between March 20 and April 3, Enyia reportedly raised $680,000 which he claimed was for consultation, putting up Vallas signs in black neighborhoods and removing others that were vandalized and destroyed. linked the candidate to former President Donald Trump.

In a bid to collect the money, the lawsuit claims Enyia repeatedly pressured Jeon to cut the checks, going so far as to warn that the alleged campaign workers he was paying were jumping ship. and start working for mayor-elect Brandon Johnson.

Towne is not charged with any wrongdoing, but the suit says he repeatedly ordered Jeon to pay.

Veteran Democratic strategist Tom Bowen said the level of fraudulent campaign spending alleged in Vallas’ lawsuit is unprecedented. Bowen said it underscored that a desperate Vallas needed to make inroads into the black community and that his campaign had little control over the avalanche of contributions pouring in from the business world after his first place in the Feb. 28 election.

If he set fire to $700,000 with a very atypical campaign salesman to try to win votes in the black community like that, that might be the dumbest thing anyone in Chicago politics has ever had. ever made,” said Bowen, who served as senior adviser to Mayor Lori. Lightfoots campaign and as political director to former mayor Rahm Emanuel in 2012.

Vallas claims that when he found out about the payments after losing the second round, Enyia repeatedly said he could not and would not provide any documents and refused to return the money, according to the suit.

Enyia reportedly claimed that he did in fact receive a blank check for $700,000 to do campaign work in black communities which Vallas ended up losing, including a payment of $20,000 for approved consultancy work.

The first sign that something was wrong came when Vallas’ campaign filed its latest financial disclosure last week, showing that $480,000 of the $500,000 in payments to Enyias’ company, Ikoro LLC, were disputed. Another disputed payment of $200,000 came on April 3 after that reporting period ended, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit charges Enyia with fraud, unjust enrichment and breach of contract and seeks restitution of the money, as well as an award of prejudgment interest and the imposition of punitive damages, among other remedies.

But on Monday, Enyia threatened to sue Vallas for defamation if he repeated the lawsuit allegations in public statements.

In the end, the voters were right, he said, Paul Vallas did not deserve to be mayor of the city of Chicago.

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