Politics

Meet The Corrupt, Serial-Marrying, Tree-Hugging Femme Fatale Who Brought Down Oregon’s Governor

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By now, you may know that disgraced Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber, a Democrat, was brought low this week by a scandal concerning his fiancée’s dealings with green energy groups.

You may not be aware, however, of exactly the extent to which Kitzhaber’s fiancée, Cylvia Hayes, is a corrupt, serial-marrying tree-hugger with a background of scandals galore.

The green energy scandal involved consulting and policy work conducted by Hayes. Reports have revealed that she was advising several state employees on energy policy while simultaneously receiving substantial payments from the Clean Economy Development Center — a direct and obvious conflict of interest.

Hayes was paid $118,000 in recent years to lobby for global warming regulations on transportation fuel, according to reports. She received another $40,000 from the San Francisco-based Energy Foundation, which is connected to lefty billionaire Tom Steyer.

Hayes used her access to the Oregon governor’s mansion to hold meetings and peddle green energy policies.

While Hayes finally managed to end the political career of her governor boyfriend this week, she was the focal point for a slew of scandals that engulfed his 2014 re-election campaign — scandals which Kitzhaber perhaps had thought he had survived.

In October, Willamette Week, a Portland alternative weekly, first reported that Hayes illegally married a teenage illegal immigrant from Ethiopia named Abraham B. Abraham back in 1997. He was 18. She was 29.

Hayes entered the 1997 sham wedding because she needed money, she admitted.

The marriage was the third trip down the aisle for Hayes.

She had kept the deceptive marriage a secret until the small alternative weekly unearthed it. Kitzhaber swore he had never known a thing about it.

A few days after the wedding con was revealed, another 1997 scandal emerged. This one involved property Hayes purchased property in the state of Washington with the intent to use it as an illegal marijuana farm.

Hayes blamed an abusive boyfriend for the pot-growing plan.

In 2002, Hayes ran for the Oregon House of Representatives as a Democrat. She had listed herself as a politically independent before entering the race.

At the time, she considered aligning herself with the Pacific Green Party, an obscure local party that demands that everyone “[a]cknowledge the human contribution to climate change.” The group also demands that the United States “[b]ring home all US troops stationed abroad” except “those functioning directly under UN peacekeeping operations.” And it wants to repeal NAFTA and abolish the World Trade Organization.

Hayes and Kitzhaber, who is two decades older than she is, first became romantically involved after Hayes lost the 2002 statehouse election. It was a landslide. She received only about 30 percent of the vote.

When Kitzhaber was elected governor of Oregon in 2010, Hayes — his live-in girlfriend — became the state’s first lady. It has been a semantic situation which has rubbed a whole lot of Oregonians the wrong way.

At long last, the couple announced their engagement in the summer of 2014.

Hayes was born Cylvia Johnson in 1967. She says she grew up dirt-poor. She took the surname Hayes from her first husband, Todd Hayes. She was married to Todd Hayes for just two years.

Hayes’s second husband was a man named Doug McCarthy.

Hayes, 47, is a graduate of The Evergreen State College, an exceedingly liberal taxpayer-funded school with lax admission standards that specializes in educating slacker leftists. Of course, “educating” is a strong word. The taxpayer-funded college has no grades. Instead, professors write narrative evaluations of each student’s work. Also, the mascot is the Geoduck, the world’s largest burrowing clam. (RELATED: The 13 Most Rabidly Leftist, Politically Correct Colleges For Dirty, Tree-Hugging Hippies)

The newly-unemployed Kitzhaber, 67, is a graduate of Dartmouth College. He was, until this week, among Oregon’s most distinguished politicians. He served two terms as governor in the 1990s and then returning to office in 2011. He was sworn in to a fourth term just three weeks ago.

Kitzhaber announced his resignation in a letter sent to Secretary of State Kate Brown, who will now assume the governor’s office and be the nation’s first openly bisexual governor.

Follow Eric on TwitterLike Eric on Facebook. Send story tips to erico@dailycaller.com.

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