HD-26: Lobbyist says Wingard abuse won’t affect race

A representative of two political action groups that have donated to Republican state Rep. Matt Wingard’s (R-Wilsonville) campaign said Tuesday that the recent publicity surrounding Wingard’s misdemeanor assault conviction for hitting his child over the head with a screwdriver in 2002 would not have a major effect on his race.

The incident was highlighted in a mailing sent to HD-26 voters on Monday by Oregon House Democrats’ FuturePAC.

“There are a lot of political attacks going on like that,” John McCully said of FuturePAC’s flyer. “That’s just what happens with political campaigns.”

McCully lobbies on behalf of the Oregon Mortgage Brokers PAC, which gave Wingard $1,000 this election cycle, as well as Ag-PAC, which gave Wingard $2,500.

FuturePAC’s mailing detailed the case in which Wingard was convicted of misdemeanor assault. On Tuesday, The Oregonian got a hold of documents that detailed other incidents of alleged abuse.

Wingard, who had already come forward about the screwdriver incident, defended himself on the other charges in a story published in The Oregonian, calling the charges untrue.

But this prompted his ex-girlfriend and son’s mother to say that Wingard was lying about the abusive incidents.

"I'm not going to support him if he's going to lie about it," Stacy Pico told reporter Dave Hogan.

McCully said the whole incident was a personal issue, and in the end voters in HD-26 would not be focused on it.

“The voters will look at a wide range of issues,” McCully said. “Personal ones will probably not be as important as legislative ones.”