Marco Rubio was on south Florida's WFTL radio this morning where for the first time he said the $133.75 tony hair salon charged on his state party credit card was not for a hair cut.
Q: What do you tip on a $134 haircut, Marco?
Rubio: "That’s not, that’s not even accurately reported, that’s not what that was. And, uh, unfortunately as I said, it’s been misrepresented, misreported. In some respects, in key aspects of it that have been left out. But look, that was a card secured in the corporate division under my personal credit. If you read the policies of American Express, it clearly says that uh if personal expenses get on there you have to pay them. Those are charge cards, not credit cards. You’ve got to pay it at the end of every month, which we did, and I paid for it out of my own pocket, all of it. So those are just charges that appeared on the statement, doesn’t mean the party paid for it, in fact the official state documents show that the party didn’t pay for it, and I wish that had been highlighted more prominently by the Miami Herald and others who covered the story. But, you know I think there job is to kind of write the story the most, uh, attention grabbing way possible. I get that. It’s uh, it’s unfortunately part of politics. We deal with it and move on. You know this is an election about a country that owes trillions of dollars, a lot of it to foreign debt holders, I doubt this election is going to turn on some $138 charge on my personal credit.
Q: Well uh, but you didn’t answer my question, what do you tip on a haircut that expensive?
Rubio: But uh, I’ve never had one, I’ve never had one that expensive, so I can’t tell you.
Q: So you did not get a haircut that expensive? That’s what you’re saying?
Rubio: No, that’s not what that was, that was a bunch of other stuff that was for a silent auction and all of that. We paid for that out of my own pocket, we were just charged there on the charge card, but you’ve got to come back and pay for it at the end of the month. So, but like I said, the bigger issues of this campaign, and that’s what we’re focused on.
Rubio has declined to itemize personal expenses for which he reimbursed the state party. And Rubio's credit card statements show that, in fact, he did not always pay off the bills every month. There was at least one six month period when he did not pay, and the party picked up his late fees several times.
http://blogs.tampabay.com/buzz/2010/03/marco-rubio-denies-130-hair-cut.html#more