As Real Housewives of New Jersey star Joe Giudice remains in ICE custody, his wife Teresa has been dining out with a member of the Trump administration who has taken to Instagram to insist that their get-together had nothing to do with getting a pardon or a deportation reprieve for Joe.
Hollywood Life reports that Teresa Giudice met for dinner with a member of the Trump administration, Lynne Patton, who is caught up in her own controversy after being reported for a second Hatch Act violation with the Department of Government Ethics, according to the New York Daily News .
Patton, who is a longtime Trump family friend, is the Administrator of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) for Region II (New York and New Jersey, posted on Instagram that it’s a sheer coincidence that Teresa Giudice is seeking assistance with her husband’s legal problems that only executive power can solve at this point.
After Patton and Giudice were spotted at the Wayfarer in New York, the Trump administration appointee posted a photo on Instagram to fight what she called “fake news.”
“OMG!@lynnepatton IS going to be on a REALITY SHOWl! OMG, @teresagiudice must be seeking a pardon for her HUSBAND!! Or GEE! Maybe it’s just TWO LONGTIME FRIENDS having DINNER for f***s sake.”
Patton then added the post “buckle up for fake news” with flame emojis.
We had to file another Hatch Act complaint against Lynne Patton https://t.co/NzWoLuaUXu
— Citizens for Ethics (@CREWcrew) April 15, 2019
Patton seemed outraged before anyone in the media mentioned the public meeting of the two women, but there is a petition making the rounds to get Donald Trump to pardon Joe Giudice, who is facing deportation back to his native Italy.
A petition has been posted on Change.org which calls upon Trump to “Bring Joe Giudice Home.” The website, created by someone named Adriana C., explains that Giudice served his sentence and now he needs to “come home to his wife and 4 daughters.”
The petition continues, saying that Giudice committed a “minor crime” and did his time, so there is no reason that he needs to be deported.
But Hollywood Life reports that the crimes committed by Teresa and Joe Giudice were not minor (the couple pleaded guilty to “41 counts of fraud – which included bank, mail, wire and bankruptcy fraud – which allegedly saw them net over $5 million over a 10-year period”).
But because Joe Giudice was not born in the United States, and never became a citizen, it is according to immigration protocol that he should face deportation.
The Inquisitr reported that last week, Giudice lost his last appeal to remain in the United States and his last procedural hope is with a federal review.