Meanwhile in New Jersey Former Campaign Manager Sues Indian American Republican Hirsh Singh Over Unpaid Invoice
- In the lawsuit, King Penna alleges that his former boss did not pay him $159,463, and is asking the judge to force Singh to pay his bill and legal fees, with interest.
Hirsh Singh is back in the news again. The Indian American Republican from New Jersey is being sued by his former political consultant and campaign manager King Penna, “over a $159,463 unpaid invoice from the 2020 Republican U.S. Senate primary,” The New Jersey Globe reported. Singh lost the primary for a chance to take on U.S. Senator Cory Booker by two percentage points, 38%-36%, to Rik Mehta, a former U.S. Food and Drug Administration official.
Described by The New Jersey Globe as a “perennial candidate,” Singh has lost six campaigns in five years, most recently an unsuccessful bid for a condo board seat in Atlantic City. Last year, he lost to former state Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli, who won a four-way primary for the Republican nomination. His campaign was managed by Penna, “despite the alleged non-payment of his 2020 invoices,” The Globe reported.
Penna’s lawsuit stems from a legal action taken against him this July, by two Morristown senior citizens, Anna and William Rike. The couple alleges that they loaned Penna and his consulting firm, Kingmaker Strategies LLC., “$70,000 two weeks before the primary election with a promise that they would be paid back $77,000 in 65 days,” as reported by The New Jersey Globe. Penna never repaid the loan. He told the court that “he needed the funds to pay for design and printing services for Singh’s Senate bid,” The New Jersey Globe report said.
Described by The New Jersey Globe as a “perennial candidate,” Singh has lost six campaigns in five years, most recently an unsuccessful bid for a condo board seat in Atlantic City.
Now he’s suing Singh, alleging that he never paid a July 22, 2020 invoice.“As a result of Singh’s wrongful failure to pay for services provided him…Singh has been unjustly enriched,” Penna claimed in his complaint, per The New Jersey Globe. He’s asking the judge “to force Singh to pay his bill and legal fees, with interest,” the report added.
While “the debt alleged to Penna does not appear on reports filed with the Federal Election Commission, he denies any personal liability to the Rikers, saying their contract was with his firm,” the report said. He said that the Rikers “breached the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing that is implied in the promissory note, because they have filed suit knowing that repayment depended upon Hirsh Singh making payment, which he has not done.”
Earlier last year, Mehta filed a defamation lawsuit against Singh. Local news reports including northjersey.com, New Jersey Globe and Insider NJ said at the time that in the lawsuit, Mehta accused Singh of spending more than $300,000 on a “smear campaign to flout the truth and create a series of repeated lies” through press releases, digital advertising and mailers. It alleges that Sing’s campaign targeted Mehta’s background as a pharmaceutical executive, accusing him of promoting dangerous opioids for Big Pharma and labeling him a “baby-killer” for selling “abortion pills.”
In 2017, Singh made a gubernatorial bid, claiming to have raised $900,000 that would have qualified him for the GOP primary debates, but the New Jersey Election Enforcement Commission (ELEC) refused to permit him to participate, saying it had no records of his fund-raising. It was reported at the time that his father was able to put $1 million into the Singh campaign because his son still lived at home.
In 2018, he wanted to challenge Sen. Bob Menendez but opted instead to run for Congress in the 2nd District, but lost in the primary where he was pilloried by one opponent questioning loans Singh took out to finance his campaign.