A letter penned by George Ortiz, a young Hoboken political player and former aide to U.S. Sen. Robert Torricelli, was sent on official senate letterhead without Torricelli’s “knowledge or consent,” according to correspondence the senator sent to a Hudson County resident recently. The unauthorized letter, which Ortiz sent before his job at the senator’s office ended abruptly in March, was written by Ortiz last fall on behalf of relatives of his who were seeking a bank loan. Ortiz wrote the letter on Torricelli’s stationery and signed it, “George A. Ortiz, Press Secretary, United States Senate.” A spokesperson for Torricelli’s office confirmed that Torricelli wrote the apologetic correspondence, dated April 6, to the resident. The spokesperson declined to comment further, citing an office policy that prohibits public comments about personnel matters. Ortiz was out of town last week and could not be reached for comment. He did not respond to messages left with relatives and on his home answering machine. Since leaving the senator’s office in March, Ortiz has continued to play a visible role in town politics. Although he had once aligned himself with a political faction in town that tends to oppose Mayor Anthony Russo and his policies, Ortiz recently shifted course and became the volunteer campaign manager for the mayor’s Excellence in Education school board slate that just swept the April 18 election. May be other incidents Ortiz, 24, was involved in town politics before he was old enough to vote. While he served as student council president at Hoboken High School, he became a student representative to the town’s Board of Education. After he graduated from high school, he enrolled at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., where he eventually became student council president. After graduating, Ortiz returned to Hoboken and got the job as a Torricelli spokesman at the senator’s office in Newark. He left suddenly this past March, causing a swirl of rumors among local politicos. Ortiz told the Reporter that he had left because he wanted to focus on other projects, including perhaps applying to law school. However, a document dropped off at the Reporter offices soon afterward suggested that there was a different story. The document, which is not on official senate stationery, appears to be from Torricelli’s state director, Sean Jackson. Dated March 22 and addressed to Ortiz, it tells Ortiz that his employment was terminated because a number of the Senator’s staffers witnessed him eavesdropping for 30 minutes on a personal phone conversation Jackson was having. The memo also rebukes Ortiz for writing letters for his friend’s, family’s and his own personal gain on senate letterhead and signing the senator’s signature to them. It also says that those letters were only discovered after Jackson asked Ortiz to clean out his desk. When the Reporter asked Ortiz about the document last month, he shook his head and said, “This is a sick joke, even for Hudson County.” He refused further comment and said he would consult a lawyer. ‘Considerable correspondence’ Jackson’s memo goes as far as to suggest that Ortiz may have violated federal law by allegedly listening in on the phone conversation. The memorandum lays out, in an almost business-like fashion, the office policies from Senator Torricelli’s office manual that Ortiz allegedly violated, including section 5.1 (personal conduct and decorum), 7.1 (confidentiality), 7.17.12 (misconduct), 7.9.5 (conflicts of interest) and 7.12 (use of official stationery). It also tells the story of how Jackson discovered the letters that Ortiz apparently signed the senator’s name to without authorization. “While you were cleaning out your desk, I observed you attempting to take with you several letters on Senate letterhead, and I requested that you leave those documents with me,” Jackson wrote. “Upon review of those documents, I discovered that you had apparently signed the senator’s name to correspondence without authorization. I also discovered considerable personal correspondence you had written, without authorization, on official Senate letterhead, in which you referred to your position as an employee of the Senate. “Some of this correspondence appears to relate solely to your personal and financial matters and/or appears to seek personal benefits for members of your family,” the memo continues. “Additionally, you wrote correspondence on the Senator’s personal stationary, without authorization, regarding an application for an apartment for a member of your family.” When asked about his sudden departure from the office in April, Ortiz told the Reporter , “I’m focusing on my future … I have nothing but the utmost respect for Bob Torricelli.”
Senator’s seal abused by Ortiz: Former aide shouldn’t have used official stationery, Torricelli says
