A fundraiser for a Republican former congressman who was reportedly paralyzed after falling from a horse at a polo event in September has raised more than a quarter of a million dollars in two days.
Michael Grimm, also a former U.S. Marine and FBI agent who served seven months in prison for financial fraud before being released in 2016, is being treated at the Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation in New Jersey, according to the New York Post.
Ongoing care and treatment to help him walk again will cost millions of dollars, according to a statement accompanying the fundraiser.
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Grimm, 54, represented Staten Island and parts of Brooklyn before resigning in 2015 after being indicted on federal tax and financial fraud charges related to practices at a New York restaurant he co-owned. He pleaded guilty to a single charge of tax evasion.
“Your moral compass, Mr. Grimm, needs some reorientation,” U.S. District Court Judge Pamela Chen told him at his sentencing.
He attempted a political comeback after his release from prison in 2016, but lost a Republican primary to regain his old seat. Grimm, an avid equestrian who regularly posted photos of himself with horses at polo events on social media, most recently worked as a pundit for the right-wing network Newsmax.
“Our friend and former Congressman Michael Grimm was in a tragic accident that left him paralyzed. He needs help to cover the significant costs that insurance will not cover on his long road to recovery,” his friend Vincent Ignizio, a former Republican New York City Councilman, told the Post.
“I’m afraid to even say it,” said Ignizio, also a former New York state lawmaker. “Mike is paralyzed from the chest down. He is currently immobilized and undergoing treatment to get him to the function he can get. Many prayers are needed.”
The GoFundMe page provided few details about the accident, other than to say Grimm was thrown from a horse during a polo tournament in September. Newsmax quoted its own host, Greg Kelly, as saying that Grimm “suffered a neck injury that required surgery, and the former congressman was in an undisclosed Westchester hospital.”
Kelly was the first to break the news of Grimm’s accident during his radio show in September.
Ignizio told the Post that Grimm was transferred last week to the rehabilitation center, where late Superman actor Christopher Reeve was treated after a similar life-altering accident in 1995 at an equestrian event in Virginia.
Democratic former New York City Councilman Domenic Recchia, who lost to Grimm in a congressional race in 2014, told the Post that he helped fundraise for his longtime political rival and friend.
“This is not a Democratic or Republican issue. It’s a human issue. Michael Grimm gave his life for our country in the armed forces. We must unite,” he said.
“It was a tragic accident. Hopefully one day he will be able to walk again.”
Since leaving politics, Grimm reinvented himself as a foreign correspondent. He traveled to Ukraine for Newsmax in 2022 and shared his experiences on his website grimmreporting.com.
Grimm, an outspoken supporter of Donald Trump who won a second presidency on November 5, has posted on his X account about climate denial and a conspiracy theory that actor Mel Gibson had exposed a pedophile ring operating in Hollywood.
