Hairy Situation For Edwards Causes Buzz
Democrat John Edwards is trying to get out of a hairy situation, reimbursing his presidential campaign $800 for two visits with a Beverly Hills stylist.
Two $400 cuts by stylist Joseph Torrenueva, who told The Associated Press that the former North Carolina senator is a longtime client, showed up on Edwards' campaign spending reports filed this weekend. Edwards spokesman Eric Schultz said it never should have been there.
"The bill was sent to the campaign. It was inadvertently paid," Schultz said. "John Edwards will be reimbursing the campaign."
Federal Election Commission records show Edwards' campaign also spent $250 in services from Designworks Salon in Dubuque, Iowa, and $225 in services from the Pink Sapphire in Manchester, N.H.
"I do cut his hair and I have cut it for quite a while," Torrenueva said. "We've been friends a long time."
Referring to a picture of Edwards published Tuesday in The Los Angeles Times, Torrenueva said: "That's my cut." The stylist said he couldn't vouch for the source of Edwards' haircuts in other photos.
One reason the cost of the cut was so steep even by Beverly Hills standards is that Torrenueva went to Edwards rather than the candidate coming into the stylist's salon a block off Rodeo Drive.
"I go to him wherever convenient," Torrenueva said. He declined to identify where the cuts paid for by the campaign took place.
According to Designworks' Web site, the salon and spa features a wide variety of beauty and health services, including massages, facials, body polishes, self tanners, and rosemary mint and Caribbean therapy body wraps.
The salon's owners did not return a call.
Pink Sapphire co-owner Ariana Franggos said the two payments last month — $150 on March 7 and $75 on March 20 — were for doing Edwards' makeup for television appearances. She handles makeup for local television personalities and was referred to Edwards through that connection.
"This poor guy. I'm telling you, I promise he's not in here getting facials and cucumber peels on his eyes or anything," she said.
Edwards, 53, who has made alleviating poverty the central theme of candidacy, has been criticized for building a 28,000-square-foot house for $5.3 million near Chapel Hill, N.C. The complex of several buildings on 102 acres includes an indoor basketball court, an indoor pool and a handball court.
Edwards is also the subject of a popular YouTube spoof poking fun at his youthful good looks. The video shows the candidate combing his tresses to the dubbed-in tune of "I Feel Pretty."
Schultz said those services were legitimate campaign expenditures to prepare Edwards for media appearances.
Political candidates often have hair and makeup done before media appearances. Edwards rival Hillary Rodham Clinton got some attention last year when her campaign paid $2,500 for two hairstyling sessions that the campaign classified as media production expenses.