A former Republican National Committee aide who allegedly hunted for videos of child rape and even discussed killing kids online pleaded guilty Friday to several child-porn charges. At the video court hearing, Ruben A. Verastigui, 27, admitted he had 152 videos and 50 images of child porn and traded sexual images of kids. Prosecutors recommended that he be sentenced to 12 to 15 years behind bars, a proposed range the judge won’t rule on until Oct. 12. Verastigui—who was a digital strategist for the Senate Republican Conference between 2019 and 2020, after working for the RNC—allegedly described online “in great detail” how he liked to watch kids be abused and killed. A detention memo stated that he even chatted online with another person about killing a kid.
