RNC Fires Staffer Who Expensed $2,000 Tab at Sex-Themed Nightclub

A Republican National Committee staffer who approved an expense reimbursement of nearly $2,000 for "meals" at a Los Angeles bondage-themed club has been fired.

In announcing the termination Tuesday, the RNC distanced itself from the after-hours outing to Voyeur West Hollywood by the Young Eagles, the invitation-only club for young donors to the Republican Party.

"This was not an RNC-sanctioned event and was not associated in any way with any RNC official event," the committee's chief of staff, Ken McKay, wrote in a statement to Politico.

The staffer "was aware that this activity was not eligible for reimbursement and had been previously counseled on this very subject," McKay wrote.

McKay did not name the staffer, but she was identified by The Huffington Post as Allison Meyers, director of the Young Eagles program since February 2009.

Erik Brown, the donor who footed the bill at Voyeur and was later reimbursed by the RNC, has agreed to pay back the $1,946.25, McKay told Politico. Brown, the owner of a Southern California direct-mail firm, has worked for Republican candidates and committees.

The expense was revealed Monday in an investigation into lavish RNC spending published Monday at The Daily Caller, the conservative Web site founded by pundit Tucker Carlson. Reporter Jonathan Strong originally contended that the RNC chairman, Michael Steele, was at Voyeur, which was strongly disputed by the committee.

"The chairman was never at the location in question, he had no knowledge of the expenditure, nor does he find the use of committee funds at such a location at all acceptable," the RNC said in a statement Monday.