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Tuesday: Another Fine Mess
posted at 2010-08-24 21:26 | Last modified 2010-08-24 21:29
The State Board of Elections today levied a $30,000 fine against the campaign committee of Governor Bev Perdue. By a bipartisan 4-1 vote, the board approved the fine as punishment for the campaign's failure to timely report more than 40 campaign flights taken on private planes during the 2004 and 2008 election cycles.
But by the same motion, the board also cleared the Perdue campaign of intentional wrongdoing in the case. That was good news to campaign spokesman Marc Farinella. He isn’t thrilled about the fine, but he says he accepts responsibility for the errors.
I think the most critical thing to us that we feel gratified that the board voted that no one in the Perdue campaign had any intent to break the law or conceal information. And that means a lot to us.
At today's meeting in Asheville, NCGOP Chairman Tom Fetzer tried but failed to convince the board to approve a motion by its Republican members to open public hearings on the matter.
According to Fetzer, the board’s findings contradict the work of its own chief investigator, Kim Strach. He says Strach’s latest report references correspondence from 2007 that proves the committee was told about at least some of the unreported flights.
They never even bothered to even think about reporting the flights until it became clear during the board’s investigation of former Governor [Mike] Easley that they had a problem.
Fetzer says the board’s Democratic majority is “whitewashing” the Perdue campaign’s actions.
First, it was a computer glitch. And then, “Oh, we didn’t have the processes in place.” And then, “Well, we didn’t know about the flights.” Well, if you look at the staff reports, all three of those explanations just don’t hold water.
Farinella says Fetzer’s accusations are just political theater.
Mr. Fetzer can call it a "whitewash." I expect that’s what he would do… Look, Tom Fetzer’s job is to make Democrats look as bad as possible. So I think you need to discount this kind of hyperbolic rhetoric from him that he delivers so well, so frequently.
Farinella also dismissed Republican calls for public hearings into the reporting errors.
Although this investigation went on for 8 months and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, there’s still nobody near the campaign or within the campaign or in close proximity to the campaign or anyone who had any knowledge of how the campaign operated who suggested that anyone in the Perdue Committee intentionally sought to break the law or intentionally sought to conceal information. No one has made that suggestion.
Fetzer might not meet those criteria, but he’s definitely making that suggestion, and he’s showing no signs of backing down even after today’s vote. In an NCGOP statement today, he renewed his calls for Wake DA Colon Willoughby to launch a criminal investigation into the board’s actions.
Fetzer is accusing SBOE Director Gary Bartlett and Chair Larry Leake of colluding with Perdue campaign attorney John Wallace to edit Strach’s report and limit the investigation – accusations both Leake and Bartlett vehemently deny. In fact, WRAL’s Cullen Browder reports Leake accused the GOP chair of trying to turn the SBOE hearing into a “Tom Fetzer campaign stop.”
Fetzer says he’s not surprised Democrats are trying to make this into a partisan issue. But he insists it isn’t.
The major issue here is – and this transcends partisan politics – how can a Board of Elections appointed by the governor – and they’re appointed by their partisan affiliation to the governor’s party – how can they be called on to responsibly investigate the person who appointed them? This is a flawed system. And they have proven it once again today.
Defenders of the current board like to point out that this is the same Democrat-controlled panel that sent former Gov. Mike Easley’s case to state prosecutors. But as Fetzer points out, that investigation wasn’t opened until Easley had left office – more than three years after the first allegations of improper dealings first surfaced.
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