(cross-posted on
BetterCA.com and
Calitics)
The Fair Political Practices Commission has issued a ruling today against Arnold Schwarzenegger's California Recovery Team. The FPPC is finally holding CRT and the Governor accountable for violating campaign finance laws last year and has ordered that they pay a stiff penalty of $200,200.
The Alliance sued the CRT last fall for failing to disclose $25,600,000 of expenditures, as required by law. In March, the California Court of Appeals
ruled in our favor, stating that either the FPPC could penalize the governor's CRT or the Alliance could file our own lawsuit to recover damages. It may have taken seven months, but our legal process has worked the way it is supposed to. This sends a message that the Governor has to play by the same rules as everyone else. It is a victory for all Californians and our justice system.
This $200,200 fine is one of the highest in FPPC history. The funds are payable to the General Fund of the State of California.
It may be buried on the Friday afternoon of the July 4th weekend, but we couldn't be more pleased with the resolution. Queue obligatory line about fireworks...
Update [2006-6-30 21:39:18 by Alliance for a Better California]: The first news articles are starting to come in. Here is the
SJ Merc piece on the fine.
"We're happy the FPPC is holding the governor and the CRT accountable for violating campaign laws," said Robin Swanson, spokeswoman for the Alliance For a Better California. "Voters deserve to know where the money is coming from to finance campaigns. It's a stiff penalty that says it's not OK to play shell games with campaign money."
The California Recovery Team did file two major preliminary reports detailing contributions and spending in September and October, but it only started filing real-time, 24-hour updates on Nov. 3 - more than 60 of them by Election Day.
The appeals court found that the California Recovery Team should have been filing the 24-hour reports all along, saying that the organization offered no compelling rationale against doing so. The organization alleged that it need not file "simply because they say so," the appeals decision read. "Unfortunately for real parties in interest, the law says otherwise."