Top WA Repubs "Merge" State's GOP and Attorney General Office
Tue Feb 20, 2007 at 09:52:36 AM PDT
Adapted from Washblog
This is the image from the faux Attorney General (AG) letterhead used in 06 by WA AG Rob McKenna to support a GOP candidate for state Senate.
During the same election, McKenna recorded a robocall, identifying himself as WA's AG and urging votes for Luke Esser for state Rep.
Both cases represent a conflating of public and partisan roles by top Republicans in a state with strict ethics in public service laws. This story details how Luke Esser, who just left his position under McKenna in WA's AG office to take the State GOP Chair, has confused public and private again, perhaps illegally. McKenna and Esser are central to WA's GOP power structure, and McKenna is said to have national ambitions. They need to be held to account. If you're from WA, please visit the Washblog story, take the poll, and pass it on.<hr>
Resignation letter, 1/31/07 -- Leave request, 2/16/07 <hr>
Luke Esser, Outreach Director for Washington's Attorney General's (AG) office, included a personal touch in his 1/31/07 resignation letter from that position. He expressed gratitude to Rob McKenna, Washington's AG, for the opportunities he had provided him over the years. And, attesting to the close relationship and interlinking personal and professional activities of these two prominent state Republicans, he told Mr. McKenna: "I am comforted by the thought that I will see you regularly on Sunday mornings".
Mr. Esser's resignation letter was written several days after his election as Chair of the Washington State Republican Party (WA-GOP). It was written one day after Particle Man on Washblog had questioned why Mr. Esser had, the previous day, worked during business hours for the WA-GOP while still an AG employee.
According to the copy of the leave request I received last Friday, Mr. Esser's appplication for unpaid leave from the AG office to do partisan work on 1/29 was first applied for two weeks after he took those hours, on 2/16.
Washington state laws on ethics in public service prohibit the use of state funds, employee time, resources, or facilities for partisan activities. Wasn't Mr. Esser operating outside the law on 1/29/07? Would this kind of behavior be tolerated in the private sector?
Even if he did not break the law, by creating this appearance of impropriety and of possible illegality, Mr. Esser, a high-level employee representing the public face of our state's top legal office, brought upon himself an affirmative obligation to demonstrate that he was within the law and the public trust. To my knowledge, he took no effort to meet this obligation. At least not until 2/16, when I read a story on HorsesAss that showed Mr. Esser was still on the AGO website as an employee -- and called that office to ask for documentation to clear things up.
I don't think this resignation letter and leave request set this matter to rest. I think they demonstrate the need for further investigation.
Mr. McKenna, Washington's top legal officer, and Mr. Esser, who represented that office to the public, hold a uniquely high level of responsibility to strictly follow state's ethics laws -- and to appear to the public to strictly follow these laws -- both in their letter and their intent.
This responsibility is heightened further by Mr. McKenna's recent history of partisan advocacy, two instances of which are detailed at the head of this post. In both these instances, Mr. McKenna employed a technique of conflating in the public's mind his governmental and partisan roles. In one of these instances, the confusion created was in support of Mr. Esser's political aspirations. Esser and McKenna's responsibility is, again, heightened because they are politically ambitious individuals who have made a point of publicly declaring their support for government accountability at a time when voters so value accountability that it is a key selling point for candidates. Mr. McKenna has stated that government accountability is a top priority for the AG office. As noted above, Mr. Esser has signed a pledge "to suppport the public's right to know at every opportunity".
How can these men, who present themselves as the new, moderate, trustworthy face of the Republican party in Washington state -- honest Republicans who are safe to vote for because they are honest ... how can they be held to account? The newspapers in Washington State have not been so great recently at holding public officials accountable. And, of course, in this case, our state's top law official is not going to help us.
Jbarelli, in the comment thread of this post on Washblog has a creative idea. Since we're already blurring the public and private here, why can't we ask Republican John McKay to investigate? He's the ex-US Attorney for Western Washington who was recently forced to resign by Bush & Co., apparently for being insufficiently Republican. Maybe that means he can be trusted to uphold the public interest. Let's get him on the case...
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