Continuing the GQP’s streak of brazen law breaking, a Federal campaign finance filing reveals that Q-Anon darling Lauren Boebert (Q-CO) used campaign funds to pay personal expenses. This is (surprise!) a violation of election laws.
www.cnn.com/…
I put out a call to all Federal agencies that can take action over this abuse of the public trust: Hold Boebert accountable. If our law enforcement continues to turn a blind eye to this lawless behavior, there will only be more and more of it. Prosecuting this and other crimes of this nature will have
enormous deterrence value.
To illustrate the importance of deterrence, imagine this scenario if nothing is done in the Boebert scenario:
A candidate is toying with the idea of using campaign funds for personal purposes. He or she asks the campaign’s manager or legal advisor something along the following lines: “What would happen if, somehow, campaign funds were used to pay for personal expenses for myself or a campaign aide?” The advisor would respond: “Well, technically, it would be a violation of campaign finance laws, but as long as the funds were given back to the campaign, it would be a ‘no harm, no foul’ situation. In fact, that recently happened with a House Rep from Colorado.” Given this advice, unless the candidate actually cares about following the law, there is no discernible reason for the candidate not to try to use the funds and see if they can get away with it.
Contrast this with a scenario where Boebert is personally fined (or otherwise sanctioned) for the the infraction. Asked the same question as a above, the advisor would say: “The campaign needs to be very careful about using campaign funds for personal expenses. There was recently a case involving a House Rep from Colorado who used campaign funds to pay rent and other personal expenses and she was fined thousands of dollars.” In this scenario, the candidate would have an strong incentive to not use the campaign funds for personal purposes because there would be a precedent for this behavior to be punished.