BUSH-CHENEY 2000 TO PAY $90,000 CIVIL PENALTY

[Frodo]

FOR FAILING TO DISCLOSE RECOUNT ACTIVITY


http://www.fec.gov/press/press2004/20040420murs.html



WASHINGTON -- The Federal Election Commission (FEC) has entered into a conciliation agreement with Bush-Cheney 2000, Inc. resulting from the failure to report to the FEC receipts and disbursements associated with its recount activities. Bush – Cheney 2000, Inc. has agreed to pay a $90,000 civil penalty.

According to the conciliation agreement, Bush – Cheney 2000 held a bank account designated “Bush-Cheney 2000, Inc. – Media.” After the November 7, 2000 presidential election, the Committee redesignated this bank account “Bush-Cheney 2000, Inc. – Recount Fund” and used the account to raise funds and pay costs associated with the recount. However, the Committee failed to include that activity in disclosure reports filed with the Commission.

-Clip-

...Bush- Cheney 2000 admitted that the failure to report the receipts and disbursements associated with its recount activity and to properly itemize them as “other receipts” and “other disbursements” violated the Act. The committee agreed to cease and desist from violating these sections of the Act and agreed to submit a miscellaneous filing to the FEC that discloses and itemizes, where appropriate, its recount receipts and disbursements.

[mb7588a]

1. well...

Book keeping in these campaigns is an amazingly daunting task.

[JohnOneillsMemory]

2. Those Republican thugs stopping the recount ran up a big bar tab. n/t

[UpInArms]

3. wonder if anyone noticed

that the Bush/Cheney paid for the "Brooks Brothers Rioters"?

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2002/080502a.html

After the Miami “Brooks Brothers Riot” – named after the protesters’ preppie clothing – no government action was taken beyond the police rescuing several Democrats who were surrounded and roughed up by the rioters. While no legal charges were filed against the Republicans, newly released documents show that at least a half dozen of the publicly identified rioters were paid by Bush’s recount committee.

The payments to the Republican activists are documented in hundreds of pages of Bush committee records – released grudgingly to the Internal Revenue Service last month, 19 months after the 36-day recount battle ended. Overall, the records provide a road map of how the Bush recount team brought its operatives across state lines to stop then- Vice President Al Gore’s recount efforts.

The records show that the Bush committee spent a total of $13.8 million to frustrate the recount of Florida’s votes and secure the state's crucial electoral votes for Bush. By contrast, the Gore recount operation spent $3.2 million, about one quarter of the Bush total. Bush spent more just on lawyers – $4.4 million – than Gore did on his entire effort.

Extended Deadline

The new evidence was submitted by the Bush recount committee to the IRS under an extended deadline for disclosures of soft-money spending by so-called “527 committees,” which are not directly related to a candidate’s campaign. Bush lawyers had argued that they were not obligated legally to disclose how they had raised and spent their money.

The Bush committee finally reversed itself and filed the records on July 15. The records were released to the public on the IRS Web site in late July. Gore's committee submitted its records in line with the original IRS deadlines.

<snip>

The Miami protesters who were paid by Bush recount committee were: Matt Schlapp, a Bush staffer who was based in Austin and received $4,276.09; Thomas Pyle, a staff aide to House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, $456; Michael Murphy, a DeLay fund- raiser, $935.12; Garry Malphrus, House majority chief counsel to the House Judiciary subcommittee on criminal justice, $330; Charles Royal, a legislative aide to Rep. Jim DeMint, R-S.C. $391.80; and Kevin Smith, a former GOP House staffer, $373.23.

Three of the Miami protesters are now members of Bush’s White House staff, the Miami Herald reported last month. They include Schlapp, who is now a special assistant to the president; Malphrus, who is now deputy director of the president’s Domestic Policy Council; and Joel Kaplan, another special assistant to the president.

...more...

[0rganism]

4. $90000? Gee, they'll have to have an extra luncheon to make up for that

Given that chimpy can pull in $500k-$1mil per $2k/plate fundraising snack, that $90k is so much loose pocket change.

[July]

5. Wow, they broke the law, who'd a' thunk it? n/t

[mulethree]

6. what happens to campaign leftovers?

If the Bush 2000 campaign still has money in the bank, where does it go and how can it be used in regard to the 2004 campaign? Or does it get donated to the RNC or some thinktank?

I'm not interested just in Bush, just leftover campaign funds in general.

[ImperialistLackey]

7. They're Going to Need the Money for the 2004 recount

and much more to make sure they purge the voter rolls of liberals, minorities, gays, on time overseas absentee ballets, senior citizens, intellectuals, union members, Right to Lifers, Environmentalists, and people who don't listen to Fox Network or Conservative Talk Radio.

[Politicub]

8. That's only 1/10th of a Bush luncheon

they believe they are above reproach.

The pukes factor in the costs of fines into thier fund raising activities.

[VolcanoJen]

9. KICK!!

:dem: