Earlier this month, State Senator Carole Migden sued the state’s campaign finance watchdog. Today, the watchdog fired back – with a howitzer. The Fair Political Practices Commission filed a counter-suit in federal court against the District 3 senator seeking $9 MILLION in potential damages. This comes on top of the record-breaking $350,000 the commission fined Migden last week for 89 different campaign finance violations.
At issue in Migden’s lawsuit and the FPPC’s counter-suit is nearly $1 million in cash that the commission has barred her from spending. (See earlier blog entries and also “Migden sues the FPPC” in last week’s issue) But the FPPC’s counter-suit today alleges EVEN MORE irregularities in Migden’s bookkeeping. From a commission press release: “Migden … failed to report a number of large transactions entirely, while reporting other large transactions which simply never occurred.” When I asked FPPC spokesman Roman Porter to explain these new charges in more detail, he would only tell me that the Senator’s campaigns have “had significant issues with regard to reporting.” Porter would not elaborate, but he did repeat the word “significant” twice, with emphasis.