Bloggers file ethics complaint against Arkansas attorney general, two lawmakers and related PACs

Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin

‘Frivolous,” officials say of allegations of campaign finance impropriety

By Sonny Albarado, Arkansas Advocate

Complaints filed with the Arkansas Ethics Commission this week claim three Republican state officials and political action committees tied to them “appear to have repeatedly and willfully violated” state campaign finance law.

The co-founders of an online legislation tracking and analysis firm said in a press release Friday that they’d filed the complaints with the ethics panel. By law, the ethics commission cannot confirm it received the complaints.

The 29-page package provided by ArkLeg Bill Tracker co-founder Janie Ginocchio alleges that Attorney General Tim Griffin, state Rep. David Ray, R-Maumelle, and state Sen. Ben Gilmore, R-Crossett, and PACs associated with them violated campaign contribution limits and prohibitions on illegal coordination of contributions, the use of public property for campaign purposes and public servants receiving outside payment for carrying out official duties.

“The enclosed materials detail a pattern of conduct centered on Attorney General Tim Griffin and his PAC, Jobs and Growth (JAG PAC), which allegedly utilized a network of controlled PACs — including those operated by his campaign manager, Rep. David Ray; Sen. Ben Gilmore; and associates of the Gilmore Strategy Group — to launder contributions, evade contribution limits, and obscure the true source of campaign funds,” a letter accompanying the complaints states.

Ginocchio’s complaints also allege that Ray’s receipt of campaign funds from Griffin, while a sitting legislator who filed bills affecting the attorney general’s office, created a severe conflict of interest and the appearance of quid pro quo.”

Ray, Gilmore and Griffin all characterized the complaints as frivolous and politically motivated.

The package of complaints include allegations that:

• Griffin illegally accepted over-the-limit campaign contributions, used state resources for campaign purposes and “convert[ed] campaign funds into a personal slush fund to pay for official government operations.”
• Griffin’s political action committee, Jobs and Growth PAC, violated state ethics law by using a state vehicle owned by the attorney general’s office for campaign-related purposes.
• Ray improperly accepted more than $130,000 in cash from Griffin’s campaign during legislative sessions, “constituting unlawful outside compensation for his official duties as a state legislator” and that the payments coincided with Ray’s sponsorship of several bills that expanded the power of the attorney general’s office.
• A network of PACs controlled by Griffin, Gilmore, Ray and Gilmore Strategy Group, owned by the senator’s brother Jon Gilmore, “worked in concert” to conceal the true source of funds to Griffin’s campaign.
• Gilmore Strategy Group PAC made contributions over the campaign finance maximum of $3,300 per election to Griffin’s campaign.
• Base Point PAC, the senator’s political action committee, made over-the-limit contributions to Griffin’s campaign.

In a text to the Advocate, Griffin said: “These politically-motivated complaints are a total joke and are deeply unserious to anyone who knows anything about Arkansas law. My campaign and political action committee go to great lengths to follow all applicable laws and rules, and I look forward to this frivolous complaint being dismissed.”

“It is without a doubt a frivolous attack against me and other conservative Republicans,” Ben Gilmore said in an email, “and it is without question politically motivated. As always, I will continue to follow the law and should the Ethics Commission contact me, I will work with them to prove that to be the case.”

Ray said the complaint “might be the dumbest thing I’ve ever read. It is completely false, totally frivolous, and not even worth the paper it’s printed on. These left-wing activists are attacking me because I’m an effective Republican legislator and they don’t like my politics. I am not intimidated by their baseless attacks — in fact, they only motivate me to work even harder to advance conservative policies and principles.”

Ginocchio also filed ethics complaints against Lt. Gov. Leslie Rutledge and Secretary of State Cole Jester for filing incomplete and inaccurate campaign finance reports.

File image via Arkansas Advocate

The Arkansas Advocate is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to tough, fair daily reporting and investigative journalism that holds public officials accountable and focuses on the relationship between the lives of Arkansans and public policy.