Campaign watchdog won’t reconsider penalty against Let’s Go Washington

By Jerry Cornfield Washington State Standard For the Tacoma Daily Index • October 28, 2024 1:30 am
Jerry Cornfield/Washington State Standard Let’s Go Washington, a political committee, was fined by the state Public Disclosure Commission for not obtaining and disclosing information from firms hired to gather signatures for seven initiatives, four of which are on the November 2024 ballot. These boxes contain signed petitions for one of them, Initiative 2109, which would repeal Washington state’s capital gains tax.
Jerry Cornfield/Washington State Standard Let’s Go Washington, a political committee, was fined by the state Public Disclosure Commission for not obtaining and disclosing information from firms hired to gather signatures for seven initiatives, four of which are on the November 2024 ballot. These boxes contain signed petitions for one of them, Initiative 2109, which would repeal Washington state’s capital gains tax.

Let’s Go Washington won’t get another shot at convincing the state’s Public Disclosure Commission that it did not violate campaign finance laws.

Commissioners on Thursday said they would not reconsider their Oct. 9 ruling that the political committee failed to obtain and disclose information on payments to subvendors used by firms it hired to gather signatures for a slate of initiatives, including the four on the November ballot.

That ruling also found Let’s Go Washington did not hand over financial records in a timely fashion as it took a July subpoena before the group produced 9,000 pages of materials.

The commission levied a $20,000 fine, then suspended half as long as $10,000 was paid in 30 days and the committee “uses due diligence to determine if subvendors were used by its contracted vendors.”

On Thursday, Callie Castillo, an attorney for Let’s Go Washington, asked the panel to reconsider that ruling.

Castillo said since the ruling came out, the committee checked with the firms involved and none used subvendors – just as Let’s Go Washington maintained during proceedings before the commission – and thus there was no violation. Individuals who circulated petitions and collected signatures were paid as independent contractors, not subvendors, she said.

She also argued Let’s Go Washington had not slow-walked providing documents as commission staff alleged.

Assistant Attorney General Chad Standifer, who represents agency staff who conducted the investigation, implored commissioners to not reconsider their decision.

He argued the committee was trying to “re-argue the case” as nothing had changed since commissioners held a hearing Oct. 3 on charges filed by staff. He contended that the information about individual signature gatherers should have been presented then.

Commissioners, after hearing from both lawyers, voted 4-0 without debate to deny the committee’s request.

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