{"id":1490,"date":"2014-10-31T17:39:21","date_gmt":"2014-10-31T21:39:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/?p=1490"},"modified":"2024-08-05T14:36:49","modified_gmt":"2024-08-05T18:36:49","slug":"yes-coalition-files-complaint-with-the-board-of-elections-against-the-no-coalition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/?p=1490","title":{"rendered":"Yes Coalition Files Complaint with Board of Elections; BOE Rules on Complaint (Updated Oct. 31)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Coalition<\/a>

Included in RenewRI Complaint: Coalition for Responsible Government’s Billboard on Route 95 without Required Disclosures<\/p><\/div>\n

On Monday, October 27, RenewRI, the coalition leading the yes campaign on the constitutional convention referendum in Rhode Island, filed<\/a>\u00a0a complaint with the Rhode Island Board of Elections concerning the campaign finance disclosures of The Coalition for Responsible Government, the coalition leading the no campaign.\u00a0 \u00a0The RenewRI press release<\/a> accompanying the complaint includes the following summary:<\/p>\n

RenewRI, the pro-Constitutional Convention coalition, filed a complaint with the Rhode Island Board of Elections this morning, listing violations of Rhode Island election laws for two billboards, two internet web pages, and an Internet video published by Citizens for Responsible Government (CFRG) and their twenty-one coalition members who oppose a constitutional convention. The billboards were posted the first week of October, and the Internet video first appeared on September 28th. In the complaint RenewRI details how the CFRG has flouted Rhode Island laws that protect voters\u2019 right to know who is funding ballot advocacy campaigns.<\/p>\n

The Providence Journal<\/em> reported<\/a> on the filing of the complaint the same day and Tim Murphy, a RenewRi member, followed up with an op-ed published<\/a> in the Providence Journal<\/em> the following day.<\/p>\n

On October 28, Richard Thornton from the Rhode Island Board of Elections agreed to hold a hearing<\/a> regarding the complaint on October 30 at 2:15 pm. \u00a0That’s a remarkably quick turnaround (two days), but the close of the polls was only five days away and voting had already begun.<\/p>\n

Enforcement of election laws during the last week of a campaign is a chronic problem because there isn\u2019t time to research violations and the post-election sanctions are often inadequate to deter violations.\u00a0 This is especially a problem for constitutional convention referendums. The committees that fund such elections can disband immediately after and since such a referendum is essentially a one-time event\u2014there is no future election or political career, such as with a candidate election\u2014the practical possibilities for deterrence are weak.<\/p>\n

In America, the primary deterrent for violating the laws of politics is\u00a0the political process, not the courts. \u00a0Not only are courts very slow and expensive, but we generally want to keep courts as far removed as possible from making political decisions–unless they can rely on bright line rules. \u00a0Near the end of an election cycle, the primary job of the Board of Elections is to ferret out the facts in a timely way so the public can make its own judgment.<\/p>\n

J.H. Snider and Beverly Clay\u00a0wrote<\/a> about Rhode Island\u2019s poor history of enforcing\u00a0campaign finance laws with regard to the constitutional convention referendum in an op-ed published in the Providence Journal<\/em> earlier this year.\u00a0 For additional details, see the documents we posted<\/a>\u00a0here\u00a0on RhodeIslandConCon.info\u00a0concerning the 2004 constitutional convention referendum.\u00a0 Tim Murphy\u2019s op-ed\u00a0adds<\/a> to that\u00a0historical analysis while also covering the current election.<\/p>\n

Update\u00a0Added October 31, 2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

On October 30, 2014, the Board of Elections held a public hearing on the RenewRI complaint. \u00a0The result of the hearing was that the Board of Elections agreed with\u00a017 of 22 alleged violations \u00a0and issued a warning to The Coalition for Responsible Government, which said it had already addressed most of the complaints but that its billboard could not be fixed in as timely a manner because its printer was in Colorado. \u00a0RenewRI claimed that the Coalition’s video still had not been fixed. \u00a0 By 11:00 pm on\u00a0October 31, the video was fixed, with the view count reset to zero.<\/p>\n

The Coalition for Responsible Government appears to have been\u00a0better represented than RenewRI. \u00a0It had a lawyer; RenewRI did not. \u00a0One participant at the hearing had the impression that questions from\u00a0the Executive Director of the Board of Elections to the defendants indicated that a\u00a0Coalition representative had\u00a0privately made the Coalition’s\u00a0case to the Board of Elections prior to the hearing. \u00a0We are not aware that such behavior would be illegal in Rhode Island. \u00a0Nevertheless, it would be\u00a0striking behavior because in judicial proceedings conducted by the judicial branch of government a judge is not allowed to privately consult with counsel representing one of the two sides. \u00a0In federal administrative proceedings, when an advocate lobbies a decision maker on an active proceeding, he must file an ex parte<\/em> disclosing the time, place, and subject matter of the meeting with the decision maker.<\/p>\n

As of 4:00 pm on Friday, the Board of Elections had\u00a0not posted either minutes or the audio recording of yesterday’s meeting, so confirming\u00a0details as to what happened was difficult. \u00a0A call to the Executive Director\u00a0late Friday afternoon indicated that minutes wouldn’t be available before the election. \u00a0The audio recording would be made available upon request but could not be requested from the person responsible for them\u00a0until Monday (one day before the election) at the earliest. \u00a0The lack of timely access to webcasts of its public hearing is a great problem because enforcement of campaign finance laws primarily relies on public opinion. \u00a0If the public lacks timely access to relevant evidence because the Board of Elections uses archaic information systems that favor insiders, this would be inconsistent with the intent of the campaign finance laws, which is\u00a0to implement the core democratic principle of political equality in an effective way.<\/p>\n

The Executive Director of the Board of Elections agreed\u00a0that the Coalition for Responsible Government had\u00a0failed to\u00a0make legally required disclosures but criticized RenewRI for waiting until 10 days before the election before filing its complaint. \u00a0The implication was that the delay was politically motivated. \u00a0No explanation was provided as to why allowing misleading advertising that favored its opponent would be in RenewRI’s interest.<\/p>\n

The criticism revealed a vital insight into how the Board of Elections views its job. \u00a0It doesn’t view its job as investigating violations of the law, only responding to complaints by interested parties who allege a violation of the law. \u00a0An uniformed voter might presume that the Board of Elections would have an independent interest in ensuring that campaign finance disclosures were accurate, but they would be wrong. \u00a0 As a practical matter, it\u00a0views researching violations as solely the duty of the citizenry; if the citizens don’t develop a well documented, professionally written complaint the moment they discover a potential violation and then seriatim for each successively found violation, it is the citizens’ fault when the law isn’t upheld by the Board of Elections.<\/p>\n

The Executive Director of the Board of Elections\u00a0asked questions of the defendants but apparently didn’t ask them about their entity status, arguably the key\u00a0question in the complaint because if RenewRI didn’t properly file as an entity, the scope of the proceeding would be greatly expanded and include a wh0-is-who of prominent Rhode Island Interest groups: the Coalition’s\u00a0members.<\/p>\n

We\u00a0don’t understand how the law would work if the Coalition for Responsible Government didn’t properly file as an entity. \u00a0For example, the Coalition for Responsible Government must disclose the names of its contributors and the names of its five largest contributors on its mass media advertising such as billboards. \u00a0But if it weren’t the entity, then its member entities would presumably have to disclose such information. \u00a0This would probably be the subject of endless litigation stretching years into the future. \u00a0Logistically, this could work for Board of Elections campaign finance filings but it’s not clear how it could work on something such as a billboard, where if dozens of organizations had to disclose their top five contributors the billboard could have no room for any other information.<\/p>\n

It could also reveal highly sensitive information. \u00a0For example, the Rhode Island ACLU may receive a substantial fraction of its funding from its fellow Coalition members. \u00a0Currently,\u00a0\u00a0the Coalition just lists the Rhode Island ACLU as one of its top five funders with the implication that its funding\u00a0is independent of the other top four coalition members. \u00a0After the 2004 referendum to convene a constitutional convention in Rhode Island, the Rhode Island Board of Elections sent a letter<\/a> to the Rhode Island ACLU requesting that it make required disclosures. The Rhode Island ACLU had opposed the referendum as a member\u00a0of the Coalition for Representative Government. \u00a0In response, the\u00a0Rhode Island ACLU sued<\/a> the State of Rhode Island, arguing that it didn’t have to disclose its funders.<\/p>\n

The Providence Journal<\/em> covered the hearing here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

We expect to post future clarifications and updates on this issue on this page.<\/p>\n

Update\u00a0Added November 11, 2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

After many calls to the Executive Director’s assistant on November 3 and November 4, she agreed to make a copy of the October 30 hearing available on Wednesday morning, November 5. \u00a0It would be made available for pickup on a cassette tape, the type of music format\u00a0that was popular in the 1960s though the 1980s. \u00a0Thanks to Sandy Riojas, the vice president\u00a0of Operation Clean Government, for promptly picking up the tape and mailing it to J.H. Snider. \u00a0Fortunately, he\u00a0had a high quality old-fashioned cassette player. \u00a0But he\u00a0found the\u00a0voices on the cassette to be recorded at\u00a0little more than a distant whisper, as though the cassette recorder was on one side of the room and the speakers far away and without microphones linked to the recorder. Through professional equipment the voices could presumably be amplified and thus make audible, but this additional level of required effort was\u00a0too burdensome and so the effort to listen to the hearing was abandoned.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the Board of Elections is content not to have its meetings meaningfully public. \u00a0If so, such behavior\u00a0could conflict with one of its primary purposes, which is to\u00a0educate\u00a0the public about campaign finance disclosures in a timely and effective manner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Monday, October 27, RenewRI, the coalition leading the yes campaign on the constitutional convention referendum in Rhode Island, filed\u00a0a complaint with the Rhode Island Board of Elections concerning the campaign finance disclosures of The Coalition for Responsible Government, the coalition leading the no campaign.\u00a0 \u00a0The RenewRI press release accompanying the complaint includes the following […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"[caption id=\"attachment_1537\" align=\"alignnone\" width=\"719\"]\"Coalition<\/a> Included in RenewRI Complaint: Coalition for Responsible Government's Billboard on Route 95 without Required Disclosures[\/caption]\r\n\r\nOn Monday, October 27, RenewRI, the coalition leading the yes campaign on the constitutional convention referendum in Rhode Island, filed<\/a>\u00a0a complaint with the Rhode Island Board of Elections concerning the campaign finance disclosures of The Coalition for Responsible Government, the coalition leading the no campaign.\u00a0 \u00a0The RenewRI press release<\/a> accompanying the complaint includes the following summary:\r\n

RenewRI, the pro-Constitutional Convention coalition, filed a complaint with the Rhode Island Board of Elections this morning, listing violations of Rhode Island election laws for two billboards, two internet web pages, and an Internet video published by Citizens for Responsible Government (CFRG) and their twenty-one coalition members who oppose a constitutional convention. The billboards were posted the first week of October, and the Internet video first appeared on September 28th. In the complaint RenewRI details how the CFRG has flouted Rhode Island laws that protect voters\u2019 right to know who is funding ballot advocacy campaigns.<\/p>\r\nThe Providence Journal<\/em> reported<\/a> on the filing of the complaint the same day and Tim Murphy, a RenewRi member, followed up with an op-ed published<\/a> in the Providence Journal<\/em> the following day.\r\n\r\nOn October 28, Richard Thornton from the Rhode Island Board of Elections agreed to hold a hearing<\/a> regarding the complaint on October 30 at 2:15 pm. \u00a0That's a remarkably quick turnaround (two days), but the close of the polls was only five days away and voting had already begun.\r\n\r\nEnforcement of election laws during the last week of a campaign is a chronic problem because there isn\u2019t time to research violations and the post-election sanctions are often inadequate to deter violations.\u00a0 This is especially a problem for constitutional convention referendums. The committees that fund such elections can disband immediately after and since such a referendum is essentially a one-time event\u2014there is no future election or political career, such as with a candidate election\u2014the practical possibilities for deterrence are weak.\r\n\r\nIn America, the primary deterrent for violating the laws of politics is\u00a0the political process, not the courts. \u00a0Not only are courts very slow and expensive, but we generally want to keep courts as far removed as possible from making political decisions--unless they can rely on bright line rules. \u00a0Near the end of an election cycle, the primary job of the Board of Elections is to ferret out the facts in a timely way so the public can make its own judgment.\r\n\r\nJ.H. Snider and Beverly Clay\u00a0wrote<\/a> about Rhode Island\u2019s poor history of enforcing\u00a0campaign finance laws with regard to the constitutional convention referendum in an op-ed published in the Providence Journal<\/em> earlier this year.\u00a0 For additional details, see the documents we posted<\/a>\u00a0here\u00a0on RhodeIslandConCon.info\u00a0concerning the 2004 constitutional convention referendum.\u00a0 Tim Murphy\u2019s op-ed\u00a0adds<\/a> to that\u00a0historical analysis while also covering the current election.\r\n\r\nUpdate\u00a0Added October 31, 2014<\/strong>\r\n\r\nOn October 30, 2014, the Board of Elections held a public hearing on the RenewRI complaint. \u00a0The result of the hearing was that the Board of Elections agreed with\u00a017 of 22 alleged violations \u00a0and issued a warning to The Coalition for Responsible Government, which said it had already addressed most of the complaints but that its billboard could not be fixed in as timely a manner because its printer was in Colorado. \u00a0RenewRI claimed that the Coalition's video still had not been fixed. \u00a0 By 11:00 pm on\u00a0October 31, the video was fixed, with the view count reset to zero.\r\n\r\nThe Coalition for Responsible Government appears to have been\u00a0better represented than RenewRI. \u00a0It had a lawyer; RenewRI did not. \u00a0One participant at the hearing had the impression that questions from\u00a0the Executive Director of the Board of Elections to the defendants indicated that a\u00a0Coalition representative had\u00a0privately made the Coalition's\u00a0case to the Board of Elections prior to the hearing. \u00a0We are not aware that such behavior would be illegal in Rhode Island. \u00a0Nevertheless, it would be\u00a0striking behavior because in judicial proceedings conducted by the judicial branch of government a judge is not allowed to privately consult with counsel representing one of the two sides. \u00a0In federal administrative proceedings, when an advocate lobbies a decision maker on an active proceeding, he must file an ex parte<\/em> disclosing the time, place, and subject matter of the meeting with the decision maker.\r\n\r\nAs of 4:00 pm on Friday, the Board of Elections had\u00a0not posted either minutes or the audio recording of yesterday's meeting, so confirming\u00a0details as to what happened was difficult. \u00a0A call to the Executive Director\u00a0late Friday afternoon indicated that minutes wouldn't be available before the election. \u00a0The audio recording would be made available upon request but could not be requested from the person responsible for them\u00a0until Monday (one day before the election) at the earliest. \u00a0The lack of timely access to webcasts of its public hearing is a great problem because enforcement of campaign finance laws primarily relies on public opinion. \u00a0If the public lacks timely access to relevant evidence because the Board of Elections uses archaic information systems that favor insiders, this would be inconsistent with the intent of the campaign finance laws, which is\u00a0to implement the core democratic principle of political equality in an effective way.\r\n\r\nThe Executive Director of the Board of Elections agreed\u00a0that the Coalition for Responsible Government had\u00a0failed to\u00a0make legally required disclosures but criticized RenewRI for waiting until 10 days before the election before filing its complaint. \u00a0The implication was that the delay was politically motivated. \u00a0No explanation was provided as to why allowing misleading advertising that favored its opponent would be in RenewRI's interest.\r\n\r\nThe criticism revealed a vital insight into how the Board of Elections views its job. \u00a0It doesn't view its job as investigating violations of the law, only responding to complaints by interested parties who allege a violation of the law. \u00a0An uniformed voter might presume that the Board of Elections would have an independent interest in ensuring that campaign finance disclosures were accurate, but they would be wrong. \u00a0 As a practical matter, it\u00a0views researching violations as solely the duty of the citizenry; if the citizens don't develop a well documented, professionally written complaint the moment they discover a potential violation and then seriatim for each successively found violation, it is the citizens' fault when the law isn't upheld by the Board of Elections.\r\n\r\nThe Executive Director of the Board of Elections\u00a0asked questions of the defendants but apparently didn't ask them about their entity status, arguably the key\u00a0question in the complaint because if RenewRI didn't properly file as an entity, the scope of the proceeding would be greatly expanded and include a wh0-is-who of prominent Rhode Island Interest groups: the Coalition's\u00a0members.\r\n\r\nWe\u00a0don't understand how the law would work if the Coalition for Responsible Government didn't properly file as an entity. \u00a0For example, the Coalition for Responsible Government must disclose the names of its contributors and the names of its five largest contributors on its mass media advertising such as billboards. \u00a0But if it weren't the entity, then its member entities would presumably have to disclose such information. \u00a0This would probably be the subject of endless litigation stretching years into the future. \u00a0Logistically, this could work for Board of Elections campaign finance filings but it's not clear how it could work on something such as a billboard, where if dozens of organizations had to disclose their top five contributors the billboard could have no room for any other information.\r\n\r\nIt could also reveal highly sensitive information. \u00a0For example, the Rhode Island ACLU may receive a substantial fraction of its funding from its fellow Coalition members. \u00a0Currently,\u00a0\u00a0the Coalition just lists the Rhode Island ACLU as one of its top five funders with the implication that its funding\u00a0is independent of the other top four coalition members. \u00a0After the 2004 referendum to convene a constitutional convention in Rhode Island, the Rhode Island Board of Elections sent a letter<\/a> to the Rhode Island ACLU requesting that it make required disclosures. The Rhode Island ACLU had opposed the referendum as a member\u00a0of the Coalition for Representative Government. \u00a0In response, the\u00a0Rhode Island ACLU sued<\/a> the State of Rhode Island, arguing that it didn't have to disclose its funders.\r\n\r\nThe Providence Journal<\/em> covered the hearing here<\/a>.\r\n\r\nWe expect to post future clarifications and updates on this issue on this page.\r\n\r\nUpdate\u00a0Added November 11, 2014<\/strong>\r\n\r\nAfter many calls to the Executive Director's assistant on November 3 and November 4, she agreed to make a copy of the October 30 hearing available on Wednesday morning, November 5. \u00a0It would be made available for pickup on a cassette tape, the type of music format\u00a0that was popular in the 1960s though the 1980s. \u00a0Thanks to Sandy Riojas, the vice president\u00a0of Operation Clean Government, for promptly picking up the tape and mailing it to J.H. Snider. \u00a0Fortunately, he\u00a0had a high quality old-fashioned cassette player. \u00a0But he\u00a0found the\u00a0voices on the cassette to be recorded at\u00a0little more than a distant whisper, as though the cassette recorder was on one side of the room and the speakers far away and without microphones linked to the recorder. Through professional equipment the voices could presumably be amplified and thus make audible, but this additional level of required effort was\u00a0too burdensome and so the effort to listen to the hearing was abandoned.\r\n\r\nPerhaps the Board of Elections is content not to have its meetings meaningfully public. \u00a0If so, such behavior\u00a0could conflict with one of its primary purposes, which is to\u00a0educate\u00a0the public about campaign finance disclosures in a timely and effective manner.","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1490"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1490\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2195,"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1490\/revisions\/2195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rhodeisland.concon.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}