jon motl copp
sandefur also texas?
MSSA
AUGUST 27, 2016 BY MSSA·COMMENTS OFF ON NEWS RELEASE – POLITICAL PRACTICES
NEWS RELEASE
MONTANA GUN GROUP DEMANDS ANSWERS FROM POLITICAL PRACTICES
MOTL MISTAKES USED TO JUSTIFY DEROGATORY DECISION
(for immediate release, August 27, 2016)
MISSOULA – Montana’s primer advocate for gun owners has demanded answers
to critical questions from the political appointee currently enforcing
campaign laws in Montana. Gary Marbut, president of the Montana
Shooting Sports Association (MSSA) sent a letter
progunleaders.org/Roberts_v_MSSA2/
Friday to Jonathan Motl, the controversial Commissioner of Political
Practices (COPP), asking how the Commissioner could justify using wrong
facts in a Decision derogatory to MSSA.
Marbut says that Motl’s handling of a Complaint about MSSA showed bias
and impropriety from the beginning because Motl chose to not publish
Marbut’s April 14th Response
progunleaders.org/Roberts_v_MSSA/
to the Complaint in the public space of the COPP Website, although Motl
did choose to publish both the Complaint and his Decision there. “This
one-sided use of public funds makes the Commissioner’s effort look like
a dedicated attempt to smear MSSA and me,” Marbut said. About Motl’s
publication of the Complaint but non-publication of Marbut’s Response,
Marbut’s letter asks, “Am I being treated fairly?”
In his August 16th Decision,
http://politicalpractices.mt.gov/content/2recentdecisions/RobertsVMSSADecision
Motl claims that Marbut and/or MSSA violated public disclosure law when
a submitted form failed to include a list of candidates MSSA would
support in the 2014 Primary Election. However, the Decision also admits
that the required list was indeed submitted. (Finding of Fact No 14:)
“The Commissioner determines that the disclosure set out in FOF No. 14
meets the requirements of Montana law.” (Decision, Page 8) The problem,
it seems, is that COPP attached the MSSA-provided list to the wrong COPP
form when two forms and the list arrived in the same envelope at the
COPP office. This error by COPP, Motl claims, proves that MSSA broke
the law.
In his August 25th letter to Motl, Marbut asks if it wasn’t actually
COPP that “fell short of its responsibility to keep the public informed
by failing to attach the provided list of candidates to the correct COPP
form.”
Motl’s Decision also faults MSSA for not providing quarterly Federal
Election Commission (FEC) reports to COPP. Motl’s Decision states, “…
MSSA filed no copies of its federal PAC (Political Action Committee, GM)
reports with COPP.” (Decision, Page 4) Rebutting this factually
incorrect claim by COPP, Marbut offers evidence in his letter to Motl
that he sent 37 quarterly FEC reports (also publicly available from the
FEC Website), not just the four reports Motl wanted, to COPP by email
when asked for them by COPP. Marbut also offers to send Motl a copy of
the email in which COPP acknowledged receipt of this decade of FEC reports.
In the section of Marbut’s letter addressing this SNAFU by COPP, Marbut
asks, “Does this flaw cause COPP to have failed in its due diligence to
have properly investigated this matter before issuing its derogatory
Decision?”
In his letter, Marbut asks several other relevant questions about Motl’s
conduct, rationale, and conclusions in this matter.
Commissioner Motl has shown a history of feeding his side of a case to
the media, while those subject to his enforcement action suffer bad
publicity in legally advisable silence. In order to correct this unfair
advantage wielded by Motl, Marbut has chosen to go public with his
Response to the original Complaint (previously hidden from public view
by Motl) and with his related questions for Motl about the recent
Decision. Marbut says, “With fair, open, and equal public disclosure of
the false facts used by Motl to justify his Decision in this case, and
exposure of a biased process, let the public examine those facts and
make up their own minds.”
Marbut concluded, “The power inherent in government offices must not be
used in attempt to punish or silence political opposition. The people
will not allow that to become standard practice to be used by whatever
clique is currently in power.”
– 30 –
Information: Gary Marbut, 549-1252 or gary(AT)marbut(DOT)com
Original Complaint:
http://politicalpractices.mt.gov/content/2recentdecisions/RobertsvMontanaShootingSprotsAssociationPoliticalCommitteeComplaint
Response to Complaint:
progunleaders.org/Roberts_v_MSSA/
COPP Decision:
http://politicalpractices.mt.gov/content/2recentdecisions/RobertsVMSSADecision
Letter of questions about Decision:
progunleaders.org/Roberts_v_MSSA2/
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http://cordilleramontana.worldnow.com/story/31605421/motl-takes-the-stand-in-wittich-dark-money-trial
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Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motl
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Art Wittich
HELENA -
The state’s top campaign cop took the witness stand Wednesday in the high-profile trial on “dark money” involving state lawmaker Art Wittich, testifying that Wittich illegally coordinated his campaign with a secretive web of conservative political groups.
Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motl told the Helena jury that the groups provided Wittich with far more campaign services and assistance than he paid for, in his 2010 campaign for the state Senate.
By accepting or knowing of those services, Wittich received illegal corporate contributions, Motl said.
The groups affiliated with the anti-union National Right to Work Committee also didn’t report their spending or donors – a classic case of “dark money” trying to illegally influence elections in Montana, Motl said.
“(They) not only did not disclose in-kind contributions, they didn’t even register,” he testified. “That is dark money. It is dark in every way you can get.
“It’s not disclosed by the entity that made the contribution to the candidate. It’s not disclosed by the candidate.”
Yet Wittich’s attorney – Quentin Rhoades of Missoula– later pressed Motl to point to any email or document that proved Wittich knew about the groups’ efforts, or asked for anything he didn’t pay for.
Rhoades said the communications between Wittich and some of the groups are related to direct-mail and other services that Wittich legally bought from campaign consultants and companies affiliated with Right to Work.
He also suggested that Motl investigated Wittich because of a personal bias against so-called “dark money” and groups that successfully overturned a Montana ban on corporate campaign spending – groups represented by Wittich’s Bozeman law firm.
“Why didn’t you disclose that bias in your direct examination?” Rhoades asked Motl under cross-examination. “If you had a bias that was relevant … it would have been something to disclose to all of us, so we could take that into account.”
Motl replied that his bias against dark money is a “positive bias,” because it’s his job as commissioner to police elections in Montana and enforce campaign-disclosure laws.
Wittich, a Republican state representative from Bozeman, is accused of accepting illegal corporate campaign contributions and illegally coordinating his campaign with the Right to Work groups, which sent mailers attacking one of his GOP primary opponents in 2010.
Wittich went on to win the election and served one term as state senator, before deciding in 2014 to run for the state House. He won that election and is up for re-election this year.
If the six-man, six-woman jury finds that Wittich broke campaign laws, he could be fined or removed from office.
Wittich is expected to testify Thursday in his behalf.
But Wednesday was dominated by Motl’s testimony and cross-examination.
Motl, the state commissioner of political practices since mid-2013, has forged a reputation as an aggressive commissioner who has said he wants to rigorously enforce Montana’s laws requiring disclosure of campaign spending.
He also has cleared a sizable backlog of cases before the commissioner’s office. His term expires at the end of this year.
Motl outlined to the jury his investigation of Wittich and eight other Montana Republicans accused of getting help from eight groups affiliated with the National Right to Work Committee.
The groups provided a wide array of services to chosen, conservative candidates in 2010 and didn’t charge for most of those services, he said, thus creating “in-kind” corporate donations, which are illegal.
Wittich didn’t report receiving or paying for most of those services, Motl maintained – and knew about the broad effort by the groups on his behalf.
“My opinion is that Mr. Wittich coordinated with the umbrella group of National Right to Work corporations,” he said.
Rhoades, however, said the contacts between Wittich and the groups are easily explainable, because Wittich not only bought campaign services from them, such as direct-mail pieces, but also represented one of them in a landmark court case against Montana’s restrictions against corporate campaign spending.
The case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which struck down Montana’s law in 2012.
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https://montanafreepress.org/:{2018/03/12/}:right-to-work-shady-activities/
no lmx many
CAMPAIGN SPENDING / ELECTIONS / NEWS / POLITICS / MARCH 12, 2018
Complaint: Dark Money Right to Work Group Engaged in Illegal Political Activities
Republican Kalispell Rep. Frank Garner files complaint against group, which was at the center of allegations of illegal third-party influence in state primaries in 2008, 2010 and 2012
HELENA — A group at the center of one of the biggest elections scandals in modern Montana history is actively engaged in the 2018 election, while hiding its activities and spending, according to a complaint filed with state elections regulators.
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Kalispell Republican Rep. Frank Garner said in a complaint filed March 6 with the Montana Commissioner of Political Practices that a field operative for Montana Citizens for Right to Work is actively recruiting candidates to run against him in House District 7. Garner said that activity is illegal because the group has not registered with state elections officials as required by law.
Kalispell Republican Rep. Frank Garner filed a complaint against an operative for Montana Citizens for Right to Work for what he says are illegal campaign activities. Courtesy photo.
“It appears as if these groups are back and are trying to corrupt our election system once again,” Garner wrote in his complaint.
The complaint stems from a meeting that Montana Citizens for Right to Work assistant director Al Chan allegedly held on Feb. 28 in Kalispell with members of the Flathead County Libertarian Party. According to Kalispell resident Dan Nelson, who said he was at the meeting, the purpose of the confab was for Chan to recruit candidates to run against Garner in the June 5 Republican primary. Nelson later provided Garner with a detailed written account of the meeting, which Garner attached to the complaint.
“Al [Chan] said he did not like Garner and talked about him being a liberal and listed off several bills Garner either supported or was against in what seemed to be a negative fashion,” Nelson stated in his account. “Only one of the bills and issue [sic] he talked about as it was related to Garner was related to the Right to Work issue. Al said he also had a personal beef with Frank Garner and implied he had met him before and didn’t like him. Al did not specify what his issue was or why.”
Garner said in an interview that Chan contacted him in February and tried to set up a meeting. Garner said he refused to meet with Chan because of Right to Work’s shady history with Montana elections.
Chan did not return multiple requests for comment via phone and email.
Calls and emails to Randy Pope, executive director of the Belgrade-based Montana Citizens for Right to Work, also went unanswered.
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Montana Citizens for Right to Work, along with its national affiliate, the National Right to Work Committee, was at the center of wide-ranging political corruption scandal in Montana covering the 2008 to 2012 election cycles. Tens of thousands of pages of documents obtained by the state Commissioner of Political Practices revealed how the national anti-union group oversaw the activities of American Tradition Partnership, the group at the center of allegations of illegal third-party influence in Montana Republican primary campaigns in 2008, 2010 and 2012.
Montana Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motlreviews documents in the basement of his Helena office that connect the National Right to Work Committee to political campaign activities in Montana during the 2010 Republican primary election. Photo by John S. Adams, Montana Free Press.
The lengthy investigation spanned years and resulted in former Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motl in 2014 pursuing nine Republican candidates on allegations of illegal coordination and failure to report campaign contributions stemming from the 2010 Republican primary elections.
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Five Republican plaintiffs eventually settled with Motl, and two others had default judgments entered against them. The settlements and judgments included financial penalties and signed admissions by some of the candidates that they violated state elections laws by illegally coordinating with third-party political groups.
Bozeman Republican Rep. Art Wittich, was among those who faced illegal coordination allegations.
After a protracted legal battle, Wittich faced a four-day trial in the spring of 2016 that featured testimony from former Right to Work staffers who helped run the network of private and non-profit companies involved in the massive campaign scheme.
At the trial’s conclusion, a jury found Wittich broke Montana law by illegally coordinating with Right to Work-connected groups during his 2010 Senate primary campaign. A judge ordered Wittich to pay $68,232.58 in fines. In a 5-0 decision in August 2017, the Montana Supreme Court affirmed the jury’s verdict.
One final candidate, Terry Bannan, of Belgrade, is still facing allegations of illegal campaign coordination stemming from the 2010 Right to Work scandal. Wittich is representing Bannan in those legal proceedings.
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The Commissioner of Political Practices is currently suing Montana Citizens for Right to Work and its affiliated organizations for their alleged illegal activities in the 2010 and 2012 elections cycles. That case has not yet been scheduled for trial.
Documents obtained by the Montana Free Press indicate that Montana Citizens for Right to Work has been actively participating in Montana elections since as far back as2008. However, state records show the organization has not registered with the Commissioner of Political Practices, nor has it reported any political activities or election-related spending since at least 2012.
Under Montana campaign finance laws, political committees must file a statement of organization “within five days after appointing a campaign treasurer or making an expenditure to support or oppose a candidate or ballot issue, whichever occurs first.”
The extent of Montana Citizens for Right to Work’s political activities during the six years is unclear, but evidence obtained by the Montana Free Press suggests the group was spending money on election-related activity in the state.
Page 186 of Documents detail Right to Work's involvement in MT DocumentCloud
Page 186 of Documents detail Right to Work's involvement in MT
Contributed to DocumentCloud by John Adams of Montana Free Press • View document
Anonymous hit counter for DocumentCloud
On his LinkedIn page — which as of March 6 had been removed from the popular professional networking website — Al Chan listed his job as “Assistan [sic] Executive Director at Montana Citizens For Right To Work,” a Bozeman-based position he stated he has held since January.
Chan’s LinkedIn profile also stated he worked for the National Right to Work Committee out of Bozeman from August 2014 through December 2014. Chan lists his work experience during that time as “strategic campaign consulting, executing campaign strategies, and secur[ing] pledges from state House/Senate candidates via survey program.”
[Editor’s Note: See DocumentCloud viewer at the bottom of this story to examine additional documents, including Chan’s résumé.]
Chan previously worked for the National Right to Work Committee in Washington statefrom April 2016 to January 2018, according to his online resume, which was also recently removed.
Chan also listed a three-and-a-half-month stint as a “Right to Work Committee” field staffer based in Manhattan, Montana during the 2014 election season.
According to his resume, as a Montana field staffer in 2014, Chan:
“Met with candidates for state house and senate for the purposes of candidate recruitment and candidate vetting”;
“Secured pledgesto support Right-to-Work legislation from state house/senate candidates via a survey program”;
“Facilitated mass communications with pro-Right-to-Work voters in targeted state house/senate districts via direct mail.”
Chan also listed having worked as a Livingston-based Right to Work field staffer from Sept. 2 to Nov. 15, 2012, during which time he “facilitated mass communications with pro-Right-to-Work voters in targeted state house/senate districts via direct mail.”
Right to Work was not registered as a political committee, and none of these activities were reported to the state, according to Commissioner of Political Practices records.
Sarah Arnold, a former Right to Work staffer, testifies during the 2016 trial of Art Wittich, a former Republican lawmaker a jury found illegally coordinated with the organization during his 2010 Senate primary campaign. Photo courtesy Kim Reed.
Sarah Arnold, a former Right to Work staffer who provided in-depth testimony about the inner workings of the Right to Work campaign machine during the Wittich trial, said in an interview Friday that it’s inconceivable Chan could have executed the tasks he claims to have done in Montana in 2012 and 2014 without spending money.
“It sounds to me like they’re asking for another complaint,” Arnold said when reached Friday at her home in Colorado. “They [Right to Work] are clearly trying to do something under the radar, which is shifty. This definitely sounds to me like they’re trying to keep things hidden, given their previous work.”
Arnold said when she worked for Right to Work,direct mail survey campaignsalone cost upward of 60 cents per mail piece. That cost did not include time and labor expenses, Arnold said.
“You can’t do direct mail without spending money,” Arnold said. “At minimum you have to pay for postage and printing.”
Federal tax records indicate that salaries were paid toMontana Citizens for Right to Work employees by a group called Conservative Action League, which lists its address as a post office box in Springfield, Virginia.
Montana Citizens for Right to Work sends out surveys like this one to candidates running for office. The group then uses the responses to the survey to vet candidates and attack candidates who don’t respond or don’t support “Right to Work’s” agenda, according to former Right ot Work staffers. Courtesy photo.
According to IRS 990 records,Conservative Action League received $820,000 from the National Right to Work Committeebetween 2014 and 2016. IRS 990 records for 2017 were not immediately available.
It’s unclear how much money the Conservative Action League spent in Montana in salaries or other grants. According to records from 2014 and 2015, the group paid at least $154,182 to “Western States Right to Work,” which is the group that includes Montana Citizens for Right to Work.
Arnold said when she worked in Montana for the Right to Work-affiliated groups she was paid directly by the National Right to Work Committee.
“I’m not sure why they would put it through another group unless the other group is trying to hide something,” Arnold said.
Garner was not aware of the group’s source of funding until contacted by the Montana Free Press.
“People have to decide if they want to be represented by citizen legislators — people they see in the street or in their grocery store every day — or if they want to be represented by dark money groups funded out of a P.O. Box in Virginia,” Garner said. “That’s why I felt I had to bring this information to the commissioner. This isn’t my first run-in with dark money groups, but this is my first complaint. Enough is enough.”
Americans for Prosperity went door to door on March 3 handing out flyers criticizing Kalispell Republican Rep. Frank Garner for his support of increasing the gas tax to help fund highway construction. Photo: AFP-Montana’s Facebook page.
Garner has been in the crosshairs of dark money political groups since 2015, his freshman year in the House.
In February of that year, in the midst of the legislative session, the Koch Brothers-funded Americans for Prosperity held a “town hall” meeting in Garner’s district and didn’t invite the lawmaker to attend. According to the Flathead Beacon, a crowd of about 100 people attended the event at the Red Lion Inn in Kalispell. Some of them received word about the gathering through the postcard mailers, which read, “Tell Frank Garner to stand with us and vote no on ObamaCare’s expansion in Montana.”
Garner came under attack from AFP again over the weekend when the group went door-to-door handing out postcards criticizing Garner for his support of a 2017 bill to increase the gas tax. That measure passed the Republican-controlled House 57-43.
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Robert Welzel, of Kalispell, filed in January to challenge Garner in the Republican primary. Candidate filing closes March 12.
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Garner is expected to face an aggressive third-party campaign between now and the June 5 primary election.
“It would be nice if we were on a level playing field,” Garner said of the outside spending by third-party groups.
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Garner said as a part-time citizen legislator, he’s required to report who supports his campaign, including their name, occupation and address. The same is not true for dark money groups who are not required to report the names of their donors or, in some cases, their expenditures.
“In this case, you have groups whose avocation it is to promote their mission, with unlimited amounts of money, who don’t have to tell us who their donors are, and in many cases what their expenses are, as long as they are engaged in so-called issue advocacy,” Garner said. “If we allow dark money groups to spend unlimited amounts of money against people in an elected office, with no controls, no regulations, and aren’t required to follow the rules, then we might as well give them our seats and let them vote for us.”
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404 elsewhere
https://flatheadbeacon.com/2016/11/01/montana-official-national-group-broke-disclosure-law-court-race/
Montana Official: National Group Broke Disclosure Law in Court Race
Republican State Leadership Committee's Judicial Fairness Initiative has until Wednesday to file campaign finance report
BY MATT VOLZ, ASSOCIATED PRESS // NOV 1, 2016
HELENA — A national organization that seeks to elect conservative judges blatantly violated state law by not reporting $268,000 that was used for attack ads against a Montana Supreme Court candidate, the state’s campaign finance regulator said Tuesday.
Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motl gave the Republican State Leadership Committee’s Judicial Fairness Initiativeuntil 3 p.m. Wednesday to register and file a campaign finance report detailing where the money came from.
“I fully expect them to comply,” Motl said. “If they don’t, we have options available.” Those options include having a judge issue an order for the organization to show cause.
Motl’s decision is the latest development in the highly contentious race between District Judge Dirk Sandefur of Great Falls and University of Montana adjunct law professor Kristen Juras for an open seat on the state’s highest court. The nonpartisan race has seen a flood of outside money with partisan interests, including the RSLC cash that helps Juras and about $60,000 from the state Democratic Party, which is backing Sandefur. Republican State Leadership Committee spokeswoman Ellie Hockenbury did not have an immediate comment.
The RSLC money went to a political committee called Stop Set ‘Em Free Sandefur, which used the cash to create a website, ad and mailers portraying Sandefur soft on crime. The anti-Sandefur organization reported in its campaign finance filings that the source of the money was the RSLC’s Montana-registered political committee.
However, that committee did not disclose any spending in that amount, prompting a complaint by the executive director of the Montana Trial Lawyers Association, which backs Sandefur.
Motl said he talked to the RSLC’s attorney, who told Motl that the money actually came from a different RSLC-affiliated group that is registered with the IRS as a tax-exempt 527 organization and is therefore not regulated by any campaign practice laws.
Motl, in the decision, called that position “foolhardy” and said the group’s IRS status does not exempt it from registering as a political committee when it is active in a Montana election.
“It is hard to fathom the logic of this attempt to avoid Montana reporting and disclosure laws,” Motl wrote in the decision.
The commissioner ordered the group to report and disclose the $268,000 it received in contributions and expenditures. He also ordered the anti-Sandefur political committee and the RSLC’s Montana political committee to update their filings.
Campaign violations are usually resolved through a cash settlement negotiated by the commissioner’s office and the violator, but they can go to court if a settlement is not reached.
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