Hey, remember December 17, when I broke the news that Lt. Gov. John Rodgers’ campaign had reported spending 31.5% more money than it had received? (His final filing for 2024 reported receiving $216,468 and spending $288,588.01.) Curious thing for a tough-minded fiscal conservative, right?
Now, remember when someone in The Respectable Media finally deigned to report on Rodgers’ faulty filings?
One and a half months later?
Yeah, watchdogs, hahaha. (VTDigger, which couldn’t wait to breathlessly inform us that U.S. Rep. Becca Balint’s leadership PAC received small quantities of corporate cash, which is absolutely legal, has yet to publish a goddamn word about Rodgers’ violations of the law. Vermont Public, also silent.)
That single published report about Rodgers’ faulty filings, by Seven Days’ Kevin McCallum, quoted campaign manager Rep. Casey Toof as attributing the gross discrepancy to a pair of whopper-sized bookkeeping errors. McCallum also quoted Rodgers as whining about how hard it is to comply with campaign finance law.
Oh, boo hoo hoo, Johnny, everybody else manages to do it. Why not you, or your experienced politician of a campaign manager?
But enough about the past. Let’s bring things up to date.
We’re now in mid-August, six and a half months since McCallum’s piece was published and nine long months since Toof & Co. filed a massively incorrect campaign finance report. And so far, neither Rodgers nor Toof has bothered to correct their campaign finance filings. He is still officially carrying a deficit of $68,120.01 from the 2024 campaign.
Oh, but wait, there’s more.
Constant readers will recall, surely they will, that the first filing deadline for the 2026 campaign occurred on July 1.
And Rodgers has yet to file a report.
That’s right, he hasn’t bothered to correct his deeply flawed 2024 figures, and now he’s blown right by the first deadline of the 2026 cycle.
This guy.
This guy, who we’re supposed to take seriously as a potential future governor, but who can’t keep his own books straight or take the time to comply with state law.
I guess that’s just part of his roguish charm.
And it doesn’t look like our political media are in any kind of hurry to follow up on this story. Too bad. The people ought to know what this guy thinks of campaign finance law.
The Vermont Political Observer. 
I’m still waiting on public accountability for Rodgers hooking his wagon to that proven and unrepentant rapist Trump and then attacking then LtG Zuckerman for daring to make personal hygiene products freely available in a place where they weren’t previously available.
It’s not just the transparency stuff … it’s enough to say there’s personal traits that need discussing.
John, you know it’s different if you are a Republican.
What are you going to do when he is governor in two years?
You have a much higher opinion of his electability than I do.
That’s because he’s nowhere as dumb as you think he is despite the typos. Mike Pieciak is my guy, anyone else will get annihilated.
I don’t think he’s dumb. I do think he’s careless about grammar and campaign finance, which are not great indicators for his ability to govern a state. He’s also got quite the temper, as seen in his continuing dispute with his own home town. And some of his views are out there in RFK-land.