Category Archives: Campaign finance

It’s time for an outside probe of our Eternal General

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Brady Toensing, D.C. attorney and vice chair of the VTGOP, has sometimes operated as the political equivalent of an ambulance chaser — taking legal actions with an obvious partisan motive. He comes by it honestly; his mother and stepdad are notorious conservative attack dogs.

But this time, I’m with him 100%. Toensing has sent a letter to Eternal General Bill Sorrell, asking him to appoint an independent counsel to investigate Sorrell’s campaign activities.

SorrellRehabThis is the second time Toensing has made this request. The first was in October 2012, in the midst of the election campaign — which was reason enough to dismiss it as a partisan stunt. But now, the time has come. There’s enough smoke around Sorrell’s campaign activities to warrant an objective fireman. Especially since Vermont’s campaign finance law makes Bill Sorrell the sole judge and arbiter of whether Bill Sorrell has violated the law. Which Bill Sorrell assures us is not the case. Indeed, he has already rejected Toensing’s request, insisting again that he’s done nothing wrong. We just have to take his word for it, I guess.

This stinks, and if any situation required an outside probe, it’s this one.

Toensing cites four allegations:

— “Coordinated expenditures” in the hotly-contested 2012 primary. Sorrell received a late blast of money (200 G’s) from the Democratic Attorneys General Association (by way of a third party superPAC). As Toensing’s letter says: “This record-setting expenditure was controlled and directed by former Governor Howard Dean, who, at the same time, was an active, high-level agent of your campaign.”

That money was almost certainly the deciding factor in Sorrell’s whisker-thin victory over TJ Donovan. And as Toensing notes in his complaint, one month before the primary, Sorrell “revers[ed] his office policy to allow PACS to accept contributions in excess of the state limit of $2000 and still make unlimited campaign expenditures in Vermont. This action cleared the way for the unprecedented expenditures made on General Sorrell’s behalf during the primary.”

— Failure to comply with campaign finance disclosure laws mandating that a candidate report “each expenditure listed by amount, date, to whom paid, for what purpose.” As Paul Heintz has reported, Sorrell’s reports for personal-expense reimbursement have included numerous vague and incomplete entries.

— A joint appearance with Dean Corren, candidate for Lieutenant Governor, on September 15, 2014. While Sorrell has aggressively pursued Corren for accepting an email blast from the Vermont Democratic Party, he has denied any wrongdoing in his appearance with Corren. He has, in fact, claimed that the appearance was not a campaign event — which is laughable to the point of bitter tears.

— Sorrell has routinely given state business to outside law firms that have contributed heavily to his re-election campaigns. Sorrell denies any quid pro quo, but Toensing cites legal precedent that indicates “In cases involving government officials, a jury can infer guilt from evidence of benefits received and subsequent favorable treatment.”

By that standard, Sorrell’s own denials are clearly inadequate. Given his refusal to investigate himself, as Toensing says, “the appointment of an independent counsel is necessary to restore and maintain the integrity of your office.”

I fully expect Bill Sorrell to refuse this very reasonable request for an objective probe of Bill Sorrell. At that point, we will turn to other Democratic officeholders for leadership. Governor Shumlin has repeatedly ducked questions about Sorrell’s activities, while Secretary of State Jim Condos has said his office lacks the standing to investigate.

Well, standing or no, Shumlin and Condos have their bully pulpits. It’s time to put them to use. They don’t have to throw Sorrell under the bus; all they have to do is say “There are questions that deserve answers, and the only way to restore public trust is through an independent counsel.”

Heck, if they want to, they can even throw in a gratuitous “I’m sure the investigation will show that General Sorrell acted properly.” The important thing is, it’s time to put the heat to Sorrell’s backside and get answers to all of these questions.

Governor? Mr. Secretary? Mr. Speaker? Mr. Pro Tem? We’re waiting.

Let’s go to the 990

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Okay, so I spent part of Monday (maybe five, ten minutes all told) in a slow-motion Tweetchat with the fine folks at the Ethan Allen Institute. At one point, whoever Tweets on behalf of EAI accused me of lying about its connection with the Koch empire. And I pointed out that it wasn’t a lie, just a mistake.

Then came the following exchange:

Dunno what they mean by “solution” there, but the whole Tweet is kind of inartful. Anyway, @EAIVT asked if I had consulted its IRS Form 990, the annual filing required of nonprofit organizations.

Well, I hadn’t checked the 990 because I knew it was irrelevant to my assertion. Nonprofits aren’t required to disclose revenue sources, so nothing in EAI’s form would prove or disprove any Koch connection.

But hey, I’m open to suggestion, so I found EAI’s latest 990 — for tax year 2013 — as posted by the journalistic nonprofit ProPublica. (Where you can find the last several years’ worth, in fact.)

And as I thought, there’s no information about where the money comes from. But there are some interesting numbers to be found, and here’s a sampling.

In 2013, EAI took in $140,690 in “contributions, gifts, grants and similar amounts received,” plus another $60,000 in membership dues. Add in a bit here and there, and EAI revenue was $201,018.

Not bad, not bad. There’s no further information about the sources of that $201, 018, nothing to prove or disprove any financial dependence on the Kochs or the State Policy Network or other out-of-state corporate interests.

Unfortunately, EAI was a deficit spender in 2013. It racked up expenses of $224,290. Fortunately, it began the year with a positive balance of $43,021, so it ended the year in the black.

Yay!

On to Part III, “Statement of Program Service Accomplishments,” a.k.a. EAI’s nonprofit fig leaf. The IRS requires a list of the organization’s three primary programs. Here’s the EAI list:

— $72,200 for “Two daily radio programs on WDEV Radio Vermont.” This includes John McClaughry’s Daily Diatribe (I think that’s what they call it); and the hour-long “Common Sense Radio,” which causes massive tuneout at the end of the Mark Johnson Show every weekday at 11.

Well, now we know why the folks at WDEV put up with that drivel. They are well paid to put up with that drivel. And they get a better deal than we do; thanks to EAI’s tax-exempt status, we are all paying, indirectly, for the glories of “Common Sense Radio.”

— $44,205 for something called the Energy Education Project, which “promotes intelligent energy choices in Vermont through a daily blog, a website and educational events.” Gee, I’d never heard of this endeavor before. So I searched for “Energy Education Project Vermont,” and there it was.

However, it hasn’t been updated in a very long time. The top item on its homepage is entitled “Entergy Announces That Vermont Yankee Will Close in October 2014.” Checking the Google, I see that Entergy made that announcement in August of 2013.

Pretty sad, for EAI’s number-two Service Accomplishment.

— $47,000 for a variety of programs, not a single entry. These include the montlhly Ethan Allen Letter; a series of opinion pieces offered gratis to Vermont media outlets; “public meetings and educational seminars”; and a transparency website jointly maintained with the Public Assets Institute. Now there’s an odd couple.

On to Part IV, a list of officers and key employees. Oh boy, salary disclosure!

EAI President Rob Roper pulled down $50,000 last year, slightly under Vermont’s median income. Hey look, he’s middle class!

Vice President John McClaughry made $24,000 and his wife Anne made $18,000 as Secretary/Treasurer, plus another $5500 combined for “Health benefits, contributions to employee benefit plans, and deferred compensation.”

Bill Sayre, member of the Board of Directors, made $9600, presumably for hosting Common Sense Radio. None of the other directors (Wendy Wilton, Jack McMullen, Catherine Clark, John Cueman, Milt Eaton) was paid.

Finally, the caboose on EAI’s very short gravy train is occupied by Shayne Spence, who was paid $6000 to serve as “Outreach Coordinator.” I don’t know whether this includes the compensation he received as a Koch Summer Fellow in 2013, but that’s a thing that exists.

I’ll skip over several boring pages, which brings me to Schedule A, Part III, which lists total “Public Support” for the five preceding years. During that time, EAI took in a total of $784,910. The totals for 2009 through 2013 go:

$151,775; $155,225; $171,565; $105,345; and $201,000.

Don’t know what happened in 2012, but there you are. In addition to the “public support,” EAI has made a few hundred bucks every year from “interest, dividends” and other non-donor sources.

Well, that was fun. It did nothing to illuminate the sources of EAI’s money or to settle the question of whether it has financial ties to the State Policy Network and other Koch- and Koch-like operations, or whether its ties are purely ideological.

Too bad, as I wrote earlier: we really need more transparency in the nonprofit world. If EAI could show that it really is a home-grown organization that gets the bulk of its financing from Vermonters, that would lend it some credibility.

The hidden world of nonprofit advocacy

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Okay, so today I Tweeted this:

It’s something I’ve been thinking for a long time. There are more and more “nonprofit organizations” whose official mission is “educational” or some such, but whose actual purpose is political advocacy, including activity that ought to be classified as lobbying but it’s not.

This is one reason I’m less exercised than some about the proposed cap on itemized deductions: a lot of “charitable contributions” are being spent politically. Many wealthy people set up their own nonprofit foundations for the purpose of spreading their political beliefs. The Koch Empire is the prime example of this, but there are lots of others. In Vermont, their number includes the Vermont Workers’ Center, VPIRG, Campaign for Vermont, Energize Vermont, Vermonters for a Clean Environment, Vermonters for Health Care Freedom, the Ethan Allen Institute, and the late unlamented Vermonters First.

That’s a heavy-hitting list of groups trying to influence our politics, and they range from far left to far right. Nobody’s got a patent on this. Although I will say that the quantity of money on the right is much greater than on the lieft. Although although I will say that Vermont is an exception to this rule; our nonprofits lean leftward.

Some of these groups do report direct lobbying activities, but because they are nonprofits, they are not legally obligated to report the source of their revenue. Some voluntarily report to some extent, but as far as I know, none of them provide full donor disclosure. Which would include name, town and state of residence, and amount of donation. (If any group does so, please let me know and I will amend this post.)

I say “Ive been thinking about this for a long time,” so what made me write about it today? Actually, the inspiration was a mistake I made on Twitter, in replying to a Tweet from the corporate-funded folks at “Stop the Vermont Beverage Tax.”

Which brought a quick response from, well, a ready chorus of right-wingers, but let’s stick with the Ethan Allen Institute, Tweeting as @EAIVT:

They’re right. At least they’re partly right. “SPN” is the State Policy Network, which is part of the Koch nonprofit empire. I didn’t lie, though; I mistakenly believed that EAI is Koch-funded. I picked this up from the Center for Media and Democracy’s “Sourcewatch,” which describes SPN thusly:

The State Policy Network (SPN) has franchised, funded, and fostered a growing number of “mini Heritage Foundations” at the state level since the early 1990s.[1] SPN is a web of right-wing “think tanks” in every state across the country. It is an $83 million right-wing empire as of the 2011 funding documents from SPN itself and each of its state “think tank” members.

Sourcewatch lists the Ethan Allen Institute as the SPN’s Vermont affiliate. There’s where I made my leap of faith. I’ll take EAI’s word for it that they don’t get money from SPN or the Kochs; too bad for them, since a lot of their fellow SPNers are ridin’ that gravy train.

Still, for EAI to pay for the privilege of SPN affilliation… it’s not correct to call them “Koch-funded,” but they’re definitely “Koch-friendly.”

I will freely admit that I sometimes shoot from the hip, as I did in this case. I try to own up when I’m wrong; this isn’t the first time and I’m sure it won’t be the last. But I could have avoided my mistake if we had better disclosure laws; I could have gone to the source instead of poking around for indirect scraps of information.

But the real point isn’t a matter of my convenience. It’s openness and transparency in our politics.

Organized political parties (and the Democrats, haha) will tell you that campaign finance laws are stacked against them. It’s better in a number of ways for donors to go through their own organizations than through parties: there are effectlvely no limits and few disclosure requirements, and they retain control over how their money is spent. That’s why the Kochs and Sheldon Adelson and Foster Friess and all those people don’t give much money to the Republican Party; they funnel their wealth through their own organizations. And when those groups are nonprofits, We, the Taxpayers, are underwriting their political activities. Nice work if you can get it.

The point is, in this modern world of political nonprofits, we need better disclosure rules. We need to know who’s spending money for what political purpose, whether they’re going through the Ethan Allen Institute or the Vermont Workers’ Center.

The punishment fit the crime

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Here’s something that’s by-the-books, letter of the law… but makes absolutely not a bit of sense.

Our dogged hero of law enforcement, Eternal General BIll Sorrell, is in hot pursuit of the scoundrel Dean Corren for a campaign violation. Seems the Democratic Party sent an email blast supporting Corren’s candidacy for Lieutenant Governor, and Sorrell deems this a violation of the public financing law.

Estimated value of the blast: $255.

The penalty Sorrell seeks: $72,000.

Sorrell says, and I understand, that he is simply following the law. which requires repayment of public funds still in Corren’s kitty at the time of the violation, plus a $10,000 fine for each of two violations (accepting the email, and failing to report it).

But holy Hell, I don’t care what the law says. $72,000 for a $255 violation is like a ten-year sentence for a speeding ticket. Does Sorrell have no flexibility whatsoever, or is he choosing to be a right bastard about this?

Also, this: I know for a fact that there was an ongoing, vigorous discussion within Democratic Party circles and the Corren campaign over what the party could do and couldn’t do on his behalf. The Democrats were very careful about it — so much so, that some liberals (including yours truly) wondered if they really wanted him to succeed. It’s hard for me to imagine that the Dems suddenly abandoned their caution in a spasm of Corren-love and sent out that email in a moment of blind passion, followed by headaches and regret the next morning.

Maybe so, because the Dems have responded to Sorrell’s onslaught like an abashed libertine trying to reform:

“To avoid the cost of litigation and move forward, both for the benefit of the Party and the State, the VDP decided to settle with the Attorney General’s Office,” the statement said.

As part of the settlement, VDP will agree to cooperate with Sorrell’s office in its investigation and litigation against Corren.

That’s nice. I’m sure it only appears that the Dems are throwing Corren under the bus.

Given the party’s SOP in dealing with Corren, I’m sure the email blast had to have been vetted by its legal staff. But that won’t do Corren any good now; he’s facing Mr. Prosecutor all by his lonesome.

Connect the dots, and reveal a black hat

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The Senate Government Operations Committee, last seen saying yes to the Fourteenth Star, held a hearing Friday on a bill that would increase disclosure requirements for ad campaigns meant to influence legislative debate.

The bill would require disclosure of public-policy advertising over $1,000 within 48 hours. Under current law, disclosure is only required three times a year: January 25, April 25, and July 25. The April report is the biggie, since it covers the bulk of a legislative session. And it comes at the very end of the session, which means the disclosure is almost useless for finding out who’s spending money to influence which piece of legislation.

The Associated Press’ Wilson Ring was there, and reports that one of the top lobbyists in Montpelier, Andrew MacLean, testified against the idea.

Ring failed, however, to deliver the context. Which I will now do. You’re welcome.

MacLean makes a darn fine living representing numerous business interests. He told the committee that the 48-hour disclosure requirement would be difficult for lobbyists to meet.

Which is, pardon my French, pure bullshit.

The same requirement is already placed on political candidates in the last 45 days of a campaign season. If candidates can meet the requirement, surely a well-endowed lobbying firm can do so.

MacLean also efforted the First Amendment argument —  “the proposal… could infringe on free speech rights” — which is also bullshit. Disclosure imposes no limits on speech.

His alternative? “… change your disclosure dates and maybe add one or two.”

Uh-huh. And why, you might ask, is Mr. MacLean so anxious to avoid prompt disclosure? Committee chair Jeanette White gave us a hint:

[White] said the proposal grew out of a case in which a lot of money was spent trying to get members of the House to vote against an issue. She did not say what the issue was.

Well, I’ll tell you what the issue was. It was the 2013 attempt to impose a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages. The beverage and retail industries mounted an all-out effort to kill the bill, spending more than $600,000 in the first three months of 2013. We didn’t find that out until April 25, 2013, by which time the beverage tax was dead.

The chief local lobbyist for that effort? Andrew MacLean.

Fast forward to 2015, when the legislature is once again considering a beverage tax, and Andrew MacLean is once again at the forefront of a very expensive advertising and lobbying campaign against the bill.

Naturally, he prefers disclosure to be as infrequent and untimely as possible.

MacLean’s testimony was motivated by blatant self-interest. I hope the committee sees through that, and proceeds with a reasonable effort to add some transparency to the flow of money through our politics.

Just what we needed: another “grassroots” group

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Oh boy, look what’s cluttering up my inbox.

 

VPRlogo

Yes indeed, it’s yet another grassroots “movement” consisting of a few dedicated people with enough money to set up a website.

The Vermont Political Revolution’s bugbear is money in politics, which is defined as “campaign contributions from special interests.” Their strategy…

… garnering voter pledges to only vote for candidates who pledge to not seek or accept campaign contributions from special interests; likewise, candidate active learning and commitment are reinforced by garnering candidate pledges to not seek or accept campaign contributions from special interests.

Which is nice but kinda misses the point. The biggest flood of money in politics is not going to candidates, but to closely-held SuperPACs and “nonprofits” with loose to nonexistent accountability standards.

If you focus solely on campaign contributions, you get the false equivalency of left and right: Republicans have corporations and the mega-rich, Democrats have unions and George Soros. Indeed, conservatives claim that Democrats outdrew Republicans in campaign contributions in the 2014 cycle, and they may be right. But that’s because the Karl Roves of the world operate outside the bounds of parties and candidates, and rich people like the Kochs largely do the same. Their money doesn’t count as “campaign contributions.” And with all that money being spent “independently” for conservative causes, a Democrat refusing special interest contributions is basically going into a gunfight with a butter knife.

The VPR (not to be confused with, um, VPR, or theVPO for that matter) is Vermont-based, but aims to become a national organization wielding vast influence by attracting voters and candidates to its banner. Which, ha. This never works.

Especially when the organizers are virtual unknowns.

The president of The VPR is Dr. Daniel Freilich, last seen in these parts in 2010, staging a massively unsuccessful primary challenge to Sen. Patrick Leahy. He lost 89-11. The most memorable aspect of his campaign was a Web-only commercial (“I’m on a cow. HYAAA!”) spoofing the then-popular Old Spice Guy ads. (I miss that guy.)

For liberals, it’s hard to find fault with Freilich’s 2010 platform; he called for, among other things, universal health insurance, a more progressive tax system, and improvements in the environment and public health. And he also, as it happens, used the phrase “A Vermont Political Revolution” in his campaign, so he obviously believes in recycling.

So Dr. Dan seems to be a well-intentioned guy with a thing for lost political causes. First, challenging St. Patrick, and now launching a nationwide “grassroots movement.” The VPR’s homepage features a large national map, promising a 50-state reach; but so far, they’ve received a total of five “voter pledges,” four from Vermont and one from New Hampshire, and no “candidate pledges.”

It’s also launched a very limited database — grandly dubbed “an analysis and report” — seemingly designed to shame candidates into complying with its “no special interests” pledge. Each candidate in the 2014 Vermont campaign is listed, and two questions are answered for each: Did they accept special interest contributions (according to their campaign finance filings), and did they pledge not to?

Any candidate who accepted such contributions is highlighted in bright red. Subtle. (Also hard to read.)

That’s the extent of the “analysis.”

The VPR seems to be a noble, if somewhat mis-targeted, effort. But I have two fundamental problems with it:

— It claims to be a “grassroots movement” when it consists of a bare handful of people with a preset agenda.

— The track record of such efforts is dismal to say the least.

I’m sure we’ll continue to get emails from The VPR, and I’m sure that the audible “ping” of an arriving email is about all we’ll ever hear from them.

Drivin’ down the highway, throwin’ money out the windows

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That would appear to be Governor Shumlin’s campaign strategy in the final two weeks of the campaign. Faced with less-than-daunting opposition from the likes of Mr. Blandy and Mr. Fringey, not to mention Ms. Hempy, Hat Lady and The Beard, the Governor has been spending money like he’s running against a Koch brother.

The final pre-election campaign finance deadline was today, and Shumlin’s money machine was in overdrive, raising another $179,000* since mid-October and spending an incredible $342,000, more than half of it on TV advertising.

*Including $96,000 in cash, and $83,000 in “in-kind” donations. The latter were services performed by the state Democratic Party: robocalls and mailers. I guess his campaign was too strapped for cash to foot the bills himself, sheesh. 

That’s $342,000 spent in two and a half weeks. 

That brings his total spending on the campaign to $890,000, which is almost three times as much as he spent two years ago to defeat Randy Brock. Unless he’s really scared of Scott Milne, I’d say he’s going all out to boost his vote total. A finish under 50% would be embarrassing and make a serious dent in his political clout for his third term; anything less than 53% or so would be a significant deflation of his 2012 total, and weaken him going into the fight for single-payer health care.

Scott Milne, meanwhile, did well by his low standards, but mainly because he injected a bunch of his own money into his own campaign. He took in $91,000 since Oct. 15, but that includes a $50,000 loan to his campaign and $25K in “in-kind” contributions; the lion’s share of that was in the form of mass mailings done by the Vermont Republican State Committee on Milne’s behalf.

For the entire campaign, he’s raised $238,000. But that includes almost $90,000 from himself and his family. Plus another $20K or so from the famous Boieses.

He spent $98,000 since Oct. 15, mainly on TV ads, bringing his total spending for the campaign to $211,000. Which would be a nice total if he were running for Lieutenant Governor, but it’s simply not enough to be competitive, especially against Governor Moneybags.

Libertarian Dan Feliciano, meanwhile, limped to the finish line with a few thousand bucks in outside donations plus another $10,000 in self-funding. Most of his recent spending was on airing his awful TV ad. But again, Feliciano showed no sign of attracting broad support as expressed in campaign donations. He got damn little, in fact. In the marketplace of ideas, nobody was buying Dan the Libertarian Man.

In the race for Lieutenant Governor, incumbent Phil Scott eased back the pace. He raised less than $10,000 and spent about $10,000 since the last report. For the entire campaign, he’s raised $289,000 and spent $233,000.

The big news there is that Scott will head into the next campaign with a good-sized warchest by the standards of anyone other than Peter Shumlin, Pat Leahy, Peter Welch, and Bernie Sanders. He reports cash-on-hand totaling $98,000, which is a nice head start on 2016.

His opponent Dean Corren, as reported in this space, went on a spending binge in the last two weeks. He spent $92,000 since Oct. 15, including an intensive (by Lt. Gov. standards) TV ad campaign. And he planned out his expenditures intelligently; his campaign to date has spent $188,000, leaving only $12,000 left of his (mainly publicly financed) $200,000 kitty.

And now, ’tis the night before Election, and all through the state, not a candidate was stirring. Not even… hmm… does anybody’s name rhyme with “state”?

Corren redux

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Got a phone call today. From Ben and Jerry.

Well, they weren’t live on the line; it was a robo-call on behalf of Dean Corren for Lieutenant Governor. And no, they didn’t offer free ice cream for my vote.

It’s part of Corren’s last-minute, multi-media blitz. Since last I reported, the Corren campaign has filed four more mass-mediz expenditure reports with the Secretary of State’s office, one of which was a $3,000 bill for robo-calls.

The new filings add up to $11,411, bringing the grand total of Corren spending since Oct. 20 to a whopping $72,372. That includes TV, radio, newspaper, and online advertising, robo-calls, graphic design services, and campaign consultancy.

Pretty impressive. It’ll have to be equally effective, for him to have a chance at taking down Phil Scott next Tuesday.

Dean Corren puts the pedal to the metal

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The Secretary of State’s office has been blizzarded by Mass Media spending reports from the Dean Corren campaign in the past eight days, representing a strong home-stretch advertising blitz for Phil Scott’s challenger.

Since October 20, Corren has reported spending a total of $60,961, with almost two-thirds of the money going to TV advertising. Going into the campaign, Corren had a fixed budget of $200,000 because once he opted for public financing, he couldn’t take any further donations.

The rundown:

  • $38,980 for TV (broadcast and cable)
  • $8,095 for radio
  • $5,387 for newspapers
  • $4,000 for campaign consultancy by State Rep. Chris Pearson’s firm
  • $2,385 for graphic design work
  • $1,542 for online advertising
  • $572 for printing (The campaign had done a lot more printing earlier in the season.)

All in all, it’s a nice healthy push. Earlier, I’d wondered if Corren was hoarding his money too long. Now, I think he was right to keep his powder dry until the campaign’s closing days. Most voters don’t pay much attention until right before the election. Except for those who don’t pay any attention at all.

Also, the recent TV ads have good production values and strong messaging. I don’t know that it’s enough to knock off Phil Scott, but full credit to the Corren team for a sound strategy.

Dan Feliciano invests in himself; nobody else does

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Nice little discovery by the Freeploid’s Terri Hallenbeck: apparently, Dan Feliciano’s had a little trouble with the mechanics of the Secretary of State’s new online campaign finance system, and mistakenly underreported his own donations to his campaign.

Dan Feliciano, the Libertarian candidate for governor, has contributed $30,000 to his own campaign — or nearly three-quarters of his campaign’s money — though that information was unclear on campaign finance reports filed with the state.

Selling trinkets in the park: a vital cog in the Feliciano money machine.

Selling trinkets in the park: a vital cog in the Feliciano money machine.

That’s $30,000 out of his fundraising total of less than $41,000. He’s also received $1,153 from two people named Aja, which is his wife’s maiden name.

Add it up: Feliciano has raised less than $10,000 from people outside his immediate family. For the entire campaign.

So the question remains: what happened to the Feliciano groundswell? To, ahem, #Felicianomentum? To judge by his finances, his would-be challenge to the political establishment has been a damp fizzle.

Even the notable Republicans who publicly backed his candidacy, like Brady Toensing and Wendy Wilton and Patricia Crocker and Jim Peyton and Becky Amos and Tom Burditt and Chet Greenwood, don’t appear on Feliciano’s donor list. Mark Snelling gave one gift, a munificent $200. GOP House candidate Paul Dame chipped in $101. Darcie Johnston hasn’t given any money, but she has been acting as Feliciano’s unpaid campaign manager.

Which, judging by her past record, may have a cash value of less than zero.

The point is, the right wing of the Republican Party may have raised their voices for Feliciano, but when it comes to money, they’ve left him to fend for himself.

A great deal was made of Feliciano’s showing in the Republican primary: he took 15% of the vote as a write-in candidate. As a percentage, that’s impressive. But it’s 15% of a very small total: about 2,100 votes. At the time, many thought Feliciano would build on that showing and provide a real challenge to Scott Milne, if not Governor Shumlin.

Now, looking at his financials, I wonder if that 2,100 doesn’t represent a high-water mark. Oh, he’ll probably get more votes in the general election — but he’s not getting anywhere near 15%. I’m beginning to wonder if he’ll even crack the magic 5% number that would give the Libertarians major-party status in the next cycle.

Because considering the latest news about the extent of his self-dependence, his campaign looks weaker than ever.