Tag Archives: Jim Condos

The Money Race: Secretary of State

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Fourth in a series on the July `1 campaign finance reports. Yes, it’s still relevant because the general media coverage of the filings was disgracefully thin. Previously: Lieutenant Governor, Governor, Attorney General. Final installment pending: a look at select legislative races.

The Democratic primary for Secretary of State attracted three very qualified candidates after incumbent Jim Condos decided it was time to retire. One has a clear lead thanks to being the first candidate to declare; the second is catching up in a hurry; the third is lagging far behind.

The first is Deputy Secretary of State Chris Winters. He’s been a candidate the longest, plus he had to know long before Condos’ announcement that the position would be vacant. Condos has been thumbing the scale with gusto even before he stepped out of the race, and recently he flouted tradition by formally endorsing Winters.

That should be a substantial intangible factor in Winters’ favor. He also leads in the tangibles, having raised $39,000 in the reporting period and a total of $61,000 for the campaign to date. He has spent $23K so far, which leaves him with $38K in the bank. $5,500 of his spends went to the Vermont Democratic Party: $1,500 for placement at the party’s Curtis-Hoff fundraiser, and $4,000 for access to the VDP’s extortionately priced and indispensable voter database. He also spent $1,500 on yard signs from the Texas-based firm Super Cheap Signs. Union shop, I trust.

Notable donors on Winters’ list: $4175 from Martha Allen, former head of the VT-NEA; $4,210 from the Vermont Association of Realtors; $4,000 from Ernie Pomerleau, Burlington developer and friend of moderate Democrats everywhere; $500 from outgoing Treasurer Beth Pearce; and $101 from former governor Howard Dean.

Second place in the money race is Rep. Sarah Copeland Hanzas, who didn’t announce until late April. She’s done well since then, receiving $39K in donations in a month and a half. She has spent $22K, so she has $17K in cash on hand.

Topping her donor list are a bunch of people named Copeland, presumably family, who gave a combined $11K. She got $1,000 apiece from renewable energy developer David Blittersdorf and former ANR deputy secretary Peter Walke. There’s a gaggle of current and former lawmakers including Shap Smith, John Gannon, Carol Ode, Leslie Goldman, Becca White, Sarita Austin, Amy Sheldon, Maxine Grad, Don Hooper, Mary Sullivan, Janet Ancel, Tony Klein, and Mike Yantachka.

Other notable names: $1,050 from Lisa Senecal, co-host of “We’re Speaking,” a podcast produced by The Lincoln Project; $500 from Democratic donor Billi Gosh and $300 from progressive donor Crea Lintilhac; $500 from Will Raap, founder of Gardeners’ Supply; $300 from former lobbyist turned bluesman Bob Stannard; $500 from the Leonine lobbying firm and $250 from lobbyist Heidi Tringe; and $150 from attorney general candidate Charity Clark. Her expenditure list is topped by $13,463 for postcards (and presumably mailing) from the Print & Mailing Center of Barre.

Finishing a distant third in fundraising is Montpelier City Clerk John Odum, who entered the race shortly before the March 15 filing deadline. He raised $13K during the latest reporting period and a total of $20K for the campaign to date. He’s spent $14,494, which leaves him with $5K and some change.

But wait, it gets worse. Odum received $8,400 from Elizabeth Shayne, partner of state Rep. Tiff Bluemle. Now, a donor can’t give a candidate more than $4,210 for the primary. I have to assume that half of Shayne’s money is earmarked for the general election campaign and can’t be spent until after the primary. If that’s true, then Odum only has about $1,000 in cash on hand. He’d better have one crackerjack of a grassroots/field operation, is all I can say.

(Update! The $8,400 was a clerical error. Shayne donated a total of $4,200. Odum’s financial report has been corrected. His amended report indicates that his campaign has about $1,900 in cash on hand.)

Overall, Copeland Hanzas has a clear advantage among Democratic officeholders and party mainstays. Winters has outraised the field and has more cash on hand plus Condos’ imprimatur, but his donor list is short on Democratic stalwarts. Odum is far behind in fundraising and cash on hand; unless he’s got hidden advantages, he’s looking like the third place finisher in the primary.

Otherwise, how do I see the race from here to Primary Day, now less than a month away? Hard to tell. Neither Winters nor Copeland Hanzas has a high profile outside of Montpelier. Winters has Condos behind him; Copeland Hanzas has a lot of lawmakers in her corner, and that’s nothing to sneeze at. Members of the House are very plugged in to their districts. Get enough of them in your corner, you’ve got a head start on a statewide network.

So. If anyone claims to know how this is going to turn out, they’re probably blowing smoke.

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My Name Is Jim Condos, King of Kings

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There’s something about immortality, about escaping the finite bounds of a lifetime. If not in corporeal form, at least in lasting impact. Making a mark, leaving a legacy, your name remembered long after your contemporaries have returned to the dust. Escaping the curse of Adam and Eve. It’s an almost universal human yearning, reflected in the appeal of religious belief and, well, superhero comics.

Well, you didn’t come here for the warmed-over philosophy. Let’s get to Jim Condos.

The outgoing Secretary of State put his thumb on the sca — I should say, smashed his fist on the scale and jumped up and down on it with all his considerable weight* when he endorsed his deputy Chris Winters to succeed him when he leaves office.

*Big-boned.

He wants that legacy, doesn’t he? He wants his impact on the office to last beyond his physical tenure. He wants one final validation from the voters, who have treated him kindly over the years.

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Signs of a Backroom Deal

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Did Beth Pearce just hand the treasurer’s office to Michael Pieciak? Consider the timing.

April 27: Gov. Phil Scott’s office announces that Pieciak would step down as Commissioner of the Department of Financial Regulation in mid-May “to pursue other opportunities” of the unspecified variety.

May 4: Pearce announces she will not seek re-election as treasurer. Her decision, she said, was made after being diagnosed with cancer three weeks earlier. Or about two weeks before Pieciak’s departure from the administration.

May 6: Pieciak launches a campaign for treasurer as a Democrat. (He served under Republican Scott, but he was brought into state government by Dem Peter Shumlin.)

Here’s what it looks like: Pearce realizes she’s stepping down and essentially handpicks Pieciak as her successor. How could you look at the sequence of events and think otherwise?

Pearce took a couple weeks after her diagnosis, more than enough time to drop a word to Pieciak. He steps down as commissioner “to pursue other opportunities” only a week before Pearce’s surprise announcement. And he launches his candidacy only two days after Pearce’s announcement.

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To Resign… or Not to Resign. That is the Question.

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Charity Clark stepped down today as Attorney General TJ Donovan’s chief of staff. The remarkably coy announcement of the move said she “has stepped down from her post to explore new opportunities” and would “make an announcement about her plans in the near future.”

Yuh-huh. She’s running for AG. She’s hinted as much, and it’s the most obvious reason for her sudden departure, which (a) apparently took immediate effect and (b) came only four days after Donovan announced he would leave office at the end of his term or possibly before.

I guess it ends all speculation that Clark might be elevated to acting attorney general should Donovan depart before Election Day, thus giving her the kinda-sorta incumbent’s edge. If so, it’s a noble and selfless move.

And it raises questions about Chris Winters, deputy secretary of state, who remains in office nearly three months after he announced his candidacy to succeed his boss, Jim Condos.

If Clark thought it best to resign before she even opened the doors on her campaign, why hasn’t Winters?

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The Enjoyable Weight of Massive Talent

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Vermont’s Democratic electorate is yet again spoiled for choice. Not only do we have multiple credible candidates for U.S. Congress; now we have a three-way race for the party’s Secretary of State nomination among candidates with differing, but equally impressive, qualifications and political associations.

Yesterday, State Rep. Sarah Copeland Hanzas entered the fray, joining Montpelier City Clerk John Odum and Deputy Secretary of State Chris Winters in the running to succeed the retiring Jim Condos. Each would make a great nominee and a worthy successor to Condos.

Each also has a different set of experiences and political associations. The latter will likely have the most impact in a party primary, and I frankly don’t know how the political stuff will play out. So let’s bullet-point the three of ’em, shall we?

Winters. Pluses: Top deputy to Condos, who turned out to be a strong and capable Secretary. Winters knows the job, and ought to have a handle on where the office needs to go next. Condos isn’t endorsing, but he’s made no secret that he wants Winters to succeed him, and Condos is very popular. Nice guy.

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Not Quite So Many Scofflaws in High Places As It Seemed

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As expected, I’ve gotten some blowback from my post naming all the state lawmakers who didn’t file campaign finance reports by the March 15 deadline, and still hadn’t as of a couple weeks later.

I’ve heard from five lawmakers in all. One, Sen. Brian Campion, said I’d mistakenly put him on the list, and he was right. Four others (Sen. Phil Baruth, Reps. Seth Chase, Martin LaLonde and Emily Long) said they’d been advised by the Secretary of State’s office that they didn’t need to file.

And yes, they were right.

Here’s the deal. If you ended the 2020 campaign cycle with nothing in the bank and reported that fact at the time, and you have yet to raise or spend $500 or more in this cycle, you don’t have to report until you reach that threshold.

That was, indeed, the case for the four lawmakers named above. It may be true for others as well (and I’ll add their names to the list if they let me know). But I believe their number is fairly small.

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A Whole Lotta Scofflaws in High Places

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Running update: Sen. Brian Campion, named below as having failed to file, did actually file. Four other lawmakers — Sen. Phil Baruth and Reps. Martin Lalonde, Emily Long and Seth Chase — say they zeroed out their accounts after the 2020 election and have neither raised nor spent more than $500 since, so they don’t have to file.

Updated update. I haven’t heard from any more lawmakers (so far), but I’ve written a second post explaining this exemption in more detail.

Well, if Jim Condos won’t do it, and Sarah Mearhoff won’t do it, I guess I have to.

Allow me to explain.

Last Friday, VTDigger’s always informative Final Reading kicked off with an item about lawmakers failing to abide by the law. Specifically, dozens of them have yet to file campaign finance reports that were due on March 15. Secretary of State Condos sent an email to lawmakers asking that they comply but refused to identify the scofflaws, saying “I can’t be their babysitter,” which kind of implies that they need one. Reporter Mearhoff also demurred from naming names, but teasingly said “I know who you are.”

Gee, and here I thought it was a reporter’s job to tell us what they know. Maybe space reasons? After all, the list of noncompliers is 69 names long. That’s almost 40% of the 180 “public servants” in the Legislature. Forty percent.

Mearhoff also reminded us that when the Legislature wrote the law, it refused to include any penalties for failing to file. That’s pretty standard fare for laws touching on their own interests; lawmakers jealously guard their privileges when it comes to campaign finance and ethics and reapportionment and such. Which leaves us with the plastic épée of public shaming, which rarely manages to penetrate a lawmaker’s skin.

Before I get to naming names, I should say that any mistakes are my responsibility and I will gladly make corrections if any of those listed below can show that they did, in fact, file as required by law. Also, this list was made on the morning of April 5; any reports filed after that are not reflected below.

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Bon Voyage, Jim (UPDATED w/another candidacy rumor)

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As the rumor mill had predicted, Secretary of State Jim Condos has announced he will not seek a seventh term in office. The 71-year-old Condos has been a quietly influential figure in state politics. He was the champion vote-winner in three successive elections (2012-16), when the Republicans failed to even field a candidate to oppose him.

You never know what you’re going to get when a politician becomes Secretary of State. It can be a sinecure for an aging pol or a mischief-making opportunity for a real partisan, but Condos did neither. He fulfilled his duties with honesty and a minimum of politics, and did his best to make the office run more efficiently in all aspects.

He was also unafraid to take stands unpopular with his old friends in the Legislature. I’ll always appreciate his advocacy for ethical standards and campaign finance reform, which are uncomfortable topics in the Statehouse.

No sooner did he announce his decision in a YouTubed press conference than the speculation began about his successor. The first question was whether Condos would endorse his deputy, Chris Winters, to succeed him. Condos praised Winters’ performance, but declined to issue an endorsement. “I will deal with that at the appropriate time,” he said.

I can add a couple of names to the potential candidate pool. The Republican grapevine sings the name “Dustin Degree,” former state senator and top adviser to Gov. Phil Scott who’s now deputy labor commissioner. Among potential Dems, Montpelier city clerk John Odum, who tells me he is “seriously considering an SoS run and will make a decision within the next couple weeks.”

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“Condos & Winters,” Eh?

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There’s nothing new in Secretary of State Jim Condos penning an op-ed for Vermont news outlets. Does it all the time. But there’s something different with his latest: He lists deputy SoS Chris Winters as co-author. And earlier this month, Condos’ office announced the creation of an Elections “Myth vs. Fact” page on the Secretary’s website. Specifically, it announced that Condos and Winters had created the page.

This would be mere trivia except for one thing. The Democratic rumor mill is rife with word that Condos will not seek a seventh term in office, and that he will endorse Winters as his successor. In that context, it makes all the sense in the world for Condos to be elevating Winters to kinda-sorta coequal status in the public business of the office.

Condos’ endorsement would be a huge plus for the politically untested Winters, but it would be far from dispositive. There would be other entries in the race, possibly from two distinct spheres: (1) the technocrat class, with experience in running elections and such, and (2) Democratic politicos looking to climb the ladder. I don’t have specific names in either category besides Winters in Column A, but the opening would be a big fat juicy opportunity.

The statewide offices, generally speaking, are the best perch for those seeking to reach the highest levels of Vermont politics. They get your name before a statewide audience. They get voters accustomed to filling in the oval next to your name. (I was going to say “pulling the lever,” but I need provide no additional proof that I’m old.) A statewide post is a far better launchpad than any position in the Legislature, and I’m including Speaker and Pro Tem in that calculation. Most people, even most voters, just don’t pay much attention to the Statehouse.

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Son Of Hey, Let’s Have Some Fun With the Chittenden Senate District!

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After I wrote my post about the Chittenden Senate district, I found out that Sen. Kesha Ram has decamped to the suburbs. Specifically, the tony confines of Shelburne. Her Legislative bio still says “Burlington,” but oh well.

This dramatically changes the calculus for reapportionment, or at least my version of it. Rather than try to amend the original post, I decided to start afresh here.

For those just joining us, Vermont is preparing the once-a-decade task of redrawing legislative districts to reflect population changes. The Legislative Apportionment Board will draw up a proposal in time for the House and Senate to approve it or make changes during the 2022 session.

Thanks to a 2019 law, districts cannot include more than three House or Senate seats. This will mean dismembering the six-seat Chittenden district, which is a good thing. Multi-member districts are basically incumbent-protection schemes.

Because Chittenden County is growing while many other areas are shrinking, the district will get at least one more seat and possibly two. (By sheer population, it warrants 7 1/2.)

Adding a Chittenden seat means taking one away somewhere else, so let’s assume the new district will have seven seats, not eight. That means shifting one sizeable community out of the district. Colchester is currently in the Grand Isle district, and it’s likely to stay there in order to protect eternal incumbent Dick Mazza.

But for purposes of this thought experiment, I’m going to focus entirely on Chittenden County and try to describe districts that would be as even as possible population-wise, and keep communities intact whenever possible. On my map, no district would have more than two seats — and the lines could easily be drawn so that each district would have a single senator.

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