Sinclair directs local TV stations across the country, including Maine's WGME, to promote Trump campaign merch

Sinclair Broadcasting, the conservative Maryland-based company that's the largest owner of local television stations in the country, this month directed its stations to publish "news articles" promoting Trump campaign merchandise.

The articles, which were published and promoted (via Tweets) by Maine's WGME-13, have no sources and read much like a product catalog entry. Some stations linked directly to the Trump campaign's internet store product pages. Proceeds from campaign merchandise sales are used to fund the political campaign. I reported about this in Tuesday's Portland Press Herald.

It's not the first media ethics controversy involving Sinclair and WGME. I wrote about a scripted spot attacking alleged "fake news" broadcast by other news organizations last fall.

Trump's "judge whisperer" buys Maine mansion, hosts fundraiser for Susan Collins

In this past week's Maine Sunday Telegram, I have the story of how Leonard Leo, executive vice president of the Federalist Society and the man credited with pre-selecting Brett Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch and other conservative justices for the Supreme Court, bought a mansion on Maine's Mount Desert Island and held a fundraiser for Senator Susan Collins.

It features C. Boyden Grey (who co-hosted the Collins fundraiser Aug. 8 and serves on the Federalist Society board) and the Knights of Malta (a Catholic order that has many of the attributes of a sovereign state, including 108 embassies, postage stamps, passports, coins and a seat at the United Nations) and even the W.R. Grace company (the one featured in the book and movie "A Civil Action.")

Maine: Andre Cushing's finances under scrutiny...by his sister

The Assistant Majority Leader of the Maine state Senate, Andre Cushing III, has long had one of the most active leadership PACs, fueled by donations from multinational corporations, many of them members of the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, which Cushing helps lead as a member of the national board of directors and state legislative chair.

But this week, Cushing's finances -- political and otherwise -- have been under scrutiny on account of a dispute with his own sister.

As reported in Tuesday's Portland Press Herald, Cushing's sister has filed a law suit alleging a variety of fraudulent financial transfers involving a family corporation (that both have shares in) and various corporate and PAC entities (which she does not.) She alleges well over a $1 million in fraudulent transfers.

In today's Press Herald, a follow up: the sister, Laura Cushing McIntyre, has filed a complaint with the state's ethics commission requesting an investigation into tens of thousands of dollars of alleged transfers between Cushing's campaign and PAC (on one hand) and a corporation he controls (on the other). The transfers don't show up on Cushing's various campaign finance disclosures, as required under Maine law, meaning either they didn't take place or he's failed to comply.

For details, read on from the links.

Maine: Democrats have big fundraising advantage in battle for legislature

Here in Maine, the most important electoral issue to be resolved in November -- aside from who will be the President of the United States -- is which party will control the two houses of the state legislature. Currently Democrats control the House, while Republicans have the Senate and the governor's mansion.

There isn't any polling of state legislative races, so voters usually get to surprise everyone each election day. But for those who can't wait, one can always track the money race. In Saturday's Portland Press Herald I have this story on the fundraising situation for the two parties' primary legislative war chests.

Bottom line: Democrats currently have a roughly two-to-one advantage in this regard, mostly because they've received big contributions from the national party (and the Republicans have not.) Even more interesting for politicos is where the money comes from and, perhaps, who the respective parties owe one to.

I last wrote about Maine political finance last month, with this Press Herald story on the "leadership PACs" of Maine legislators and who gives to them.

Maine: who provides the cash for legislator's personal PACs?

Ever wonder who the biggest contributors are to the personal "leadership" PACs of Maine's legislator? Read about it all in this week's Maine Sunday Telegram, where we've crunched the numbers on the 15 biggest donors and who their favorite legislators are. There's also some insight into how legislators raise money from the lobbyists, drug companies, business associations and casinos that make up the lion's share of the supply for these entities, and then some of the things they spend it on.

I last wrote about Maine leadership PACs way back during the last presidential election year, focusing on those controlled by clean elections candidates.

While reporting this story, I became introduced to the Sunlight Foundation's clever crowdsourcing site for political PAC and campaign event invites. It's a nifty tool for journalists trying to make sense of candidate's fundraising filings.

Jeb's "Walker's Point" Advantage

In this week's Maine Sunday Telegram, I write about one of Jeb Bush's many fundraising advantages: the existence of the family estate in Kennebunkport, Maine.

Walker's Point, a town park purchased by his great-great grandfather at the opening of the 20th century and developed into a summer retreat, has been the base camp of the Bush clan since Jeb's great-grandfather served in the U.S. Senate. Since then, the family has produced two presidents, and the compound has been used to host world leaders, national luminaries, and family weddings. Get an invitation to a party there, and you're probably going to say yes. As one campaign finance expert told me, Hillary Clinton has no Walker's Point.

And if Jeb had any reticence about publicly embracing his family's quasi-aristocratic legacy, he seems to have set it aside. He's just built himself a house on the compound and last Thursday co-hosted with his parents 300 major campaign donors for a reception and dinner.

Kennebunkport, it seems, is back on the political map.

Snowe's Mixed Signals

In February, the political establishment here in Maine was rocked by Sen. Olympia’s Snowe’s late and entirely surprising announcement that she would not seek reelection. The Senate, she said, had become a frustrating place, where “an atmosphere of polarization and ‘my way or the highway’ ideologies has become pervasive in campaigns and in our governing institutions.” Rather than serve another term - her reelection was a given - she would “enter a new chapter” in which she would “help give voice to my fellow citizens who believe, as I do, that we must return to an era of civility in government driven by a common purpose to fulfill the promise that is unique to America.”

“I see a vital need for the political center in order for our democracy to flourish and to find solutions that unite rather than divide us,” she added, and later announced she would convert her campaign committee into a PAC to support such centrist, post-partisan change.
But here in Maine, where she is the perhaps most influential Republican, Snowe has not yet put her money where her mouth is.

As my story in today’s Portland Press Herald shows, Snowe, her husband, and her campaign committee gave exclusively to Republicans and in Maine’s state-level races this cycle, including divisive and polarizing figures like Gov. Paul LePage, with whom she shares a personal loyalty. Indeed, her staff say she gave to candidates based on their loyalty to her during her abortive reelection bid, and the pattern of her giving emphasizes party over ideology, as when she appeared in television ads to unseat the most avowedly centrist, non-partisan member of the state senate in favor of a Republican challenger.

Sources expect her political donations will change character going forward, now that her campaign committee has become Olympia’s List. Stay tuned.

Cross-posted from Washington Monthly

How did the Maine GOP lose the State House?

Earlier this month, Republicans lost control of both houses of the Maine legislature, reversing their historic takeover just two years ago and isolating Gov. Paul LePage, a Tea Party-style conservative now mid-way through his first term.

In today's Maine Sunday Telegram, I've tried to determine how and why. Drawing on data on electoral geography, political spending, party strategy, candidate incumbency and candidate ideology (as determined by the LePage-ist Maine People Before Politics and the liberal Maine Peoples Alliance) -- and interviewing candidates, part strategists, and academics -- the piece concludes that the Democratic effort was regionally targeted and greatly helped by Gov. LePage's reputation in those areas and the willingness of donors to give lavishly to block his agenda.

Also with the article check out the map of the new Maine House of Representatives: a stark "red/blue" map showing the GOP to have become the party of the so-called "rim counties", the Democrats the party of southern, central, and coastal Maine as well as Bangor. (The senate map is similar.) Given the relative population of these areas, that's a worrying trend for Republicans and one that's likely to be on their minds as the 126th legislature gets to work.

Maine Politics: Evaluating the Money Flood

I have a number of election related pieces about to come out in several venues, and the first is on the legislative races here in my home state of Maine.

After the 2010 elections, I wrote about the unsavory consequences of outside spending in Maine's once fairly chivalrous state senate, house, and gubernatorial races in Down East. This year, the flood of third party spending into our legislative races more than doubled that of 2008, with unknown consequence for Pine Tree State politics.

In tomorrow's Maine Sunday Telegram I explore the issue, speaking with campaign finance experts, candidates who'd won and lost in targeted races, and other sources about what it all means. Did it work? What's it mean for clean elections candidates? Who outspent whom and why might they be involved? It's all in the piece, now up online.

NOM, same sex marriage, and Maine campaign finance law

If you've lost track of where things stand with the National Organization for Marriage, same sex marriage initiatives, and Maine's campaign finance laws, here's the story for you.

NOM was the primary force behind efforts to defeat the same sex marriage ballot measure back in 2009, giving nearly $2 million to the effort. It ran afoul of Maine law, however, by refusing to disclose the source of those funds, prompting an investigation by the state ethics commission, a suit by NOM against the commission in federal court, and this story I wrote for Down East at the time.

As of the last filing period, NOM had given $250,000 to defeat this year's repeat ballot initiative, again constituting a majority of the funds raised so far. This time it claims all funds came from its general treasury, meaning no further disclosure is required.

So is NOM in violation of the law this year as one national activist has claimed, and why haven't they had to disclose their 2009 donors, given that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against them? Read my story in today's Maine Sunday Telegram for an overview of where things stand.

Reviewing "The Party is Over" in the Washington Post

My review of Mike Lofgren's The Party is Over is in the Washington Post this weekend.

Lofgren, a career Republican congressional staffer, retired last year after 28 years and published a fiery essay at Truthout about what he saw as the radicalization of his party. The book expands upon these themes, and takes Democrats to task for not offering a credible alternative.

For more -- and my thoughts on the book -- enjoy the review.

Gov. LePage attacks Telegram investigation in radio address

Gov. Paul LePage is apparently not concerned about the troubling findings of my investigation in last week's Maine Sunday Telegram, which showed how private online learning companies with dubious track records were shaping his administration's digital learning policies.

The governor instead used his weekly radio address to lash out at the article, claiming at one point that it had "lied saying that my campaign was paid by an out of state company to push virtual learning."

"This is a bold faced lie," the governor added, apparently referring to the article rather than the statement he had just made.

Of course, the article made no such claim, as anyone who reads it can see for themselves.

What it did say was that the nation's largest digital learning company, K12 Inc. of Herndon, Va., spent $19,000 to help get LePage elected in 2010, via the Republican Governors Association Maine PAC.

But let's recap this issue for the governor, since he seems to have been poorly briefed. The RGA Maine PAC was created to get the Republican nominee -- LePage --elected, and it would spend over a million dollars to do so in 2010.

On October 11, 2010, K12 Inc. kicked in two donations totaling $19,000, which you can see on page 3 of their disclosure for that period at the Maine ethics commission (or the image here:)

Over the next 48 hours, the PAC made ad buys totaling over $360,000, about half spent in support of LePage and the rest on negative ads targeting LePage's opponents, Libby Mitchell and Eliot Culter. You can find all of this on page 5 of the same document, or in this image:


So it's the governor who is the one who is being boldfaced here. I suggest his office should issue a correction, as we did in regards to the typographical error in our piece.

On that: last week Brent Littlefield, LePage's chief political adviser, did his best to make hay over the fact that in one of the references to this $19,000 contribution in my article, the wording made it sound like the RGA Maine PAC had given the $19,000 to LePage's campaign organization to spend, rather than spending it themselves in support of LePage. (This would of course impossible, since direct donations to campaign organizations are capped at $750.) We corrected that online and in print last week, and I responded to Littlefield's effort to spin this on WGAN Friday morning.

"[O]ur education policy was taken to task because of a perception that what we are doing somehow hurts school boards, superintendents or taxpayers," the governor also proclaimed in the radio address. "And yet nobody was talking about our core goal: what is best for the students."

Of course, the effect on students was precisely what the article said was at stake, though the set of policies LePage has directed the education department to move forward on -- the Digital Learning Now! standards -- have plenty to interest the taxpayer as well, including directives to have the state pay for the online classes of private school students.

But, then, anyone who has actually read the articles already knows this, and has been able to avail themselves of the source documents that back it up. If you're one of those who haven't read it, you might want to do so, even if you're the governor of Maine.

Virtual schools in Maine: LePage adviser tries a diversion

My Maine Sunday Telegram investigation on full-time virtual charter schools and digital education policy seems to have gotten the attention of Gov. Paul LePage's inner circle.

LePage's political adviser, Brent Littlefield, called up WGAN's morning news program Wednesday to denounce a "falsehood" in the article: that in one of three references to K12 Inc.'s $19,000 contribution to LePage's candidacy via the Republican Governor's Association PAC, the wording suggested the money had been given directly to LePage's campaign organization. If there are such blatant falsehoods, Mr. Littlefield asserted, how can we trust anything in the piece?

First things first: yes, the wording of that first reference inadvertently got changed in a way that made it incorrect. Of course the RGA Maine PAC didn't direct the $19,000 to LePage's campaign organization -- such donations are capped at $750 by law. The reason such PACs exist is precisely to get around such spending caps. We've corrected the wording online and put a clarification in print.

But the point that was actually being made was that K12 Inc. contributed $19,000 to help get LePage elected, which is absolutely true.

Littlefield is of course well aware of the RGA Maine PAC's role in the 2010 gubernatorial election. The PAC -- whose purpose was to get the Republican nominee elected to the Blaine House -- spent over a million dollars in support of LePage or to oppose his opponents.

On October 11, 2010, K12 kicked in two payments totaling $19,000 (see page 3 of the PAC's disclosure here). Over the next 72 hours, the PAC made ad buys totaling over $356,000, about half spent in support of LePage (on the radio) and the other half on negative ads targeting his opponents, Libby Mitchell and Eliot Culter (on television; see page 5 of the same document.)

During the interview, Littlefield also displayed a surprisingly poor understanding of what the article was actually about, suggesting he hadn't bothered to read it before hopping on the phone for a little spin work.

I suppose Littlefield is just doing his job, but I don't think WGAN's listeners will appreciate being manipulated in this way, especially over a what is actually a minor fact in the story, and one that isn't even news, having been reported on nearly two years ago.

I'll be on WGAN this morning to set the record straight and to encourage listeners to read the piece and the sidebar, even if Littlefield hasn't.

[Update, 21:29: link to this morning's interview added.]

Virtual control: an expose on digital education policymaking in Maine

Readers of the Portland Press Herald and its sister papers may have noticed I've been relatively quiet for the past month. Here's why:

On the front of today's Maine Sunday Telegram you'll find my special report on how national online education companies have influenced the creation of digital education policies -- and full-time, virtual schools -- here in Maine.

There are a lot of revelations in this one (that education commissioner Stephen Bowen was a member of the American Legislative Exchange Council until March of last year gets lost in the flood), but you shouldn't miss the sidebar on the dubious record of full-time virtual schools elsewhere in the country.

Oh, and my colleague Bill Nemitz -- not knowing what I was working on -- independently came up with this separate piece concerning Mr. Bowen as well.

Thanks to everyone who has e-mailed, posted, or otherwise commented on the piece; I appreciate the flood of kind words. Will keep the investigations coming.

DeCoster, Land o Lakes reward friendly lawmakers

Many of you may recall last year's fight over a special bill to reduce labor protections for worker's at Austin Jack DeCoster's notorious egg farms, home to serial violations of labor, environmental, health, and worker safety laws of frankly jaw dropping magnitude. The bill -- sponsored by Rep. Dale Crafts (R-Lisbon Falls) and backed by Rep. Jeffrey Timberlake (R-Turner) -- was approved in commitee, but struck down after Sen. Chris Rector (R-Thomaston) and other lawmakers learned they had been deceived about the company's recent track record.

Decoster subsequently sold his holdings to Land o Lakes subsidiary Moark LLC, and last session the legislature passed the sought-after labor restrictions on the egg farms' behalf.

Now the legislators involved appear to be reaping their rewards. Austin Jack DeCoster has donated $100 each to Mr. Timberlake and Mr. Crafts' reelection efforts. His longtime farm manager Doucas Goranites -- foster brother and genetic first cousin of Sen. Olympia Snowe -- has given Timberlake the maximum allowed donation of $350.

For its part, Land o Lakes has given both lawmakers -- and another Turner-area legislator, Sen. Garrett Mason (R-Lisbon Falls) -- the maximum $350 each through Moark LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary based in Fontana, California. Two of Moark's employees, General Manager Blair Hagy and DeCoster Farms official Laurin Hagy, also gave $350 apiece to Rep. Crafts. Blair also gave Rep. Timberlake and Sen. Mason $350 apiece. Altogether, egg interests have added up to what amounts to significant money in legislative races, which are often won with a campaign chest of just a few thousand dollars.

In the world of money and politics, it's rare one finds a clear quid pro quo, but every once in a while...

(Cross-posted from the Press Herald's Open Season)

Talking money in politics, Hallowell, Me., June 13

For those in Central and Southern Maine, I'm one of the panelists discussing money and politics at the OneMaine round table this Wednesday evening, June 13, at Hallowell Town Hall, just south of the state capital.

My fellow panelists include Anthony Corrado Jr. of Colby College and the Brookings Institution, Lance Dutson of the Maine Heritage Policy Center, Alison Smith of Maine Citizens for Clean Elections, Bowdoin College's Michael Franz, and the executive director of the state ethics commission, Jonathan Wayne. It being a small state, my wife, Sarah Skillin Woodard, is moderating.

The event runs from 5:30 to 7 pm and is free and open to the public.

Maine's U.S. Senate money race: a pre-primary survey

For those curious about the race to replace U.S. Senator Olympia Snowe, the field is about to narrow considerably. On Tuesday, a small subset of my fellow Mainers will vote in the party primaries, presumably reducing the number of candidates from twelve to four: a Democrat, a Republican, a dark horse independent candidate with no shot of winning, and presumed frontrunner Angus King, an independent who served two terms as governor in the 1990s.

In understanding how formidable a candidate is and who they represent, it can be enormously helpful to follow their money, not just their speeches. With that in mind, I prepared a second survey of the Senate aspirants’ political fundraising – who’s giving to them, how much have they spent, and the like – for the Maine Sunday Telegram. It’s based on campaign finance disclosures that were to be filed May 31 and cover the period from April 1 to May 23. (For the first quarter, see this.)

The new data suggests that, in terms of political finance, two tiers have formed in both party contests, with Republicans Rick Bennett and Bruce Poliquin and Democrats Matt Dunlap and Jon Hinck having moved out ahead. King, meanwhile, is steadily building what is, for Maine, a formidable war chest.

One other pre-primary item: earlier this week I reported on the money bomb racino developers Ocean Properties dropped on the state senate primary in the Biddeford-Saco area. I have a blog post over at the Press Herald's Open Season on an additional PAC intervention there, this time by the National Association of Realtors. (As of last I looked, the byline on the post was incorrect, but, yes, it's me again.)

Maine: first money bomb of legislative elections

Ocean Properties has made the first big independent expenditure to influence legislative races here in Maine over the past few days, dumping over $13,000 into three Democratic primary races in the Biddeford-Saco area, where their proposed racino would be located. The sum exceeds that of all six candidates' war chests combined and comes a week before the primary.

For details, here's my story in this morning's Portland Press Herald.

Two corrections in regards to background from 2011: the story says the racino was defeated 60-40 by the state's voters last year. The actual number was 54.3-44.6 (with some blank ballots making up the difference.) My fault there.

Also, although the Maine ethics commission website currently says Ocean Properties contributed $8.5 million on the ballot question, Peter Connell tells me the figure was more like $4 million. The discrepancy appears to lie with how the commission website tabulates OP's loans, but I haven't yet gotten to the bottom of it.

For more background on Ocean Properties' involvement in Portland's Maine State Pier project, read this.

Following the money in Maine's 2nd U.S. House District race

As regular readers have probably gathered, I'm doing a lot of the political finance coverage for the Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram and its sister papers. There's a fresh heap of data to explore, with both federal and Maine state candidates, PACs, and ballot committees having recently filed fresh returns.

Today's story in the Telegram looks at the money in Maine's Second Congressional District race. The general election will almost certainly pit state senate president Kevin Raye (a relatively moderate Republican) against incumbent Mike Michaud (a Blue Dog Democrat) in a rematch of their 2004 race. It's expected to be the most closely contested of the three federal races on the ballot in November. Article abstract: Michaud has a significant advantage accounted for by contributions from PACs, though that's not all that unusual for an incumbent,

The U.S. Senate is an arcane institution and, unlike the House, doesn't require candidates to post their campaign finance disclosures electronically, so there's usually a delay in gathering them all. (We asked all Senate candidates here in Maine to send us their full reports once they filed them, but only three -- Angus King, Charlie Summers, and Bill Schneider -- did so. Why anyone would refuse to provide a public document we'll all obtain shortly is something of a mystery but, rest assured, there will be attention paid to them later.)

Maine: Quebec and East-West Highway; prominent campaign donors

I have two short stories in today's Portland Press Herald.

In the first, we check in with officials in Quebec to see what they are thinking in regards to the proposed East-West Highway and the "missing link" from the Quebec border to the nearest existing highway at Sherbrooke. Short answer: it's not really on their radar screen. (For more on East-West highway issue, consider this feature in the Maine Sunday Telegram last week.)

The second is an early take on donations to Maine's US Senate and House hopefuls, as shown in early returns for the latest reporting deadline yesterday. My piece highlights a few prominent Mainers and who they're giving to. My colleague John Richardson has a round-up of the money totals thus far. More details to come.