Aunty Maxine pressed on FEC audit over fundraising shenanigans

California Democrat Rep. Maxine Waters, named the most corrupt member of Congress 4 times may be going for a new record of 5 times a loser as she is facing another complaint about an obscure fundraising tactic. It rakes in thousands from state politicians who then are listed on her slate mailers in exchange for the money. This time it involves supporters of a former Los Angeles mayor who lost in the June gubernatorial primary.

Holy moly Batman . . . that's beginning to sound like a Hillary Clinton ploy, except without a foundation shelter to cover her butt.

The National Legal and Policy Center, a conservative watchdog group, filed the complaint with the FEC against Waters, her campaign and a pro-charter school group called Families and Teachers for Antonio Villaraigosa. This group backed the former Democratic mayor of Los Angeles.

The pro-charter school group paid $25 thousand to the Citizens for Waters Committee on May 25th to include Villaraigosa in the slate mailer, according to the complaint. But the FEC guidelines say only a candidate's committee is permitted to pay for the mailers--sample ballots are mailed out to about 200,000 voters in LA and it indicates who Waters supports.

This is not the first time Waters' mailers faced scrutiny. Since 2004, Waters paid her daughter Karen Waters, or her public relations firm Progressive Connections, to produce, print and mail the sample ballots. Her mailers have faced scrutiny since 2010.

Legally, candidates are not buying an endorsement but are paying a reimbursement for the slate mailer. But it's very hard to prove whether Waters is endorsing the candidate as a result of the payment or if already endorsed candidates are paying for their share. And Waters is as slippery as an eel swimming through Crisco.

Worse, the mailers can be a loophole to get around federal campaign contribution limits. The watchdog group's FEC complaint, the second against Aunty Maxine since July, is asking for a full audit of her campaign.

The complaint filed Thursday morning said:

"Since the commission has given federal campaigns broad discretion involving slate mailers it is imperative the issues cited in this complaint are fully investigated and all penalties and fines that may result from a finding that the Citizen for Waters campaign was in violation of the statutes cited should be applied in full."

Neither Waters nor her campaign responded to phone calls and email inquiries fo this report. This surprises no one.


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