For those of you interested in things California Republican Party – there have been a lot of emails passed around containing a letter signed by legislative leaders indicating that they are starting a new fundraising program that is outside of the CAGOP structure that has been used for the last 12+ years.

I am concerned that because of Term limits there is no one still around that was there the last time this scheme was created. Over the last 20+ years several candidates and county parties have found themselves at the center of FPPC investigations. The FPPC is the campaign finance people whose job it is to enforce the ever-changing campaign finance rules. A lot of people talk about FPPC complaints but few know that the FPPC has some extreme power.

The FPPC can execute broad power to go beyond the scope of any complaint and I have seen this many times over the years as I have had to respond to the FPPC many times over garbage complaints filed by people with axes to grind. The FPPC can subpoena your emails, phone records, bank records, copies of checks, and anything else they feel like getting. I have seen it happen many times that the fines and penalties levied have nothing to do with the original complaint!

Under the proposed new plan, it appears that the Legislative Leaders are going to create an arrangement similar to the “Golden State Leadership Fund” + county parties scheme that was done during both Ron Nehring and Tom DelBaccardi’s terms of office as CAGOP Chair. What it looks like? Basically, money is sent to the designated Central Committee and or PAC’s that are set up. Sometimes money is “transferred” between these PACS and committees. (In the era of 2008-2014 committees such as Tulare, SLO, SJ and Stanislaus all got used and most were later fined by the FPPC)

Let’s say you are the Chair / Treasurer of the XX County Republican Party for example. Now, you take some large chunks money from various places, then you send checks to candidates. Then, the democrats see this happening, know exactly what it is and file complaints for earmarking and coordination. Now the Treasurer is directly personally labile for any fines, and perhaps the Chair. The board of directors (by definition the committee itself) will be personally liable for expenses related to the charges. Then the FPPC has carte blanche to start looking through your personal stuff on their fishing expedition.

I have personal first hand experience dealing with the FPPC and have seen everything I am talking about happen.

During the era of 2008-2014 the Placer GOP was approached about taking money, holding back a couple thousand and then sending the money to candidates “to do the right thing”. Tom Hudson to his credit screamed (this time with righteous cause) that we’d be insane to do this and exposing ourselves to all kinds of liability. We did not participate and later Tom was vindicated by the myriad of fines related to this candidate and others. I recall a lot of fines getting handed out to several committees and PAC’s for money laundering, coordination and earmarking funds. (Tom Berryhill and Damon Dunn are two candidates that come to mind, whose support caused some of the fines)

If you are a county party, you need to do research and think long and hard about what you’d do if approached to take large dollars from outside donors. The risk is extreme and there is ample record of county parties getting hammered… something that if we still had legislators in office that had heritage dating back to the 2008-2014 Golden State Leadership Fund Era would remember.

But there is another bigger problem than just finding some of the County Party officers at the crosshairs of the FPPC facing large fines and subpoenas, etc… Insurance.

Running operations outside the State GOP structure will expose all the county parties to uninsured liability. Each Party would have to buy their own insurance (if they can get it) to cover the liability of running campaign operations. As a man who has done insurance for 28 years, including insuring county parties, clubs and sometimes campaigns themselves – this should scare everyone. Without the umbrella of the CAGOP, County Parties go from having some insurance to none at all.

Just 4 years ago a volunteer for a County Party helping a Congressional Campaign in the Southern Central Valley got in to an accident. $11M later the claim was settled. Could you imagine being a county party member that is uninsured facing your portion of this liability? Even splitting it 20-30 ways is a lot of money!

FYI – if you are on a committee or leadership of a club, your personal home/renters insurance will NOT cover anything related to serving on the board of directors of a political organization (or serving in office). As a side note, many (if not all now) exclude service on the boards of charitable organizations / sports clubs, etc. as well.

Your friendly local insurance broker (namely me), can help you get insurance, but be ready to spend several thousand dollars a year for insurance that will cover you adequately for the exposure.

The conclusion to this is, I have a lot of friends on all sides of the current issue between the CAGOP Leadership and the Legislative Leaders. I wrote this blog as an appeal to people to think through the consequences of everything, remove the circumstances and personalities and game this out on a straight line. If you are a hard-working county party member, do you deserve to be exposed to liability like this? If you are a legislator should you be asking counties to expose themselves like this, and should you be exposing your own committees/selves to additional liability like this? There has to be a better way than hanging extra targets on yourselves and others for the California State Government to use to discredit Republicans.