There are legislative fundraisers, and then there are legislative fundraisers. Those of Representative David Segal, which have a bit of Mardi Gras, fall into the latter category, and he's got one this week.

Please Join Rep Segal for a night of music, fun and progressive politics this Thursday, May 8th, at Nick-a-Nee's in Providence's Jewelry District.

 

For more info, or to donate online, please visit www.VoteSegal.com

  

Thursday, May 8th

6-10PM

 

Nick-a-Nees

75 South Street, Jewelry District

 

Featuring:

The What Cheer? Brigade

The Low Anthem

The Trolleys

 

Pay-what-you-can

Here's part of my report from a previous event:

Interesting crowd last night for state Representative David Segal's (D-Providence) fundraiser at Nick-a-Nee's. Aside from assorted advocates (Matt Auten, Peter Asen), neighborhood activists (David Riley), artists (Bert Crenca, Mimo Riley) and scribes (Scott MacKay, yours truly), there was a strong showing from the Green-turned-Democrat's House colleagues, including good sports Republican Minority Leader Bob Watson and Minority Whip Nick Gorham. The Dems in the House included Speaker Bill Murphy, Majority Leader Gordon Fox, Tim Williamson, Art Handy, and Gus Silva (N4N arrived on the late side, so my apology for any omissions).  

It was an inspired choice to have music provided by the excellent What Cheer Brigade

House Minority Leader Robert A. Watson of East Greenwich is having a $100-per-person time ($150 for couples, $25 for young Republicans) tonight at Olives, 108 North Main St., Providence, from 5:30 to 7:30 pm.

As I wrote last week, the Clinton campaign botched it by alienating David Cicilline.

The mayor's in a difficult position, as Buddy Cianci pointed out today, since his headache with the firefighters will come with him if he were to throw his support to Obama.

Meanwhile, Scott MacKay reports today that Jack McConnell, treasurer of the RI Democratic Party, and someone close to Cicilline, stayed away from Clinton's Providence fundraiser yesterday ($100,000 raised) because of his pique over Cicilline having been disinvited.

McConnell is a bigfoot in RI, so this is not a good way to make friends and influence people amid a tight campaign.

Btw, speaking this morning on his show, John DePetro wondered why Elizabeth Roberts, considering her liberal profile, isn't with Obama. Might the answer be summed up in two letters (EL)?

From The Wall Street Journal:

While Sen. Hillary Clinton’s camp was dogged earlier this week of reports over a $5 million loan to herself and a handful of staff temporarily going without pay, her communications director told reporters today that they have rebounded and are raising sums that rival Sen. Barack Obama. Howard Wolfson said Clinton has raised $8 million since the polls closed on Super Tuesday and is approaching raising $10 million since Feb. 1. Further, they have expanded their donor base by 75,000.

Clinton

“This is a very important development going forward,” Wolfson said, adding that the campaign has overcome advantages Obama had with the endorsement of MoveOn.org and mobilizing its membership, as well as a donor database from Sen. John Kerry’s 2004 presidential that Obama’s campaign earned along with the Massachusetts senator’s endorsement. “We anticipate this will be ongoing and it will continue,” Wolfson said of the recent run in fund-raising success.

Obama still appears to have the money edge. Clinton only raised $13.5 million to Obama’s $32 million in January, and his campaign said Thursday they had raised $7.2 million in the 48 hours after Feb. 5, poising his campaign to near or match their record-setting January haul.

With the Clinton campaign facing funding issues, Obama is rolling:

Barack Obama’s campaign is on track to raise another $30 million in February, sources close to the Illinois senator say, while Hillary Rodham Clinton’s spokesman revealed Wednesday that she had loaned her campaign $5 million.

Insiders in both campaigns say the growing financial disparity virtually ensures that Obama will be able to significantly outspend Clinton in the critical primaries to come.

Even before all the Super Tuesday votes were counted, Obama began airing advertisements in Nebraska, Virginia, the District of Columbia, Maryland and Maine — the next round of primary and caucus states — before Clinton did.

His campaign has raised $2.2 million in less than 24 hours, sources say.

The Page:

*Matches his previous three-month record.*

The most ever raised by a Democrat in the January of an election year.

Campaign manager Plouffe on media call says they also added 170,000 new donors. Strongest money-raising day was after losing New Hampshire primary. Listen to audio here.

Launching TV, radio spots to markets in six states and Washington, DC that have post-Super Tuesday contests.

Justice Brandeis famously said that sunlight is the best disinfectant. So it is with campaign donations and the public's ability to scrutinize them.

If people know who and what is funding their lawmakers, it makes it that much easier to guard against criminal behavior and garden-variety conflicts of interest. The public has an interest in public officials knowing that this information is publicly available.

That's why the General Assembly made a bad move by reducing the number of Rhode Island politicians who need to file fundraising and campaign spending reports.

Had the bill been law during the 2006 election year, the number of candidates and office holders required to list their donors online would have dropped by close to a third, according to an analysis performed yesterday by the Board of Elections.

With Capitol TV cameras rolling during Tuesday night’s veto-override session at the State House, Rep. Thomas Slater, D-Providence, told colleagues he introduced the bill because: “there are a lot of elderly candidates who run for office … [who] still do not understand the logic of the computer.” For people like this, he argued, paper filings should again be an option.

But House Minority Whip Nicholas Gorham, R-Coventry, said: “I don’t really think the issue is about protecting the elderly here.”

“There are people in this room that just don’t want the data in that kind of format with the Board of Elections, where the public will be able to more easily access it …because our history has been to oppose such things; the history of the party in control has been to oppose public information on campaign finance,” he said. “That’s too bad.”

Nick Gorham is right. The potential inconvenience for public officials (and this seems overstated) is more than offset by the benefits of an open and accessible system for examining campaign donations.

Legislative officials should appreciate this, particularly in light of how Operation Dollar Bill has cast a shadow on the General Assembly.

The Boston Globe today puts the value of Mitt Romney, "by far the wealthiest presidential candidate," and his wife in the neighborhood of $250 million.

Writing last week in the Phoenix, David Bernstein noted how Romney is awash in campaign contributions from his financial-world friends. So what price is their loyalty?

Since becoming a very wealthy man by the mid 1990s, several observers say, Romney has cared less about making more money and more about how his loyal and grateful minions can help him politically: collecting contributions for him, and burnishing his image by providing tales of his successful leadership. (See “Rewriting Staples History.”)

Since then, political observers add, Romney has been laying the groundwork for what he has sown this year: a far-flung fundraising network, outpacing his Republican rivals by raising more than $37 million in individual contributions. That money has primarily come from wealthy people in the finance and business communities, each giving the maximum allowed: donations of $2300. His “bundlers” — supporters who raise large sums by soliciting donations from their friends and associates — include dozens of people who have, in some way, benefited from Romney’s business acumen (or largesse) and through the private-equity company he co-founded, at the behest of his former boss (and key funder) William Bain.

That support begins with dozens of current and former employees of Bain Capital, its sister management-consulting firm Bain & Company, and Bain spin-offs, who along with their spouses have contributed more than a half-million dollars to Romney’s campaign, according to a Phoenix analysis of campaign-finance reports.

Equally generous have been the banking, legal, and advisory firms that Bain Capital uses for its large venture-capital and leveraged-buyout (LBO) deals. Bain has remained loyal to a small number of elite firms for these transactions, including Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, and Kirkland & Ellis. Employees of those three companies and their spouses account for well over another half-million dollars in Romney’s coffers. Romney is hardly unique in that regard — Barack Obama has received more than a half-million from Goldman Sachs and Lehman Brothers — but when it comes to successfully soliciting funds from Wall Street, Romney has out-raised his more-politically-powerful competition, including McCain, Rudy Giuliani, and Hillary Clinton.

-- There's a fundraiser tonight for state Representative Grace Diaz (D-Providence) at the Roger Williams Park Casino. Matt has the details.

-- Brian C. Jones updates how Providence's long-awaited, long delayed First Source ordinance is being implemented. (Andrew offers his view here.)

The law is beginning to help substantial number of workers get jobs. Almost 200 residents have received jobs, about half at the Renaissance Providence Hotel, which opened this year in the former Masonic Temple near the State House. This disclosure came in a report from the city’s Department of Planning & Devel¬opment to the community activist group Direct Action for Rights & Equality (DARE).
 
But mirroring the agonizingly slow birth of the “First Source” jobs program, even that upbeat progress report seemingly had to be pried from city officials. It was written after about 20 DARE member visited the city’s planning and law offices on July 24 to de¬mand answers to an earlier public records’ request.

-- The Providence chapter of the Progressive Democrats of America is slated to have its kickoff event on Monday, August 13 -- a screening at the elegant Columbus Theatre of Norman Solomon's War Made Easy, with producer and co-director Loretta Alper on hand.

-- This is more of a libertarian note, but Tom has valid concerns about the creeping surveillance state.

Frank Caprio demurred when recently asked about his political plans, but RI Report has the details of how the general treasurer has considerably strengthened his war chest. Matt also has the scoop here:

Update 7/31: With the final numbers in, Treasurer Frank Caprio has taken the overall fundraising lead and he, along with Mayor David Cicilline, remain at the top of the Cash on Hand (CoH) category. Updated numbers are below.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Original Post 7/3: The 2nd quarter of fundraising (4/1-6/30) has ended for the possible 2010 Democratic gubernatorial candidates and we can now report some numbers. Caprio had another strong quarter with Cicilline slowing down because of his focus on the city budget and Roberts and Lynch picking up some steam from their slow 1st quarters.

• Frank Caprio - Q1: 162k Q2: 165k CoH: $301k
• David Cicilline - Q1: 246k Q2: 72k CoH: $244k
• Patrick Lynch - Q1: 9k Q2: 70k CoH: $30k
• Elizabeth Roberts - Q1: 2k Q2: 45k CoH: $38k
• Scott Avedisian - Q1: $33k  Q2: 16k  CoH: $74k
• Steve Laffey - Q1: $8k  Q2: 12k  CoH: $20k

That question was put forward in a story I wrote for the Phoenix in February 2005. Now, more than two years later, Common Cause of Rhode Island is hosting a forum tonight to ask whether the state is ready for Fair Elections, the new name for the campaign-finance reform backed by the good government group. In short,

The proposal would equalize funding in races between publicly backed candidates and better financed, privately supported candidates by topping off the "Clean" candidates with additional funds. The record in Maine and Arizona suggests that this approach fosters more campaign contests, and exerts a kind of collective peer pressure toward embracing Clean Elections.

According to Common Cause,

The forum, which is free and open to the public, will take place at 7 pm at The Squantum Association, at 947 Veterans Memorial Parkway in East Providence. At 6 pm Common Cause RI will host an appreciation reception, which is complimentary to all Common Cause donors (donations also accepted at the door). RSVPs are requested by COB Tuesday, June 5; please call Diana Kelly at 861.2322. More details are available at http://www.commoncauseri.org/.

. . . .

Panelists will include the Hon. Norm Ferguson, a retired Maine state senator who participated in Maine's full financing system; Andy Sauer, Director of Common Cause Connecticut, where full public financing was signed into law in 2006; and Wright. Moderated by Common Cause RI Executive Director Christine Lopes, the discussion will examine the mechanics of various states' systems and consider issues facing reformers such as potential limits on free speech, legal challenges, the effect on public spending, the experience of participating candidates, and the positive impact on candidate diversity. Questions will be accepted from the audience.

Legislation to create a system of publicly financed campaigns has been considered by the Rhode Island General Assembly in each of the past three legislative sessions, but has yet to reach either chamber's floor for a vote. Reflecting on the challenge of getting the election reform passed by the Connecticut legislature and signed into law, Sauer noted, "While there were a lot of factors that contributed to our success -- such as the resignation and subsequent conviction of ex-Gov. John G. Rowland -- the most important factor in the passage of our campaign finance law was the determination of the people of Connecticut that its government respond to the worst scandal in state history. Warmed-over ethics legislation wasn't going to do it. We wanted meaningful reform."

Rhode Island currently has a system for partial public financing of campaigns, which has been used by elected officials like former Lt. Governor Charles Fogarty, Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis, and Lt. Governor Elizabeth Roberts. A number of New England states have enacted public financing reforms which go further than matching funds, with Maine at the forefront. Senator Norman Ferguson, who served for eight years as a state senator from 1994 to 2002 before stepping down because of Maine's term limits, commented; "In the 2006 election cycle, over 80% of the candidates for the Maine legislature took advantage of the Maine Clean Election Act. It is fair to say that public funding of elections in Maine has been a resounding success."

Providence Mayor David N. Cicilline is thought to be closing a very strong quarter of fund-raising. And while we know it takes considerable money to run for mayor, it takes a lot more to run for governor.

Proponents of publicly financing Rhode Island elections are slated to hold a 3 pm rally in the State House rotunda tomorrow to highlight the introduction of related legislation. This will be the third year in which Clean Elections legislation has been introduced, so we'll see if it gets any further than in the past.

As Phil West, then the director of Common Cause of Rhode Island, told me when I wrote about this issue a few years back:

"We have to go to the very people [in the General Assembly] who are directly affected and say, 'Can we make it easier for someone to run against you? It's not an easy sell."

Still, the long journey of separation of powers, which became law last year after a fight that began in the '90s, shows that even improbable reform measures can come to fruition in Rhode Island with enough public support. West, who finds the youthful interest of [Te-Ping] Chen and her fellow Brown students [backing the measure] inspiring, was encouraged by how they began pushing the proposal last year. "It's a good thing you're freshman," he recalls telling them at the time, "because we might not get this done in a year."

One of Rhode Island's unsuccessful 2006 candidates recently contacted me to vent about the influence of money in politics, and how the press rates the credibility of candidates according to their war chests. Well, as I told him, welcome to the real world. It's sad, but true, that money remains the juice on which our politics runs.

Not coincidentally, this morning's New York Times has the story of how Hillary Clinton has become the first presidential candidate since 1976 to opt out of public financing for both the primary and general election "because of the spending limits that come with federal money." Not for Nothing, but we're looking at a wild spending spree as a superstar like Hillary tries to emerge from the Democratic pack. It hardly hurts, of course, that the Clinton machine will back her to the hilt.

Here in Rhode Island, I broke the story a few years back of how a Brown student, Te-Ping Chen (who went on to intern at the Phoenix), was the driving force behind a Clean Elections proposal backed by Common Cause of RI. As Phi West anticipated, the effort went nowhere fast, but it remains a top priority for his successor, Christine Lopes. People get the government that they deserve, so if Rhode Islanders are unhappy with the disproportionate influence of money in politics, they can rally behind this effort.