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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Sunday, March 26, 2006

Out-of-state cash bites Democrats

By Jerry Burris
Advertiser Columnist

This should have been a slam-dunk for the Hawai'i Republican Party.

But it took several days and obviously a lot of thinking before the local GOP jumped on an obvious goof by the Hawai'i Democratic Party involving a fundraising deal that stretched from here to Rhode Island.

This was the kind of thing political hard-ballers love. The other side got caught with its fingers in the cookie jar, no way around it.

But the care with which the local Republicans approached this matter suggests more than mere caution. It suggests there was a lot of time devoted to making sure their own house was in order before slapping the Democrats.

At the end of the day, this is another example of how even the best-intended efforts at campaign financing regulations create as many loopholes as they do real reform.

In this case, local Democrats were caught flat-footed. The party funneled $5,000 to Rhode Island Secretary of State Matt Brown (now running for the U.S. Senate) and shortly thereafter received $6,000 from one of Brown's Rhode Island supporters. That supporter, Richard Bready, had already maxed out on the amount he could contribute directly to Brown.

Local Democrats have insisted there was no tit-for-tat deal, but they did quickly return the money.

Now local Republicans have called for an investigation by the Federal Election Commission, saying there may have been a violation of federal laws against money-laundering.

State Democratic chairman Brickwood Galuteria says he welcomes the investigation.

A real investigation may reveal that this deal is far more common than realized. It is almost an inevitable result in a fundraising system in which candidates are virtually forced to go outside their own constituency for cash.

Local Republican officials are acutely aware that their leader, Gov. Linda Lingle, has made a serious effort at Mainland fundraising.

Democrats tried to short-circuit Lingle by passing new restrictions on out-of-state fundraising, but for some reason delayed the effective date of the new law, allowing Lingle to indulge in vigorous Mainland fundraising.

You can bet Democrats are right now going through those lists of outside contributors to see if any of them received help from Hawai'i residents with Republican connections.

If they do find that kind of relationship, and there's no evidence they will, it won't get the Democrats off the hook.

What they did, if not directly illegal, was certainly cynical.

Campaign contribution laws are there for a reason. When people find ways around them, what you see is not cleverness; it is disdain for a system everyone professes to honor.

The cure would be to insist that candidates receive contributions only from individuals within the district they hope to represent. But don't hold your breath for that one.

Jerry Burris is The Advertiser's editorial page editor.

Reach Jerry Burris at jburris@honoluluadvertiser.com.