January 31, 2012 05:34 AM UTC

See How Easy That Was?

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• by: Colorado Pols

The Colorado Independent’s Scot Kersgaard:

The Colorado Legislature acted quickly and in bipartisan fashion today to require biweekly campaign finance disclosures in advance of this year’s primary elections in June.

In past years, biweekly reporting was required beginning in the July before the primary, with quarterly reporting required before that. Last year, though, the legislature voted to move primaries from August to May but did not change the reporting requirements, thus creating a situation where biweekly reporting would have to begin almost a year before the primary instead of a month prior. That prompted Secretary of State Scott Gessler to implement a rule that eliminated bi-weekly reporting altogether.

And from Colorado Ethics Watch’s statement today:

Urgent action from the legislature became necessary because Secretary of State Scott Gessler attempted to use the failure to update the disclosure statute after the primary date change last year as justification for a regulation that would have eliminated biweekly reports before a primary altogether. Ethics Watch filed suit in Denver District Court challenging the rule on the ground that the Secretary of State has no authority to override statutory disclosure requirements. The legislature’s Legal Services Committee voted 8-2 to reject the rule as exceeding the Secretary of State’s authority, leading the Secretary to withdraw the rule on December 27. After the rule was withdrawn, Ethics Watch voluntarily dismissed its lawsuit. This paved the way for the legislature to reassert its authority over campaign finance statutes.

“We congratulate the legislature on its quick, bipartisan action to restore reasonable disclosure rules for the June primary,” said Luis Toro, Director of Ethics Watch. “If Secretary of State Gessler had his way, voters would have been in the dark just as fundraising and spending pick up before the primary date.”

Thus ends one of the more brazen attempts to manipulate a legislative mistake for predatory gain that we’ve ever seen. Sen. Greg Brophy delivered the parting shot on Gessler’s behalf, with his silly motion to delay into February when it needed to take effect this month. In the end, the lesson is not just the mistake, but the way Gessler tried to chip away at election law.

And he’s going to try again, which is why this is a very important lesson.