THE DEMOCRATS' CHOICE OF EVILS (via Glenn Dryfoos):

Return of Donations Ordered: Judge says Bustamante can't use millions from old campaign fund. An aide says it's been spent. (Dan Morain, September 23, 2003, LA Times)

A judge ruled Monday that Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante broke campaign laws by using about $4 million in donations to pay for an advertising blitz.

The judge ordered Bustamante to return the contributions. But, perhaps rendering the decision more political than practical, Bustamante's chief political consultant said all the money was gone.

In a 12-page order issued in response to a lawsuit by a Republican state senator, Sacramento Superior Court Judge Loren McMaster wrote that a fund-raising maneuver Bustamante had employed had violated the "plain and unambiguous language" of Proposition 34. That measure, passed by voters in 2000, caps political contributions at $21,200 in the recall race.

The lieutenant governor accepted donations far exceeding that sum — including a $1.5-million gift from an Indian tribe — in an old campaign fund established before Proposition 34 took effect. Then he shifted the money to a new fund, and used it for an ad campaign.

McMaster issued a preliminary injunction forbidding Bustamante to transfer any more of the disputed money to his current campaign.

But the judge also said Bustamante had probably "acted in good faith" and had not intentionally broken the law.

Bustamante initially planned to transfer millions from the old committee to his new "Bustamante for Governor" account.

But in the face of an outcry from other candidates, he changed strategy and moved the money to an even newer fund he set up to oppose Proposition 54, the measure that would restrict government's ability to gather racial and ethnic data. The measure shares the recall ballot and is the subject of the television ads paid for with the disputed cash.

Odd how everyone else understood that Mr. Bustamante was violating the law. His "good faith" would appear to depend on his being an imbecile.

Posted by Orrin Judd at September 23, 2003 6:52 PM