Union cash barred

Despite court ruling, state official prohibits campaign donations

Ann Imse, Rocky Mountain News

Tuesday, October 3, 2006

The Colorado secretary of state says that unions with possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars to contribute to political campaigns are still barred from doing so - despite a ruling by the Court of Appeals last week.

But the unions' attorney says the secretary is wrong and the contributions can start to flow.

"I haven't run into anybody in the legal community who agrees with the secretary," said lawyer Mark Grueskin.

The two sides are looking at different sections of the appellate ruling to come to their opposite conclusions.

Last Thursday, the state appeals court rejected Secretary of State Gigi Dennis' Aug. 2 ruling that barred union donations to "small-donor" political committees, unless they obtained written permission from each member.

But on Monday, Deputy Attorney General Jason Dunn said the appellate ruling applies only to the two unions that sued. All other membership organizations are not affected, he said. They must continue to follow the rule and get each member's consent to donate to political campaigns.

But Grueskin said that limitation only applies to the second part of the appeals court's decision. In the first part, he said, the appellate court and the trial judge found the secretary "exceeded her authority, period."

"If she didn't have the authority to pass the rule, then no membership organization is affected by the rule," he said.

"I'm comfortable relying on what the courts said, rather than on what the secretary says the law means," he continued.

Both sides agree that the two plaintiff unions are now free to donate. The Colorado Education Association says it has nearly $400,000 for "friends of education" of both parties. The American Federation of Teachers said it has about $5,000.

But where the two sides disagree, the gap is wide.

At issue are the donations of 133 other small-donor committees listed in the secretary of state's records. Some are not affected because they are not membership groups like unions or industry associations. One, the Realtors' committee, says it already meets the rule by asking members' permission to make political donations.

But at least 36 are union small-donor committees, and they are believed to have hundreds of thousands of dollars ready to donate to Colorado political campaigns. But they've been unable to do so since Dennis issued her rule Aug. 2.

Now they have a union attorney saying they can go ahead, and the secretary of state and a deputy attorney general saying they cannot.

If they do, the law gives the secretary of state no authority to take action. Someone must complain, and the complaint would go to a hearing before an administrative law judge.

Meanwhile, union funds donated to campaigns might get spent.

The lawsuit continues in Denver district court, to decide whether the secretary's rule will apply to future elections.

Dennis said Monday she does not intend to appeal last week's ruling to the Colorado Supreme Court because she believes it applies only to the two plaintiff unions and only for the current campaign.

"Given the proximity of the election and the fact that last week's appeals court ruling applies only to these two plaintiffs for this election, I have chosen not to appeal further," Dennis said in a statement. "We continue to believe that this rule is valid and necessary to ensure honest and open elections in Colorado."

The secretary, a Republican, said she created the rule to avoid the appearance of corruption. The unions said the rule was designed to restrict contributions to Democratic candidates.

imsea@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5438