Rep. Lauren Boebert used campaign funds for rent and utilities, new filing shows

[ZiprHead]

https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/23/politics/lauren-boebert-fec-personal-expenses/index.html

(CNN)Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert paid utility and rent bills with campaign funds, according to a new filing the Republican lawmaker made this week with the Federal Election Commission.

The report, submitted to the FEC on Tuesday, details a series of four payments this year totaling $6,650 to John Pacheco, whose address is the same as Shooters Grill in Rifle, Colorado -- the gun-themed restaurant that Boebert owns. The payments are described as rent and utilities that had been erroneously billed to campaign.
Boebert refused to answer CNN's questions Thursday. In an email, her spokesman Ben Stout said the funds in question "were reimbursed months ago when Rep. Boebert self-reported the error."

It is against the law to use campaign funds for personal use. And Adav Noti, a top official with the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center, said using donors' money to pay rent and utilities is a "flagrant violation."

"There are some gray areas in campaign finance law, and this is really not one of them," added Noti, a former associate general counsel at the FEC.
But how federal regulators respond, he said, depends on the circumstances and whether payments represented an intentional attempt to misuse campaign dollars or were the result of sloppy compliance processes within the campaign.

U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert’s campaign has publicly acknowledged that a prior campaign finance report — which raised ethical red flags and led to multiple requests for investigation — was inaccurate. Still, the campaign defended a large payment to the congresswoman.

On Feb. 2, The Denver Post reported that Boebert, a Republican from Silt, was paid more than $22,000 in mileage reimbursements from her campaign account, an unusually large amount that several ethics experts said raised questions. To justify the reimbursement, Boebert would have had to drive 38,712 miles last year during a pandemic that limited travel for several months.

Most of that money was paid on Nov. 11, when Boebert received $21,200 from her campaign coffers for mileage, according to her campaign’s original report, filed in December.

Another huckster.

 

[Keith&Co.]

So, even if she paid the money back, an "interest free loan" doesn't sound a lot better.

 

[ZiprHead]

Obviously her restaurant is losing money.

From the first link:

And last month, as first reported by the Associated Press, Boebert's required financial disclosure report showed her husband made more than $478,000 in 2020 in consulting services from Terra Energy Productions. He also made $460,000 from the firm in 2019, according to the filing.

I think he could have paid the rent for her.

Not to mention, pretty good pay for a guy who likes to show his junk to kids in bowling alleys.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

If she self-reported it I don't think it's anything more than an accounting oops. Just because she's vile doesn't mean everything she does must be malicious.

 

[Keith&Co.]

If she self-reported it I don't think it's anything more than an accounting oops. Just because she's vile doesn't mean everything she does must be malicious.

When i collected funds for Navy Relief, i went to some effort to keep those funds separate from my own money. I didn't even put the bills in the same pocket as the money i brought for the soda machine.
Similarly, when my wife was advisor for the Senior Class, the money she collected and banked for their activities was in a separate account, not handled alongside her own money.

There should not be accounting overlap in money she has collected for her campaign and money she can spend on her car, restaurant, housekeeper, etc. That gets too close to money laundering. Even if she's not being malicious, she's being a fucking moron if it's even possible for her to misspend campaign money.
These ARE the people who got so very upset about someone getting official emails on a private computer, right? If overlap is such a crucial issue, then by golly it's a crucial issue. Gander Sauce IS Goose Sauce.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

If she self-reported it I don't think it's anything more than an accounting oops. Just because she's vile doesn't mean everything she does must be malicious.

Not certain how such a mistake can happen. She has her money and then there is the campaign and her funds as a Representative. Sounds like she loaned herself money to pay the bills.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

If she self-reported it I don't think it's anything more than an accounting oops. Just because she's vile doesn't mean everything she does must be malicious.

When i collected funds for Navy Relief, i went to some effort to keep those funds separate from my own money. I didn't even put the bills in the same pocket as the money i brought for the soda machine.
Similarly, when my wife was advisor for the Senior Class, the money she collected and banked for their activities was in a separate account, not handled alongside her own money.

There should not be accounting overlap in money she has collected for her campaign and money she can spend on her car, restaurant, housekeeper, etc. That gets too close to money laundering. Even if she's not being malicious, she's being a fucking moron if it's even possible for her to misspend campaign money.
These ARE the people who got so very upset about someone getting official emails on a private computer, right? If overlap is such a crucial issue, then by golly it's a crucial issue. Gander Sauce IS Goose Sauce.

If she self-reported it I don't think it's anything more than an accounting oops. Just because she's vile doesn't mean everything she does must be malicious.

Not certain how such a mistake can happen. She has her money and then there is the campaign and her funds as a Representative. Sounds like she loaned herself money to pay the bills.

I think this is a case of selecting the wrong account to pay the bills from. These days with everything electronic it wouldn't be at all hard to do if you had access to multiple accounts using the same login.

 

[Keith&Co.]

If she self-reported it I don't think it's anything more than an accounting oops. Just because she's vile doesn't mean everything she does must be malicious.

Not certain how such a mistake can happen. She has her money and then there is the campaign and her funds as a Representative. Sounds like she loaned herself money to pay the bills.

I think this is a case of selecting the wrong account to pay the bills from. These days with everything electronic it wouldn't be at all hard to do if you had access to multiple accounts using the same login.

I don't know about your banking, but in paying online bills, i have to select the specific account to draw funds from and the person I'm paying.
To make this sort of mistake, i would have to have added my personal creditors to my campaign fund account on purpose. That would make it premeditated.

Also, my bill-pay function identifies the account i'm paying money FOR, by house address, name, account number, whatever.
If, somehow, i rented my house and my campaign office from the same realtor, my attempt to pay my campaign office rent from my personal account would hit the realtor as a second payment on my house rent.

I really, really, really don't see how this could be accidental.

 

[TomC]

I think this is a case of selecting the wrong account to pay the bills from. These days with everything electronic it wouldn't be at all hard to do if you had access to multiple accounts using the same login.

I don't know about your banking, but in paying online bills, i have to select the specific account to draw funds from and the person I'm paying.
To make this sort of mistake, i would have to have added my personal creditors to my campaign fund account on purpose. That would make it premeditated.

Also, my bill-pay function identifies the account i'm paying money FOR, by house address, name, account number, whatever.
If, somehow, i rented my house and my campaign office from the same realtor, my attempt to pay my campaign office rent from my personal account would hit the realtor as a second payment on my house rent.

I really, really, really don't see how this could be accidental.

I don't claim to know.
But it does look more like an attempt to add a veneer of plausible deniability to the corruption.
Tom

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I think this is a case of selecting the wrong account to pay the bills from. These days with everything electronic it wouldn't be at all hard to do if you had access to multiple accounts using the same login.

I don't know about your banking, but in paying online bills, i have to select the specific account to draw funds from and the person I'm paying.
To make this sort of mistake, i would have to have added my personal creditors to my campaign fund account on purpose. That would make it premeditated.

Also, my bill-pay function identifies the account i'm paying money FOR, by house address, name, account number, whatever.
If, somehow, i rented my house and my campaign office from the same realtor, my attempt to pay my campaign office rent from my personal account would hit the realtor as a second payment on my house rent.

I really, really, really don't see how this could be accidental.

Depends on the situation. I have two separate accounts with different registrations, but one list of payees. There's a pick box for what account the money comes from. These days each payee has a default but that didn't exist at first--the few bills that were supposed to be paid by the second account would come up on the first unless I explicitly changed it.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I think this is a case of selecting the wrong account to pay the bills from. These days with everything electronic it wouldn't be at all hard to do if you had access to multiple accounts using the same login.

I don't know about your banking, but in paying online bills, i have to select the specific account to draw funds from and the person I'm paying.
To make this sort of mistake, i would have to have added my personal creditors to my campaign fund account on purpose. That would make it premeditated.

Also, my bill-pay function identifies the account i'm paying money FOR, by house address, name, account number, whatever.
If, somehow, i rented my house and my campaign office from the same realtor, my attempt to pay my campaign office rent from my personal account would hit the realtor as a second payment on my house rent.

I really, really, really don't see how this could be accidental.

I don't claim to know.
But it does look more like an attempt to add a veneer of plausible deniability to the corruption.
Tom

The thing is she reported it herself. All it amounts to is an interest-free loan, nothing more. I would feel differently had it been discovered by others.

 

[Shadowy Man]

I don't claim to know.
But it does look more like an attempt to add a veneer of plausible deniability to the corruption.
Tom

The thing is she reported it herself. All it amounts to is an interest-free loan, nothing more. I would feel differently had it been discovered by others.

So it’s not too bad to misappropriate funds as long as you pay it back?

 

[TomC]

I don't claim to know.
But it does look more like an attempt to add a veneer of plausible deniability to the corruption.
Tom

The thing is she reported it herself. All it amounts to is an interest-free loan, nothing more. I would feel differently had it been discovered by others.

Why'd she report it?
I'm not claiming to know. But if some whistleblowers pointed out that they were required by law to report her illegal activities...
Tom

 

[Keith&Co.]

Depends on the situation. I have two separate accounts with different registrations, but one list of payees.

And if you're doing that with two accounts that you're legally required to keep separate, you're setting yourself up for charges of embezzlement.

I am old enough to remember Bill Clinton speaking with Loretta Lynch, and the GOP insisting that even the opportunity for collusion be punished, because people in government have to appear above all possible suspicion.
The fact Glock Spice could make this 'mistake' would be a far better example, something the 'party of personal responsibility' should take seriously.