Here's a breaking news story from today's New York Times that shows what appears to be some impropriety on behalf of Arkansas Republican senate candidate and current U.S. Congressman Tom Cotton.
Tom Cotton paid $323,000.00 to a group that may not exist.
October surprise?
So the questions are: where did the money go, to whom was it paid and for what "services"?
A certain level of murkiness has become the rule when it comes to campaign finance in a post-Citizens United world. But even by this standard, a group called Right Solutions Partners LLC is remarkable for its opacity.
Representative Tom Cotton, the Arkansas Republican running for the Senate, disbursed over $131,000 to Right Solutions Partners in March for “fund-raising consulting” and an additional $161,000 to it in August for the same purpose. A smaller third disbursement brought the total to $322,963.
But here’s the catch: It’s not clear that such an entity actually exists. It has no presence on the Internet, it appears that no other campaign is paying it this year, and it has no office at the Washington address listed on the articles of organization filed with the city last year.
However, the address, 1717 K Street Northwest, is where the Washington office of the law firm Arent Fox is located, and a Republican campaign finance lawyer at the firm signed the organizing papers with the city. When I called that lawyer, Craig Engle, he initially said he did not set up Right Solutions Partners. Then he amended that, saying, “I remember being part of the organizing of it.”
But he said he forgot who asked him to set up the entity and quickly moved into lawyer-political speak, saying he could not get into for whom he was and was not working. He said he would try to get more information, but, alas, little was proffered. In a subsequent email, Mr. Engle said only that Mr. Cotton’s campaign was not a client of Arent Fox, and that he had alerted the campaign to my inquiries.
Emails and phone calls to a spokesman for Mr. Cotton regarding just what Right Solutions Partners does for the campaign were not returned. The mystery continues.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Did Cotton pay himself that money and pretend to pay a fictional consulting firm? Wouldn't that would be grounds for jail time?
Senator Mark Pryor should have a slew of television ads out tomorrow demanding answers from Cotton about this.... immediately.
Polling Data
Poll Date Sample MoE Cotton (R) Pryor (D) Spread
RCP Average 9/20 - 10/16 -- -- 46.8 41.3 Cotton +5.5
Talk Business Poll* 10/15 - 10/16 2075 LV 2.2 49 41 Cotton +8
Rasmussen Reports 10/13 - 10/15 940 LV 3.0 47 44 Cotton +3
FOX News* 10/4 - 10/7 707 LV 3.5 46 39 Cotton +7
CBS News/NYT/YouGov 9/20 - 10/1 1991 LV 2.0 45 41 Cotton +4
All Arkansas Senate - Cotton vs. Pryor Polling Data
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/...