Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) stands accused of campaign finance violations by a government watchdog group, which is calling on the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to investigate him.
On Wednesday, the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT) filed a complaint with the FEC against Brown, his Friends of Sherrod Brown campaign committee, the Democrat Party of Ohio, and the Ohio Grassroots Victory Fund joint fundraising committee, according to the New York Post and a copy of the fililg.
The complaint contends “there is reason to believe” the respondents “have been unlawfully soliciting excessive contributions for” Brown’s campaign in violation of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 and FEC regulations.
FACT alleges two potential violations. The first is that Brown and other respondents solicited contributions for the Democrat primary “long after Ohio’s primary election occurred, despite the campaign having had no apparent primary election debt.”
The filing includes an image of an ActBlue fundraising page, purportedly from May 8. The page states that the first $3,300 or $5,000 donation from an individual or multiple candidate PAC to the joint fundraising committee “will be allocated to Friends of Sherrod Brown and designated to the primary election.”
May 8 was more than a month after the March 19 Democrat primary, in which Brown did not face an opponent.
“The next $3,300/$5,000 from a person/multi-candidate PAC will be allocated to Friends of Sherrod Brown and designated to the general election,” the page stated, per the filing.
As of Thursday, May 23, the website had apparently been updated to state the first $3,300 or $5,000 donation will go towards helping Brown in the general election.
“There is reason to believe that Sherrod Brown and Friends of Sherrod Brown’s continued solicitations of funds for an election that has long ago occurred, when the campaign had no debts outstanding from the election, may have resulted in several violations of FECA and FEC regulations,” FACT argues.
On the second allegation, FACT contends that language on the May 8 version of the page indicated that all contributions of up to $10,000 to the Ohio Grassroots Victory Fund would be used to help Brown’s reelection bid.
“Contributions to Ohio Grassroots Victory Fund will fund our get-out-the-vote and voter turnout operation to get Sherrod across the finish line this November,” the website stated, according to FACT’s complaint.
FACT argues that because of the language, “there is reason to believe” some contributors to the joint fundraising committee made donations with the understanding “that their funds will be spent on the party’s ‘get-out-the-vote and voter turnout operation,’ explicitly for Sherrod Brown.”
This would mean, FACT contends, that “all amounts contributed to the state party through the Brown [joint fundraising committee] must be deemed general-election contributions to Sherrod Brown.”
Fact contends that the contributions to the Ohio Grassroots Victory Fund should be classified as “contributions from the person to” Brown to “avoid direct circumvention of the limits.”
The watchdog called on the FEC to investigate Brown and to “seek appropriate sanctions against Brown and his agents for any and all violations.”
Brown, one of the most vulnerable Democrat senators in the country up for reelection this cycle, is squaring off with Trump-backed Republican Bernie Moreno in the general election.
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