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Power, pop, and probings from ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper
Jake Tapper is ABC News' Senior White House Correspondent based in the network's Washington bureau. He writes about politics and popular culture and covers a range of national stories.
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SEIU, Wouldn’t Want To Be You
December 27, 2007 1:08 PM
More questions are being raised today about the relationship between the presidential campaign of former Sen. John Edwards, D-NC, and a third-party group supposed to completely independent from the campaign.
An October 8 e-mail distributed among members of Service Employee International Union local chapters -- obtained by ABC News (read it HERE) and first reported by today's New York Times –- seemed to indicate that some officials of the Edwards campaign may have expected help from this third party group, Alliance for a New America, contrary to campaign law.
The Edwards campaign, noting that no one from its campaign is on the email, denied any coordination at all and said any indication to the contrary is "false and misleading."
Alliance for a New America is being run by Edwards' 2004 campaign manager, Nick Baldick, who was a senior campaign adviser until earlier this year.
By registering as a 527, the group does not have to register with or disclose information to the Federal Election Commission. The group is running hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of pro-Edwards TV ads in Iowa.
A little context is needed here.
All the Democratic candidates were competing for the endorsement of 1.9-million-member SEIU International, but no one was counting on the endorsement more than Edwards, who has trailed in fundraising behind Democratic Sens. Hillary Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois.
Just days before, on September 28, Edwards had announced that he was going to apply for federal matching funds, which Edwards would accept in exchange for which he would have to abide by spending limits. He needed that SEIU endorsement and the union's help.
On Monday, October 8, however, SEIU national President Andy Stern announced that the national union would not endorse any candidate. "Given the importance of this election, we are encouraging members and leaders to act on their passion for the candidates and get involved on a statewide basis," Stern said in a statement.
That same day SEIU Local 775 president David Rolf from Washington state wrote to other local chapter president who support Edwards.
The email contained notes from an October 6 "SEIU for Edwards" meeting. In addition to setting up "a coordinated press strategy" to roll out local SEIU endorsements with the Edwards campaign, Rolf writes that he and Cathy Singer-Glasson, president of SEIU Local 199 in Coralville, Iowa, plan to "visit the Edwards operation in Iowa on Wednesday" October 10 in order to "discuss with the Edwards campaign what specific support they’d like to see form us, give our new state-based strategy."
The very next paragraph discusses forming "a serious 527 legal structure."
One question deals with what exactly these SEIU members discussed with the Edwards campaign in that Wednesday meeting. The e-mail in general seems to discuss a state-by-state strategy, which the 527 was a part of.
The Edwards campaign argued that the email indicates that the SEIU members were putting up a firewall.
It's "an internal SEIU email about internal SEIU discussions and has nothing to do with the Edwards campaign," said spokesman Eric Schultz. The email, he said, indicated that "SEIU officials were having two separate conversations – one with the Edwards campaign to discuss perfectly legal member-to-member activities and another one internally about their own activities –- to try and link the two conversations together is false and misleading."
Schultz said that “as soon as SEIU officials informed us, later on, that some of their staff would no longer able to communicate with us about the campaign, we immediately stopped all conversation with them, as we legally had to. We found out about the existence of this outside group the same way the public did and we stand by our strong position that 527’s should have no role in the political process.”
Another question – for the group, not for the Edwards campaign -- 527s are supposed to be to educate the public, not to elect or defeat any candidate. But the formation of this 527, at least according to this email, seems to be all about electing Edwards. Is there anything fishy there? A call to the group’s spokeswoman was not returned.
A previous radio ad from the group featured a nurse named Beth Junk, who is also a member of Edwards’ Iowa Children and Youth Cabinet: "For years, the insurance companies, drug companies and their Washington lobbyists have blocked reform," Junk said in the radio spot. “It’s time someone had a plan to take them on."
-- jpt
December 27, 2007 | Permalink | User Comments (9)
Education works but is a long term strategy, few politicians want to risk it.
Posted by: joaquin | Dec 28, 2007 3:05:54 PM
Education works but is a long term strategy, few politicians want to risk it.
Posted by: joaquin | Dec 28, 2007 1:57:38 PM
"false and misleading."
One thing is for sure I can always count on seeing anything that is false & misleading prominently covered on this blog. Pitiful.
Posted by: pmorlan | Dec 27, 2007 5:29:17 PM
And yes..the DEMS can be considered very corrupt..especially when they disguise themselves as Republicans..politics needs to offer the people something...instead today's idea's wander all over the psycosis known as politics.
Posted by: Mark S. M. | Dec 27, 2007 4:33:00 PM
Jake - I ask you to do a blog on the Energy bill that the socialists just passed in Congress that is going to cause approximately 4,000 more deaths a year on our roads, and mercury poisoning in our homes.
You can call it either 'The junk of oil' or 'The new tool of Socialism - Global Warming"
Posted by: spock | Dec 27, 2007 4:16:03 PM
Obama is really hurting himself with these attacks on unions -- I can't imagine any union will be enthusiastic about his candidacy after this. I think it virtually guarantees either Edwards or Clinton wins the nomination.
Posted by: JR | Dec 27, 2007 3:20:44 PM
Is this something new for the Lib/Dems - Edwards has this so-called 527, Clinton has hers in the names of Move-on, Mediamatters and Daily kos (kooks)
Even if both candidates do not speak to the groups now, I am sure they stragetized prior to the groups creation, since move-on and Media matter are both ran by Clinton ex-members of their cabinets.
The dems are corrupt to the bone, nothing new here!
Posted by: spock | Dec 27, 2007 2:40:04 PM
Hm, something's amiss on the horizon and it doesn't smell good. Edwards come clean and stop these 527s that you yourself denounced in the past, you know exactly what's going on.
Posted by: RuthieM | Dec 27, 2007 1:32:40 PM
Considering EDUCATION..that the easiest structure to build these days..there's lots of people looking there..but the Jake Tapper BLOG-article really shows how loose the Edwards people rally together..its your Sunday "touch football" game where someone brings Beer to the Town Park..as long as your do your swiggin' behind the BLEACHERS your safe amongst the gathering..but what's there once that gathering announces the GAME is over..what is left..??..laws...I doubt that very much.
Posted by: Mark S. M. | Dec 27, 2007 1:24:48 PM
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