Wasserman using tax money for campaign

Written by Justin Phillips on July 14, 2008 – 10:53 am -

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(h/t: Wasserman Watch). –This blog also posted all the finance reports from 2002 on.

Sheldon Wasserman has been going around telling voters a lot of tall tales when campaigning against State Senator Alberta Darling. He claims that he’s a libertarian (which is just a lie), he’s a fiscal conservative (which he isn’t), he’s signed a pledge to the tax payers (which he’s broken), he claims to be saving the taxpayers money by riding a bus to Madison but what he’s really doing is using taxpayer money to build part of his quarter-million dollar war chest.

Records from the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board show that Wasserman applied for the Wisconsin Election Campaign Fund (WECF) grant every two years since 1994. The WECF is taxpayer money handed to candidates who agree to certain finance limits. Over all that time Wasserman received a total of $21,459.20 from taxpayers. This candidate welfare grant is a sort of program that was meant to provide funding to candidates who can’t fund a strong campaign otherwise, not for a liberal to abuse a government handout program while already sitting on a massive war chest.

Campaign finance records show that prior to the fall 2004 election, Wasserman had $138,416.68 on hand and still decided to fleece the taxpayers out of $2,726.20 by applying for the grant. What’s even more disgusting is during the campaign season Wasserman was able to grow his war chest to end with $169,821.38 after the election. Wasserman has been stealing money from the taxpayers and just storing it up year after year.

Here is the list of WECF Amounts that Rep. Wasserman Received from 1994 to Today

• In 1994 Wasserman received $6,519 in tax dollars
• In 1996 he received $3,888
• In 1998 he received $3,738
• In 2000 he received $4,588
• In 2002 Wasserman applied for the taxpayer handout, but he ran unopposed and did not qualify for public funds
• In 2004 he received $2,726.20
• In 2006 he again applied for the taxpayer grant but did not qualify because he ran unopposed
• Total: $21,459.20

Worse than the fact that he’s been using taxpayer money for elections is that he still applied for the funding during years when he was unopposed. All these “costly” elections, yet he entered 2007 with $220,518.53 in his war chest to make a run for State Senate against Alberta Darling, funded, in part, on the backs of taxpayers.

How much money did Wasserman save taxpayers by riding the bus?

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Posted in 2008 Election Coverage, Beyond the Facade |

2 Comments to “Wasserman using tax money for campaign”

  1. Mike Says:
    July 15th, 2008 at 10:40 am

    Justin, be careful in how you term the WECF. While Wasserman’s use of the grant may be questionable, the money he received was not technically taxpayer money. The WECF is funded by a voluntary checkoff on our state income tax forms. The money does not come from regular tax collections and is voluntary.

    Again, it may be that Wasserman’s use of the fund grants is not in keeping with the spirit of the law that created them, but it he is not fleecing the taxpayers on this. He is using a voluntary tax checkoff.

  2. Locke Says:
    July 26th, 2008 at 9:49 pm

    Mike - well since the checkoff is on income tax returns, it seems accurate and almost by definition the money is coming from taxpayers ;)

    But you are right, though it is factually correct, it doesn’t fit what I’d say is the generally accepted meaning of what people think when they hear “taxpayer funded.”

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