An unsettling campaign mailer started arriving in the mailboxes of Salem-area residents recently.
“HOME BURGLARIES, CAR THEFT, ASSAULTS & MURDERS,” reads the oversized postcard. “All on the Rise in Salem & the Mid-Willamette Valley. … Senator Deb Patterson Voted to Cut Police Resources — WHY?”
Photos next to the caption show a man using a crowbar to pry open the door of a home, a gloved hand jamming a screwdriver into a car door handle and an investigator in a hazmat suit crouching over what appears to be a tarp-covered dead body. Beside those photos is one of Patterson, the Salem Democratic state senator, who is in a tough race to retain her seat against challenger Rep. Raquel Moore-Green, R-Salem.
The ad is one of more than a dozen this election season that have prompted complaints to the Oregon Secretary of State’s Office – not because of the claims they make, but because someone has alleged they violate campaign ad disclosure laws. The complaints span the gamut of races, from the state Senate and the Clackamas County Board of Commissioners to the Gearhart City Council and the Gladstone mayorship.
In the case of the Salem-area mailer, the Oct. 17 complaint alleges that state Senate Republicans – through their political action committee, the Leadership Fund – violated a 2019 disclosure law that requires the entity paying for a printed ad to identify itself and its top five big financial backers. The complaint claims the Salem Senate race ad runs afoul of this law because it identifies one of those big financial backers only as “RSLC.”
That’s a jumble of letters that’s probably incomprehensible to 99.99% of voters, says Honest Elections Oregon, the elections monitoring group that filed the complaint.
The initials stand for Republican State Legislative Committee, a national PAC that works to elect Republicans to statehouses. But volunteers at Honest Elections Oregon say when they Googled “RSLC,” they came up with lots of other possibilities. Among them: the U.S. Army’s Reconnaissance and Surveillance Leaders Course, Rural Summer Legal Corps, Risen Savior Lutheran Church and the Residence Services Leadership Council.
“If organizations are allowed to hide behind obscure acronyms, voters are denied the transparency promised by the Oregon Legislature when it adopted this law,” said Dan Meek, a lawyer and member of Honest Elections Oregon, in an email. Meek said his group isn’t associated with either the Patterson or Moore-Green campaigns and is not affiliated with Democrats or Republicans.
The complaint calls for the Secretary of State’s Office to fine the Senate Republicans’ Leadership Fund the statutorily outlined penalty: 150% of the costs of printing and mailing the ad. The complaint also asks the state to fine the organization for a similar alleged violation in another ad.
Those fines are warranted, argues Meek, because failing to clearly identify the political party or organization that is financially backing an ad can lead to confusion.
“Let’s see, who paid for this?” Meek quipped. “A bunch of random letters. It’s like Sesame Street: ‘Brought to you by the letters RSLC.’”
The Leadership Fund didn’t respond to specific questions posed by The Oregonian/OregonLive, including whether the organization thinks it violated disclosure laws in the Patterson ad. But days after the news organization sought comment, Alayna Weimer, the Leadership Fund’s treasurer, said her group filed a complaint with the Secretary of State’s Office. It alleges that a negative social media ad targeting Patterson’s opponent, Republican Moore-Green, violates disclosure laws.
A screenshot of the ad reads: “WORKING OVERTIME SHOULD BE YOUR CHOICE. RAQUEL MOORE-GREEN VOTED TO LET EMPLOYERS PUNISH WORKERS WHO REFUSE FORCED OVERTIME.” Moore-Green voted against a bill earlier this year that prohibited employers from penalizing bakery and tortilla plant workers who refused to work overtime shifts on short notice. The complaint alleges the ad improperly identifies two of its backers by their initials: “SDLF, PAC 1471″ and “DLCC Victory Fund.”
SDLF is short for Senate Democratic Leadership Fund, the political committee of Oregon Senate Democrats, and DLCC stands for Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, a national PAC that works to elect Democrats to statehouse positions. The complaint alleges that voters wouldn’t necessarily know that off-hand.
For instance, Google searches for SDLF return results for all sorts of organizations, including the Software Delivery Leadership Forum, the Special District Leadership Foundation and the South Dakota Labor Force.
Neither the Senate Democratic Leadership Fund nor the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee responded to requests for comment from The Oregonian/OregonLive.
The Secretary of State’s Office has opened an investigation into the first complaint, which was filed about the negative Patterson ad. It’s still assessing whether to investigate the second complaint about the negative Moore-Green ad.
Ben Morris, a spokesperson for the Secretary of State’s Office, said “in general, acronyms are not sufficient.” The exception is if the organization has registered its business name under those letters, Morris said. Examples might include the NAACP or OSPIRG.
— Aimee Green; agreen@oregonian.com; @o_aimee
