| Appearance in connection with a request for an advisory opinion regarding whether the Campaign Finance Disclosure Act prohibits a candidate from spending money from any campaign account for any office or only from the account from which the fine arises. |
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Mr. Robichaux has qualified for re-election to the Orleans Parish School Board for District 7.
He has been notified by the Board of Ethics that under Section 1505.2I(3) of the CFDA, he is prohibited from using campaign funds to make expenditures in an election until his current fines assessed are paid. Mr. Robichaux argues that Section 18:1505.2I(3) as applied by the Board of Ethics violates his First Amendment right of free speech and is unconstitutional as applied. He states that the statute should be limited to the election in which the funds were used and to apply the statute to other campaigns is overreaching.
Mr. Robichaux references Citizens v. Fed Election Commission (Sup. Ct. 2008-205) which vacated multiple cases which previously allowed for government intrusion into political speech, when read in pari materia with other cases regarding the right to political speech in an election campaign. He further argues that no law has ever been upheld which restricted a candidate's right to spend money, except the prohibition against spending campaign contributions on oneself and one's family, for the obvious reason of squelching an easy means of public corruption.
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Mr. Robichaux states that he was an unsuccessful candidate for the House of Representatives, District 93, in the special election held May 1, 2010. After the election ended, he closed down and cleaned up the campaign headquarters. After the clean-up, he discovered that the two manila envelopes holding all receipts and copies of all donation cheeks were missing. He states that he spent the next year searching for the reports. He concluded that the envelopes in question had been thrown away in the trash. Because of this, he has been unable to complete the filing of his campaign reports in connection with the May 2010 election.
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Section 1505.2I (3)(a) of the CFDA provides that a candidate or principal or subsidiary campaign committee shall not make an expenditure of funds derived from contributions for any purpose so long as the candidate owes a fine, fee, or penalty imposed by a final order of a court or the supervisory committee pursuant the provisions of the CFDA and against which all appeal delays have lapsed. This Paragraph shall apply to all contributions regardless of the date received by the candidate or committee.
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Adopt the proposed advisory opinion.
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| Assigned Attorney: |
Aneatra Boykin |
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