Really, Terri???
A week after the Detroit Free Press reported that Terri Lynn Land has made nearly $3 million worth of donations to her own campaign while filing tax returns that show no such funds available, Land is finally getting around to saying that she's finally going to get around to obeying federal election laws by refiling her financial disclosure statement:
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Terri Lynn Land says she's close to filing an amended financial disclosure statement to account for nearly $3 million she's given her campaign.
Spokeswoman Heather Swift says Land likely will fix the "clerical error" this week. Democrat Gary Peters Tuesday called on the ex-Michigan secretary of state to stop spending the money until addressing discrepancies his campaign says may be illegal.
The Detroit Free Press has reported neither Land nor her husband listed joint assets or checking accounts with more than $250,000. An election expert questioned if potential transfers of money from Land's husband violated the spirit of campaign-finance laws.
Why it has taken a week to get around to this is unknown. The Peters campaign has called on her to stop spending campaign funds until she can explain why she broke the law.
The more important question here is how she could have "overlooked" a bank account she shares with her husband that has millions of dollars in it. That's quite a "clerical error". And, if funds were shifted to that account after she announced her run for the U.S. Senate, that violates federal law that limits contributions from relatives, in this case her wealthy husband, to $2,600 for each election, $5,200 per election cycle.
This "oversight" appears to be a blatant effort to skirt the law and divert money she says belongs to her husband to her campaign. Keep in mind that she was once Michigan's Secretary of State which put her in charge of Michigan elections. One would presume that she knows election law frontwards and backwards. That's certainly what she is telling voters.
Terri Lynn Land is either a liar and a criminal for doing this or she's inept and sloppy.
Either way, she's proven herself to be completely untrustworthy and absolutely not qualified to hold the position of U.S. Senator.
No amount of massive self-funding or spending on her behalf by the Koch brothers changes that.
UPDATE: This morning Michigan Democratic Party Chair Lon Johnson held a press conference where he called for two investigations since independent experts have raised that Land may have violated both state and federal election law.:
- One to the State of Michigan calling for an investigation into 15 donations Land made as owner of Land & Co. to her Secretary of State campaign. At the time, Land’s husband, Daniel Hibma, was treasurer of her Secretary of State campaign and owner of Land & Co. Ms. Land is now saying that she had no ties to Land & Company. Either she lied to the people of Michigan about her business experience or lied to the State of Michigan about her ownership of Land & Company.
- The second to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) calling for an investigation into whether Land broke the law by self-funding $2.9 million to her campaign without having $2.9 million in her own assets.