Brunner campaign transfers: iffy

I beleive that is a technical or legal term of art meaning doesn’t pass the giggle test.   Dispatch:

Verify first, transfer valuable equipment second.

Several campaign-finance and ethics experts say Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner should have asked the Federal Election Commission to determine the legality of a secret agreement before it took effect instead of nearly four months afterward.

Brunner contends that the unusual deal allows her campaigns to pull off a maneuver that normally would be improper: using assets bought by her state campaign fund in her U.S. Senate campaign.

“It seems like she should have asked for the advisory opinion first,” said Melanie Sloan, executive director of the nonpartisan Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and a former federal prosecutor.

Although Brunner’s agreement might prove legal, “Certainly it is on the shady side, and you don’t expect the secretary of state, of all candidates, to engage in activities like that. She should have checked first.”

One expert denies it is a big deal:

In the universe of campaign-finance maneuverings, what Brunner did is not uncommon, said Richard Hasen, an election-law expert and professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.

“These kinds of issues occur a lot,” Hasen said, citing a recent case where Hillary Clinton’s debt-ridden presidential campaign sold its electronic mailing list to Clinton’s Senate campaign “for a nice fee,” although those are two federal campaigns.

“Lots of things can be done if you have a good lawyer,” Hasen said. “On the scale of things that happen, (Brunner’s situation) doesn’t seem to me to be such a big deal.”

Yes, in the “universe of campaign-finance maneuverings” this is probably small potatos.  But I think Sloan hit on the ky: “you don’t expect the secretary of state, of all candidates, to engage in activities like that”

When the person who is supposed to be the expert and regulator of these type of activities is acting in a suspicious way it cast a light on their character and competence; and not in a good way.