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It took six weeks for the California’s Fair Political Practices Commission to uncover that the Mormon Church spent nearly $188,000 more on the Yes on Prop 8 campaign than it initially stated.
The church faces $5,000 fines for each omission. This discovery may help prove to church leaders that a separation between church and state serves both entities.
Click here for the full story.
11 responses so far ↓
1 Allen // Feb 2, 2009 at 10:36 am
The Mormon church wasn’t “caught” in anything. The commission investigating the allegation by the “No on 8″ camp didn’t uncover this either.
Who was the person or group that shed light on this “lie?” It was the Mormon church itself, which was doing the obligatory filings by the January 31 deadline for such filings.
Sinister, indeed.
2 Jeff from Merced // Feb 2, 2009 at 11:43 am
Allen:
You are simply wrong with your comments.
First, after the November 2008 election, the Mormon (LDS) Church only admitted to less than $3,000 of “in-kind” contributions and stated publicly that was all. Now, AFTER the Fair Political Practices Commission is investigating whether the Mormon Church violated California’s campaign finance laws, the Mormon Church is now admitting to almost $190,000 of in-kind contributions. The Mormon Church clearly failed to properly report its contribution/expenditures as it was required to do so by California law.
Second, based upon the timing of the in-kind contributions, the Mormon Church had a legal obligation to report these contributions (in-kind or otherwise) well before the January 31, 2009 deadline.
The Mormon Church’s failure to properly report its contributions (and then supporting a lawsuit to seek to prevent such disclosures from occurring) demonstrates that the church is clearly concerned about the public’s reaction to their involvement in taking away the rights of gays and lesbians to marry.
3 DanOLGB // Feb 2, 2009 at 5:04 pm
Had the Yes on 8 lawsuit succeeded in shielding the donors from public disclosures, we would never have seen this filing. It makes you wonder exactly who they were trying to protect. It’s fairly clear they were trying to protect the Mormons from more bad PR.
4 Tracy Hall Jr // Feb 2, 2009 at 10:12 pm
Please don’t let the facts stop you from inciting hatred of my religion.
On the slight chance that anyone comes to this web site for facts, please know that the Church simply filed its report by the same deadline as required of all other participants. The church’s filing had nothing to do with any investigation.
http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/commentary/church-clarifies-proposition-8-filing-corrects-erroneous-news-reports
You might have noted that the California State Democratic Committee reported, by the same deadline, expenditures of $150,000 in cash and $202,647 on mailers and other in-kind contributions against the measure. http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hKiw9iO4JJqxjTDd98GqpwyqDEewD963PUK00
And we thought this measure was non-partisan!
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (there is no “Mormon Church”) gave no cash and reported $189,903.58 in in-kind contributions – less that the California Democratic Party. Every cent allegedly attributed to “Mormons” was non tax-deductible, given directly to the campaign, and came from the already-taxed savings of individual citizens.
Under the First Amendment of the Constitution, no campaign finance law will ever require disclosure of the religious affiliation of donors to a political cause. It was a dissident Mormon who created the web site that targeted “outing” of individual donors as Mormons. Disclosure of religious association is a matter of constitutional protection and a privilege held by the member against disclosure. (Church of Hakeem v. Superior Court, CA, 1980). http://hedgehogcentral.blogspot.com/2008/10/californias-proposition-8-open-season.html
Imagine the furor if donors to the losing side, who put so much stock in the “right of privacy” were “outed” by some web site for any other private affiliation, such as, dare I suggest, for sexual orientation?
You might have also mentioned the final tally: “No on 8” raised $43.3 million; “Yes on 8” raised $39 million; so the losing side raised almost 10% more than the winning side.
hthalljr’gmail’com
5 RightCoast // Feb 3, 2009 at 5:05 am
Jeff – Please provide a link where the LDS Church stated they only donated 3k of in ‘in-kind’ donations.
They made an initial filing per CA law, and they have now made their final filing, per CA law.
Please show me something other than your opinion that states that they violated election laws.
6 Miami 'Hoo // Feb 3, 2009 at 5:21 am
From the AP: “Church spokeswoman Kim Farah said Monday that the church has complied with all campaign finance laws and that the updated figures come in response to the state’s disclosure deadlines, not the FPPC investigation”
It remains to be seen whether this assertion is true, but it’s definitely too early to say the church lied.
It’s also worth noting that $188,000 is less than 1/2% of all money donated for proposition 8. And, for those who assert that the Mormon church or even Mormons in general bought the election, don’t forget that more money was raised and spent against Prop 8 than for it. see http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hKiw9iO4JJqxjTDd98GqpwyqDEewD963PUK00
7 ajarizona // Feb 3, 2009 at 8:04 am
The lds church was not caught in a lie. They filed the expenses on time, by the deadline. Remember also that the opposition group has not filed their detailed expenses on time. The deadline was Monday.
The lds church complied and is above board. Over half of the 180 thousand was “in kind” estimates.
Remember also that the lds church would have had to directly donate hundreds of millions to the campaign to exceed their permissable involvemnt.
Read the law Morons before you take shots at he Mormon Church.
This is America and everyone can express themselves, through the democratic process. If you lose, lose with dignity, and live to fight another day. Take off your brown shirts and join the democratic process.
8 Tom // Feb 4, 2009 at 12:44 am
Uh-oh! Miami ‘Hoo and ajarizona called it the Mormon church after Tracy Hall Jr. said not to! They’re in trouble now!
9 Tom // Feb 4, 2009 at 12:48 am
Tracy Hall Jr. gave me a good laugh when he referred us to the LDS Newsroom so we could learn “the truth” about the church’s filings.
10 RM // Feb 4, 2009 at 7:21 pm
Tom wrote:
“Tracy Hall Jr. gave me a good laugh when he referred us to the LDS Newsroom so we could learn “the truth” about the church’s filings.”
I’m glad you got a good laugh, Tom.
Now I realise that there are very few people on the “liberal” side of the debate who realise this, but every discussion that leads to anything useful starts with the premise that both sides are acting in good faith. Whatever may be the actual differences between us, we accept that of you, and you accept that of us. And that is our starting point.
If we don’t start from there, the discussion can get nowhere. Period.
Now it happens that the Church has announced that its updated figures amount to nothing more than the timely filing of its reports, in compliance with its statutory obligations.
Do you have any actual evidence or information to the contrary?
Because if not, then you really have no valid basis to question (or deride) the good faith of that disclosure, do you?
The fact is that the accusations of “lying,” the claim that this was “uncovered” by a frivolous and vexatious investigation, the nasty insinuations, innuendos and sly winks, represent nothing more than a kind of pavlovian response to the hated word “Mormon.”
People in Germany in the 1930’s used to regard Jews in a rather similar light. Is that really where this blog wants to go?
11 Dr B // Feb 5, 2009 at 4:31 pm
The deadline was January 31st.
This blog is utter bullcrap.
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