City Attorney Making Friends All Around

The Mesa City Attorney has made a ruling in the campaign fund limits regarding Scott Smith's personal loan to his campaign. Not too surprisingly, Rex Griswold and Claudia Walters are none too happy with the results.

They thought that the cap was going to be blown off and they would be able to raise a bunch of money from whoever they wanted to match Smith's loan. However, they are instead, only going to be allowed to raise enough uncapped money to get their donations up to what Smith's total loan amount was. So, as the story reports, in Griswold's case, its about $20,000 more. It is my guess that Walters can raise about $40,000 or so from whoever she wants as well.

Griswold, who has shown he has some supporters with deep pockets, seems particularly miffed. He says, that he "can't understand the logic." Well, Griswold seemed a lot happier when he got off the hook with another City Attorney ruling.

I know that some people have strong feelings about Smith dumping a bunch of his own money into the race. As the City Attorney says, there is nothing preventing them from dumping their own money into the raise. And while that is highly unlikely at this point, I question who the other candidates would go to to get additional funding. Would they go find someone with deep pockets to finance their campaign for them? And if so, what influence would that person have over the course of the election and the candidate if they won as mayor?

If Michael Bloomberg jumps into this presidential race and dumps a bunch of his own money into the race, is he "buying the election?" Mitt Romney has put a bunch of money into his campaign already, does anyone accuse him of wrong doing? Smith is competing against people who have been on the council for 5 and 8 years respectively. Is anyone all that surprised that he needs to pay to get his name out there?