As most of you know, I have been trying to figure out where our politicians get their campaign cash and how the campaign cash was spent. If you look at readily available campaign finance reports from the S.C. Ethics Commission website here http://apps.sc.gov/PublicReporting/Index.aspx, you will see that cash from special interest donors largely control the political process in our state. You will also notice that the recepients of these massive loads of cash often convert those dollars into their own personal piggy banks. I have a problem with that and so should you. The Anderson Independent Mail ran an article on 3/26/2016 that indicated that Mike Gambrell had used thousands of dollars campaign contributions to attend conferences, paying club dues, football & baseball tickets as well as purchasing clothes. See link to article here:
http://www.independentmail.com/news/political-pulse-gambrell-answers-questions-about-campaign-spending-2d285e6f-d302-1fe2-e053-0100007fd-370990471.html
Mike Gambrell responded to the article publicly by saying "The House Ethics Committee has audited my campaign reports and no irregularities were found."
I am not an expert on campaign finance but I can see that there are irregularities without much effort whatsoever. On April 20th, 2016, I submitted a Freedom of Information Request to Representative Kenny Bingham (SC House Ethics Committee Chairman) in an effort to find out exactly how the auditors could have missed such blatant violations. In response my Freedom of Information Request, I received this letter from S.C. House Ethics Attorney Richard Pearce. While the response was lacking in transparency, it did provide me with the location where I can find the protocol for House member audits:
http://www.scstatehouse.gov/CommitteeInfo/HouseEthicsCommittee/1.27.16%20Protocol%20for%20Audits%20of%20Campaign%20Accounts.pdf
Now, here is what I find interesting...III. (C)5 states: "The firm will not determine if the expenditure made from campaign funds was proper." In other words, the House Ethics Committee subcontracts out the audit to a private firm that simply matches income/expense from filed reports with income/expense from bank statements. The auditing firm does NOT look at whether the expenditure was lawful or not.
ANYBODY SEE A PROBLEM HERE??
In my request, I asked specifically for copies of Rep. Gambrell's audit report and any notes. As you can see below, I was not provided the information requested and no legal FOIA exemption was claimed. Since I was not provided with the report and/or notes from the "audit" that Rep. Mike Gambrell has claimed to have been performed, I can only assume that something is not right.
Since Mike Gambrell has claimed that his campaign disclosures were audited and "no irregularities were found." I simply say - Prove it. If there is nothing to hide, lay it out for your constituents. They deserve to know the truth, not spin. In addition to disclosing the audit reports, I would also ask that you disclose your emails that will prove that you were using your state issued email for campaign purposes in violation of the law.