Shaun McClusky pulls a Dunbar, campaign circles the drain

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Shaun McClusky is a political neophyte. Hell, he admits that he wasn't politically active and didn't even bother to vote in city elections before he was recruited by the GOP to run for city council. So I know the latest actions are being directed by the GOP "brain trust" of Bill Arnold, Bruce Ash and Jim Click. This has their brand of Roger Ailes/Lee Atwater/Karl Rove "politics of personal destruction" fingerprints all over it. The kid doesn't like it.

I received a large glossy flier from the McClusky campaign with big, bold headlines screaming that money destined for the Tucson Police Department has "disappeared" and is "missing," and that Richard Fimbres won't say what happened to it. This kind of language is designed to suggest in the minds of voters that Richard Fimbres was somehow engaged in illegal conduct while he was the Director of the Office of Highway Safety. The piece concludes with "If we can't trust him to do his old job right, can we really trust him on the city council?" (That's pretty ballsy coming from a guy who is a political neophyte, attacking a man with a long distinguished record of public service on his resume.)

As an aside, sending a 4×4 Democratic voter who has already voted this attack piece is a waste of campaign resources and poor campaign management.

It turns out this entirely fabricated breathless "scandal" was simply a paperwork error that is easily remedied. The GOP, as they are wont to do, fabricated this breathless "scandal" to smear the character of Richard Fimbres. (Are these the kind of people you can trust on the city council?)

Rhonda Bodfield of the Arizona Daily Star fact checked the attack piece and exposed the lie. McClusky irritates Fimbres with new campaign mailer:

At the root of the issue is a series of federal grants for the Tucson Police Department to fund traffic enforcement and DUI task forces.

Highway Safety is essentially a pass-through agency. If a city is approved for federal funding, it spends the money and then submits a request to be reimbursed. Tucson Police spent $189,952, and sought reimbursement several times through 2008.

Leadership of the office switched under Gov. Jan Brewer. In August, Gutier's deputy director sent a letter to Fimbres asking for a detailed response for why the reimbursement requests "went unpaid and ignored."

In an interview Tuesday, Gutier said despite the wording on the mailer, he would not characterize the money as "missing." He said a Fimbres staff member neglected to file the reimbursement paperwork on time. But his office has since gotten an extension so the money can be paid.

Although the mailer said Fimbres won't answer questions about the lapse, Fimbres did respond to the state shortly after receiving the letter, telling Gutier, "I am very concerned about what appears to be a thinly veiled political attack using the state resources of your office."

He found it curious, he wrote, that in an office that handled millions of dollars in grants, the office had singled out Tucson contracts, mere months before the city elections. He said he was never personally contacted by the agencies in question with any concerns about their requests.

Fimbres also said Gutier overstated the importance of when reimbursement requests are processed. "We like to get them in during the fiscal year, but sometimes that's not possible," he said.

"All they had to do was get the paperwork in," he said, adding that's obviously the case since the feds were agreeable to the extension.

In other words, there is no substance to this last minute attack piece. It is completely fabricated by the GOP. And their puppet Shaun McClusky permitted his name to be attached to it. That causes me to question his judgment and character.

This is where our story turns comical. The very campaign responsible for this character assassination attack piece is now complaining that the Pima County Democratic Party sent out a mail piece describing the GOP candidates as right-wing Republican extremists. Pima County Republican chairman Bob Westerman complained "'Right-wing extremist' is just a nasty label designed to make conservatives look like they're not rational." The truth hurts, Bob. I warned Republican candidates when they voluntarily chose to align their campaigns with the right-wing extremists of the Tucson Tea Party that it would come back to bite them in the ass. Did they listen? No.

Shaun McClusky has pulled a Kathleen Dunbar, circa 2005, who filed a lawsuit against her opponent Karin Uhlich, the Pima County Democratic Party, and several others over a campaign mail piece. (That lawsuit was eventually dismissed – and Kathleen Dunbar left town.) McClusky has filed a complaint with the City Clerk under his own signature, not his lawyer, which is telling to me (that whole Rule 11 frivolous complaint sanctions thing; a lawyer didn't want to sign this complaint). Stupid move, Shaun. This kind of thing is the kiss of death for a campaign. Just ask Kathleen Dunbar.

"Permitting renegade organizations to drop last-minute charges is a disservice to the voters of Tucson," McClusky wrote in the complaint. McClusky files complaint over Dems' mailer (The Democratic Party is a "renegade organization"? I guess "maverick" was already taken.)

McClusky cited an Arizona statute that requires a political committee making an independent expenditure relating "to any one candidate or office" within 10 days of the election to send a certified copy of the campaign literature to the candidate mentioned in the piece.

First, the piece refers to three candidates and does not single any candidate out, which puts it outside of the statutory reference cited by McClusky. Strike one!

Second, it also falls outside the 10-day statutory period. There is a postal receipt for mailing on October 23, 2009. Strike two!

Third, the mail piece plainly included the disclaimer required by law, "Paid for by the Pima County Democratic Party not authorized by any candidate or candidate committee." Strike three! You're outta here!

Can you spell f-r-i-v-o-l-o-u-s Shaun?

The Pima County Democratic Party called the complaint frivolous and a "last-minute desperate attempt of a losing candidate"… to "either gain publicity or tarnish the Democratic Party or its candidates."

This is a fair characterization. These are the acts of a desperate campaign that is circling the drain in its final days.