Brandon Scott
Councilman for District 2, Now President of the City Council
Candidate for Mayor of Baltimore
Launderer of Contributions to Circumvent
Campaign Financing Law
We all have an interest in improving election law to reduce the influence of money on primary and general elections.
In the course of figuring out what changes to advocate for campaign financing law, we’ve been looking at contributions received by the five leading candidates for Mayor of Baltimore. In
alphabetical order, they are Sheila Dixon, Mary Miller, Brandon Scott, Thiru Vignarajah and Jack Young. Contributions data are readily available at the Maryland Board of Elections website.
The screenshot on the left is from an article in yesterday’s Baltimore Sun about the billboard in the picture. Whether or not it is related to Mayor Pugh’s scandalous behavior and the FBI’s investigation, it marks an extraordinary moment in the continuing downward spiral of Baltimore’s public image.
Hi. A lot has been said of late about the costs of running for Mayor and about two candidates in particular. One is self-made millionaire venture capitalist David Warnock. The other is a government employee, attorney Elizabeth Embry. Mr. Warnock is wealthy. Ms. Embry is not.
A hundred thousand dollars here, a hundred thousand dollars there. Pretty soon, you’re talking serious money.
As part of our ongoing review of candidates for Mayor – and City Council too – we noticed some issues with the campaign finance reports filed by Friends of Sheila Dixon. At it turns out, in February and March of 2015, Ms. Dixon’s committee revised 17 of these reports covering the period January 14, 2015 going all the way back to November 22, 2006. That’s just before Sheila Dixon became Mayor when her predecessor, Martin O’Malley, left to start his first term as Governor.
This piece is, of necessity, longer than most of what we publish. Admittedly, it’s not for everybody, but should be of interest if you’re into technical issues that are germane to candidate competence and maybe integrity too, particularly as they relate to campaign financing. Just because something is technical and takes some time to figure out, doesn’t mean it isn’t important.
Today is the deadline for the annual campaign financing reports covering the period January 15, 2015 through January 13, 2016. The table below shows you the summary data for these reports for each of the 6 leading candidates for Mayor. (Clicking on the table makes it larger.)
Hi. According to the Maryland Board of Elections, Tea Party Republican Steve Schuh didn’t register to run for Anne Arundel County Executive until January 3, 2014. Keep that date in mind.