If you’re a political insider in Placer – you’ve heard it all:
They laundered money. They embezzled money. They violated campaign finance law. They are corrupt.
The Placer GOP has has its’ meetings disrupted by shouts and a handful of local activists who believe what they are told without question. They have been loosely organized by Karen England. The anecdotal evidence and patterns of action locally suggest credence to my previous sentence – and the pattern has borne out over 2+ years.
Some would say, “Here you go again, Aaron”. It is really easy to blow this whole thing off as a hate vendetta – the stuff of local politics. I hear people say, “this is just a personality conflict” as a means of trying to dismiss the whole matter.
2+ years later – the local media is still getting contacted by Karen and her allies. Witness the above-the-fold story in the Sacramento Bee that was published today.
Recently, Karen and her allies got Doug LaMalfa, Ted Gaines and Beth Gaines involved in an attempt to pressure “us” to “open the books”.
In the recent California Republican Assembly state officer elections – Karen and her allies attempted to take over the state organization, but were thwarted by the CRA’s by-laws and the exposure of membership and delegate fraud.
The delegates that were submitted were familiar names to those of us in Placer County (legislative staff and Karen’s latest group of recruits to her jihad) – but were on the rosters of units in Corona, Arcadia, Monrovia, Glendora, Huntington Beach, Seal Beach, and units in San Diego County.
The connection to Placer County Politics is – in the late days of her campaign Karen and her allies made a statewide election for a conservative grassroots organization (the CRA) all about her personal hatred of Tom Hudson, George Park and myself.
But – it is more than that. While Ted Gaines, Beth Gaines and Doug LaMalfa may not be fully aware of the deeper issues at work here (or they don’t care), but, their recent involvement in the affairs of the Placer GOP have to be explained.
Enter the Capitol Resource Institute. The Capitol Resource Institute is the employer of Karen England. The Capitol Resource Institute holds itself out as a Conservative “advocacy” organization – whose activities resemble lobbying.
In future posts, I will expand further on the Captiol Resource Institute. Those of you wondering why a seemingly minor local dispute that is miles away from 99% of the voters seemed to have caught their attention need to have a look:
In their case, it is pretty simple – they are major donors to the Capitol Resource Institute. In this link to campaign finance records – you can see Ted Gaines’ donations of $4000 to the Capitol. (Save our kids and Capitol Resource Family Impact both got $1500 from Gaines as well as another $1,000 to Capitol Resource Institute itself further down the list) Ted Gaines did nothing wrong by giving to the Capitol Resource Institute – rather the significance of pointing this out is that it establishes the nexus of influence. (E.G. Protecting their investment?)
It didn’t stop there – Gaines chipped in three more separate contributions of $1000 each – bringing his total to the Capitol Resource Institute to $7,000.
Doug LaMalfa? Try $25,000! This certainly explains why Tom, George and I who supported Rick Keene over Doug LaMalfa started getting slandered in late 2009 by Karen England in the run up to that Primary.
Click here and here to see two more donations from Senator LaMalfa to Capitol Resource Institute – bringing his total to $27,500! Also note that the donations started in 2005. Again, as with Gaines – LaMalfa did nothing wrong by donating so generously to the Capitol Resource Institute – but the issue is the failure to disclose the connection and Karen’s failure to disclose how her paycheck is impacted by the generosity of those Republican Electeds. However, it is obvious that Both Senators thought there was some sort of significant political benefit to contributing such large amounts of money to the Capitol Resource Institute.
The financial connection to the Capitol Resource Institute alone would be an adequate explanation for why LaMalfa and Gaines got involved on Karen’s behalf in the attacks on the Placer County Republican Central Committee. It also suggests why they endorsed her candidacy for CRA President.
This is significant – because Karen and her allies sought to attempt to re-open the issue of the Placer GOP’s 2008 prop 8 campaign by getting the above three to send an email which was forwarded to the local media after the Cent Com voted 14-7 to close the issue at the May 2011 Placer GOP meeting.
After the email went out – Karen England and her team got limited press and a motion to recommit went down 15-8 at the June Placer GOP meeting.
How does this tie in to the CRA? Why would a self-styled Conservative activist want to set fire to a Prop 8 campaign? To be continued…