Appearance of impropriety: Idaho’s Fulcher, federal lawmakers shouldn’t employ family

As Kevin Fixler reported last week, U.S. Rep. Russ Fulcher has paid nearly $305,000 to his daughter over the past five years to act as his campaign manager.

It’s a shockingly high sum.

Fulcher has never faced a competitive election in the 1st District. The ceiling for his opponents in both the primary and general elections has been nearly 30 percentage points behind him.

So what are those funds for?

Conduct like this should be illegal, but it is not. While federal law prohibits paying your spouse or child out of your office funds — taxpayer dollars — it does not prohibit paying them out of campaign funds — donor dollars.

If anything, this has the priorities backward.

When it comes to the use of public funds, nepotism is the danger. The problem with nepotism is that the public will not get the best value for its money because personal connections determine where money is spent, rather than objective criteria. That is indeed a bad outcome and a good reason to forbid even the possibility of nepotism.

But the danger with campaign funds is not nepotism. It is much worse. It is corruption.

Imagine two interest groups are on opposite sides of a piece of legislation. One is better funded than the other and is able to make large contributions to a campaign, while the other is not. If a large percentage of those funds make their way into a member of his household’s pocket, how are members of the public to be sure that vote-buying is not taking place?

If you were lobbying on financial legislation, would you want to be the investment bank that did not do its part in funding Sen. Mike Crapo’s wife’s jewelry-making hobby? And if you weren’t lobbying for an investment bank but for a volunteer citizens group without funds to donate, would you have any expectation that you would receive equal treatment from your government representative?

And, particularly in Fulcher’s case, public information is sufficient to know that for every dollar they give him, 33 cents winds up in his daughter’s pocket. If a donor gives the maximum of $2,900 in the primary and $2,900 in the general, they just gave his daughter nearly $2,000.

Federal candidates in Idaho should refrain from this behavior — regardless of whether it is in fact corrupt — because it gives a strong appearance of impropriety. It is hard to trust that a candidate is acting with the interests of voters at heart when personal financial interests pull them in another direction.

And the law should be changed. Voters have a right to the assurance that candidates are acting in their interests, not because donors are in effect paying their family members. They do not have that assurance now.

This story was originally published October 26, 2022 at 4:00 AM.