The Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance is requesting that the state campaign finance agency review the campaign committee of the Brockton state legislator who posted a rumor about a raid by federal immigration authorities earlier this week.
State Representative Michelle DuBois, a Democrat, is using the national furor to try to raise money for future candidacies. But her use of an online PayPal account violates state law, according to Paul Craney, executive director of the fiscal watchdog group.
Craney wants the Massachusetts Office of Campaign and Political Finance to force DuBois to return any contributions that the agency deems illegal.
“OCPF’s regulations require that a political committee that solicits contributions using PayPal must request occupation and employer information from contributors giving $200 or more in a year before directing the contributors to the PayPal site,” Craney wrote, in a letter dated Thursday, March 30. “In addition, the website must require contributors to certify, with an affirmative action, that they are responsible for making payments on the credit card and that the contributor’s personal funds will be the true source of the contributions.”
DuBois’s PayPal setup did neither, as of Thursday, March 30.
DuBois could not immediately be reached for comment on Thursday afternoon.
A spokesman for the Office of Campaign and Political Finance said the agency does not acknowledge the existence of complaints.
But spokesman Jason Tait confirmed that a campaign website must require a contributor to certify that that person is making the payments with the contributor’s personal funds and must ask for a contributor’s occupation and employer at the time of solicitation.
Craney called on DuBois to follow the law.
“It appears the Representative is in violation of state campaign
finance. If the laws are good enough for the public to follow, it
should be good enough for legislators,” Craney said in an email message to New Boston Post.
