HELENA, Mont. (AP) - A jury deliberated Friday whether a Montana lawmaker illegally coordinated with eight corporations associated with a national anti-union organization, allowing them to run a shadow campaign supporting his candidacy and attacking his opponent in the 2010 Republican primary elections.
The trial of state Rep. Art Wittich wrapped up Friday with attorneys for the Bozeman Republican and Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motl giving their closing statements to the jury. Jurors must decide whether Wittich took illegal corporate contributions, whether he failed to report them, what the value was and whether he failed to preserve his campaign records.
If their decision goes against Wittich, he would face fines and other penalties that could include his removal from office.
Wittich attorney Quentin Rhoades told the jury that Motl, who brought the case after investigating the lawmaker, failed to produce the evidence needed to prove coordination between Wittich and the corporations affiliated with the National Right to Work Committee.
“Where’s the smoking gun?” Rhoades said. “Where is the objective, actual evidence of some sort of communication between Art Wittich and anyone in Virginia or Illinois or wherever these folks from the Right to Work are supposed to be from?”
Special Attorney General Gene Jarussi told jurors that he would have liked to present more direct evidence of Wittich communicating with top Right to Work officials. But Wittich failed to produce required documents, and the documents Motl’s office was able to gather show Wittich wanting a package of campaign services called “the works,” filling out surveys and communicating with other Right to Work staffers,
It’s like putting together a puzzle - there may be a few pieces missing, but you know what the picture is, Jarussi said. “This man cheated. He broke the campaign laws. It’s time for him to be held accountable,” Jarussi said.
He checked off a list of services Wittich got after providing the corporations with information: a website, voter contact information, opposition research, candidate training, voter letters written for him and his wife. Plus, affiliated gun-rights, anti-abortion, anti-tax, resource development and anti-union groups wrote letters to voters on Wittich’s behalf supporting him and attacking his primary election opponent, Jarussi said.
That meddling by the groups to support Wittich and other hand-picked candidates in the 2010 Republican primaries served to “wreak havoc” on Montana’s elections, Jarussi said.
The corporations, referred to as dark-money groups because they don’t disclose their donors or spending, are not on trial. A separate lawsuit against them is pending and could be affected by the outcome of the case.
Wittich, who testified earlier Friday, asserted that he hired a Livingston printer to conduct a direct voter mail campaign for him and to build a website, and that he properly paid for and reported the work in his campaign reports.
If Right to Work staffers were doing any of the work, or if other affiliated corporations were sending letters supporting his candidacy or attacking his opponent, he wasn’t aware of it, he said.
Motl led the prosecution against him because of Wittich’s conservative beliefs, the representative alleged. Motl has brought the full resources of the state of Montana against him, Wittich said.
The past 2 ½ years from the investigation to the trial has been “pure misery,” Wittich said. His name has been smeared, his campaign de-legitimized and his voice gagged in important policy matters as a result, he said.
Jarussi tried to pierce the persona Wittich presented of a beleaguered public servant, leading to a sharp exchange between the two. He had Wittich acknowledge he had publicly called Motl a political hack on a witch hunt and suggested that Wittich was lying to the jury to save his skin.
“You’d say almost anything to avoid accountability, wouldn’t you Mr. Wittich?” Jarussi said.
Wittich responded that he wouldn’t say anything if it wasn’t true.
“This is why people decide not to run for office. When they see something like this going on, against a normal person who wants to serve the public, this is why people don’t’ want to run,” he said.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.