Kane County Reporter

State Rep. Dan Ugaste (R-Geneva) argues former Auditor General Frank Mautino being cleared of misusing campaign funds is another indictment against the ethics reform now being pushed in Springfield.

When Mautino became Auditor General – the state’s “top fiscal watchdog” – in 2016, the group Edgar County Watchdogs published records of Mautino’s campaign spending. The report included “red flags” such as the fact that Mautino claimed to have spent a quarter of a million dollars at a gas station in his hometown: Happy’s Super Service Station, NPR Illinois reported. Edgar County Watchdogs’ reporting caught the attention of news outlets, as well as a former constituent of Mautino’s, who filed a citizen complaint with the Board of Elections, alleging campaign spending irregularities.

“What ethics reform?” Ugaste posted on Facebook. “Illinois’ elections oversight board voted unanimously to end a years-long dispute over campaign finance violations committed by Auditor General Mautino’s campaign committee before he became the state’s top fiscal watchdog.”  

In reaching its decision, State Board of Elections officials ruled the Democratic lawmaker and his now dissolved campaign committee were not aware they were violating state campaign finance law during his two-decade tenure in the Illinois House, according to NPR Illinois. “Knowingly” was the key word the Illinois Supreme Court asked the board to zero in on as it once again considered a complaint first filed with the board nearly six years ago.

Shortly after, Gov. J. B. Pritzker signed SB 0536, which would make it impossible for campaigns to be fined for misusing funds a year after the violation occurred. The bill also allows for campaign funds to be used for child care or retirement community payments.

Earlier this year, the state’s high court ruled that there was no evidence his campaign committee paid more than fair market value for goods and services bought with campaign dollars. At the same time, the court concluded that Mautino’s campaign committee violated state law in spending in the neighborhood of $250,000 on fuel and repairs for his and his associates’ personal vehicles when they were performing political work.

The latest ruling came after Mautino’s attorney Anthony Jacob argued the state’s campaign finance statute is convoluted, using a 2012 letter from a state Board of Elections staffer that instructed Mautino’s committee treasurer to list vendors instead of individuals who receive reimbursements from campaign cash.

“We already know that the actions violated the law, it’s just a question of whether they were done knowingly,” Liberty Justice Center attorney Jeffrey Schwab, who represented a former Mautino constituent who filed the initial complaint, said, according to NPR Illinois.

In addition to pointing out that Mautino voted for the campaign finance law at the center of the complaint, Schwab asserted that being ignorant of the law is not a defense.

Since the case was filed, legal proceedings have bounced from the board to appeals in the state’s Fourth District Appellate Court and the Illinois Supreme Court. Back in 2017, the board overwhelmingly voted to fine Mautino’s campaign committee $5,000 for failing to update financial disclosure reports.

Soon after that, the board deadlocked 4 - 4 over whether Mautino’s committee violated the law in the case’s first go-around in appellate court. After another appeal, the case ultimately reached the state supreme court, which ruled half in Mautino’s favor in May and instructing the Board of Elections to hear the case once more.

In the time since, Democrats, the majority party in Springfield, have made adjustments to the state’s elections code, now paving the way for campaign spending on vehicles not owned or leased by the campaign committee so long as those expenditures are related “to the use of the vehicle for primarily campaign purposes” or governmental duties.

More recently, Legislative Inspector General Carol Pope abruptly stepped down from her post while blasting the position as “essentially a paper tiger,” WBEZ Chicago reported.  

In her resignation letter, Pope also assailed the so-called ethics package approved by lawmakers as not going nearly far enough in granting her office the authority it needs to effectively conduct its own investigations of alleged wrongdoing by lawmakers or their staff.

“This last legislative session demonstrated true ethics reform is not a priority,” she wrote. “The [Legislative Inspector General] has no real power to effect change or shine a light on ethics violations.”

The statehouse has been embroiled in a wide-ranging federal corruption investigation that has already led to the resignation of longtime House Speaker Mike Madigan and the indictments of several lobbyists and past and current lawmakers.

Among her requests, Pope sought to be granted the power to issue subpoenas without being required to first get the approval from the Legislative Ethics Commission, a bipartisan panel of eight lawmakers.

“I am unable to remain in a position where I cannot be as effective as I hoped to be,” she wrote.

Pope offered to stay in the role until Dec. 15 unless a replacement is selected sooner. She replaced Julie Porter, who had also voiced some of the same complaints as those now being uttered by Pope.