Group that wants to provide legal help to Eyman starts fight with disclosure commission
A group that wants to represent anti-tax activist Tim Eyman in his appeal has sued over how state campaign finance law might apply to its pro bono legal work.
The Institute for Free Speech, a national nonprofit, filed the lawsuit against members of the state Public Disclosure Commission and against the state Attorney General’s Office Aug. 2 in U.S. District Court in Tacoma.
“With the advice of the Attorney General’s office, we expect to respond in court,” the PDC said in a statement Thursday.
Attorney General Bob Ferguson sued Eyman for violating campaign finance laws, and earlier this year a Thurston County judge fined Eyman $2.6 million.
Superior Court Judge James Dixon found Eyman to be a “continuing political committee,” that he hadn’t properly filed campaign finance reports, and that he put donors’ contributions to personal use, The Olympian reported.
The Institute for Free Speech said it wants to represent Eyman on appeal, but that his designation as a “continuing political committee” raised questions about whether the institute would be subject to campaign finance laws if they represented him for free.
It asked the PDC for an order earlier this year to clarify that representing Eyman wouldn’t be an in-kind contribution that would require the group to register under the Fair Campaign Practices Act, file reports under that law, or to disclose its donors and other information, such as how much its services are worth.
The PDC responded with an order that said providing pro bono legal services to Eyman individually or his bankruptcy estate for his appeal doesn’t require the institute to register.
The order also said in part: “The Superior Court has designated Mr. Eyman as a continuing political committee. Whether Pro bono legal services provided prospectively to Mr. Eyman in his role as a continuing political committee must be reported is a question reserved for the ongoing jurisdiction of the Superior Court.”
The institute argues that didn’t answer its questions, and it filed the lawsuit. It seeks an order to keep the state from enforcing campaign finance laws against it for giving pro bono legal services to Eyman as an individual or a continuing political committee, among other relief.
“... the Commission’s order specifically avoided answering whether Mr. Eyman’s status as a continuing political committee created a reporting or registration obligation for IFS,” the lawsuit said.
While the institute wants to represent Eyman, it “fears that doing so will subject it to regulation under the FCPA, a third-party complaint, or an enforcement action by the PDC or AGO,” the lawsuit said.
‘Permanently enjoined’
The complaint points to a Pierce County Superior Court ruling from 2015 about pro bono legal representation for the recall effort against former Pierce County Assessor-Treasurer Dale Washam.
That ruling by former Judge Katherine Stolz said in part that the state was “permanently enjoined from applying any cap on the amount of free legal services a political committee may receive in a federal civil rights case.”
The ruling went on to say: “Defendants are also permanently enjoined from requiring Recall Dale Washam or any other political committee to report free legal services ... in a federal civil rights lawsuit as a campaign contribution.”
The state argued in one of its court filings in that case that there wasn’t any constitutional right to “hide the value” of the pro bono legal work.
“On the contrary,” the filing said, “Washington has a compelling interest in requiring any political committee to fully disclose their financial activities, including when they receive services pro bono.”
At a meeting May 27 where the commission addressed the institute’s request, Commissioner Bill Downing said: “This body is nothing if not free speech advocates. Everyone on this body is desirous of having any case that raises First Amendment issues litigated and litigated well by top-notch attorneys.”
He went on to say that the commission could answer the narrow question before it “by stating clearly that pro bono legal services, provided prospectively for the purpose of prosecuting an appeal in Mr. Eyman’s case, do not in and of themselves give rise to any reporting or registration requirement for the entity that may be providing those pro bono services.”
He also said the commission couldn’t go further and broadly say that pro bono legal services never amount to an in-kind contribution or to “eliminate the possibility of there being complaints filed. That just can’t be done.”
Downing added that he thought it was important to note that the order did not address “in any way shape or form” Eyman’s own possible responsibilities when it comes to the legal services.
Institute for Free Speech President David Keating said in a press release: “Washington has no business hampering pro bono legal services for those needing a lawyer to represent them in court. This is a clear violation of the First Amendment.”
This story was originally published August 9, 2021 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Group that wants to provide legal help to Eyman starts fight with disclosure commission."
