Berks officials send 2 alleged election violations to DA to investigate
Two allegations of potential campaign law violations in Berks County have been forwarded to law enforcement for investigation.
At a special meeting of the board of elections Friday, members of the county legal team presented two complaints stemming from the May 20 primary election. One involved a candidate who failed to indicate who paid for campaign materials and the other involved a text message from an unknown sender.
The first complaint involved Matthew McCluskey, a Republican candidate running to represent Washington Township on the board of supervisors, who failed to include a disclaimer on campaign material sent to voters about who paid for its distribution.
While the board decided last month that they would not be sending the complaint to authorities for further review because they believed the candidate had taken the necessary action to fix the situation, Assistant County Solicitor Alexa Antanavage told the board Friday that the issue is still unresolved.
They said upon closer examination of financial campaign documents filed by McCluskey and a committee acting on his behalf, the source of the money used to send mailers to Republican voters in the township ahead of the primary remains unclear.
'Given the totality of everything that's going on here and the discrepancies that we have seen, along with the failure to include disclaimers, I think it's appropriate to recommend referral to the district attorney's office for further investigation,' Antanavage said.
The board agreed, voting unanimously to forward the issue to law enforcement.
Contacted by the Reading Eagle, McCluskey said Friday afternoon that he believes further investigation of the latest campaign finance documents he filed will accurately show who was responsible for funding his materials.
'I made a mistake filling out the paperwork,' he said. 'There's not even a question about that because I misunderstood the instructions. Listen, I'm a rookie and I've never done this before.'
McCluskey said he recently met with an attorney and financial adviser familiar with campaign finance filings to fix the mistakes that were made.
'I truly believe that everything is as it should be now,' he said.
The second complaint involved an anonymous text message sent a day before the primary to Republican voters in the Oley Valley School District advocating for the election of several candidates.
First Assistant County Solicitor Cody Kauffman said the message may have violated the silence period that prohibits candidates, committees and parties acting on their behalf from placing an advertisement in the 120 hours before an election without giving sufficient notice to opposing candidates.
He noted the message is also problematic because it did not state who paid for its distribution to voters.
Kauffman recommended the matter be sent to law enforcement for further review. The board voted unanimously to forward the issue to the district attorney.
The two referrals to the district attorney's office bring to five the total number of potential violations regarding the handling of campaign material that the county has handed over for investigation this election season.
Commissioner Michael Rivera, chairman of the elections board, said it appears this is a growing issue that needs to be addressed. He suggested the board put in place guidelines about how candidates should respond to complaints when they are brought to their attention.
'The remedy has to be equal to or greater than the infraction,' he said. 'So, in the case of the mailer sent out without a disclaimer, the candidate must send another mailer to the same people with the disclaimer. If you are sending a text message without a disclaimer, then another text message should be sent to the same people with the disclaimer.'
Rivera said adopting that guideline would help the elections team more easily determine if the candidate has taken the appropriate action to address the complaint.
His fellow board members agreed that adopting guidelines would be beneficial for the elections team and candidates who may be unfamiliar with the requirements. They asked Kauffman to work with Elections Director Anne Norton to craft guidelines for the board to approve.
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