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October 4, 2002

Host: Michael Grant
Topics:
The "Journalists' Roundtable"
In-Studio Guests:
Robbie Sherwood, Arizona Republic;
Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services;
Bob Robb, a columnist with the Arizona Republic

Michael: It's Friday October 4, 2002. In the headlines this week, Matt Salmon continues to be dogged with questions about his lobbying work after it was revealed he failed to register as a lobbyist. Governor Hull said despite the budget crisis she may not call a special session of the legislature after the election. And a federal agency says Ford Crown Victorias used by police departments are safe despite being involved in several fires. Good evening, I'm Michael Grant. This is the journalistss roundtable. Joining me to talk about these other and stories are Robbie Sherwood with the "Arizona Republic," Howie Fischer with Capitol Media Services and Bob Robb, a columnist with the "Arizona Republic." Questions being raised about Matt Salmon' role as a lobbyist after it was revealed he had failed to register as a lobbyist late this afternoon. Salmon held a news conference to clear things up. Robbie, did he clear things up?

>> Robbie Sherwood: He wanted to talk about his bungette plan but there were precious few questions on that subject. I wouldn't say he cleared things up totally. He was asked repeatedly what his definition of a lobbyist is. As you know, or as is reported, he failed to register as a lobbyist with at the federal level and he took a contract with the City of Phoenix to work with the congressional delegation. He considers appear consulting contract and his spin on this is that, I didn't register as a lobbiest because I was not a lobbyist. A lot of disagreement about that, about what constitutes lobbying. When pressed, I think Matt didn't provide an answer of what his definition of lobbying is.

>> Howard Fischer: What he provided is a definition of what lobbying is not. Because under the federal regulations it says simply setting up a meeting is not lobbying. The problem becomes that the meetings he was setting up were with members of the Arizona congressional delegation and other Republicans back in Washington for the purposes of the city making its case. So was he trying to influence legislation? You know, depends on what your definition of is is, clear. He clearly wanted to influence legislation. The city was buying something for hits 6125 a month but did that constitute a federal definition of lobbying.

>> Michael: This is the L word, Bob.

>> Robbie Sherwood: You were a lobbyist. Was it lobbying?

>> Michael: Doesn't play well politically. This one has been bothering Salmon for a couple of weeks now. Is the political damage bad or is this one of those things that just goes away?

>> Bob Robb: I think yet to be determined. Napolitano has succeeded with the help of the media in trying to turn this into a race between an Attorney General and a lobbyist. Salmon needs to return into it a race between an Attorney General and a congressman with a six-year track record and a substantial record as a state legislator. So it's an issue, and how he has earned his living is a legitimate issue, but politically it depends on how he handles it and whether he can bring back some of those other activities of his life and make those front and center rather than his most recent lobbying activities.

>> Robbie Sherwood: I don't think offering up what really amounts to a rather Clintonesque definition of lobbying is going to make this go away any time soon, I'm afraid. I think that saying that, well, I just facilitated meetings, I made some phone calls, more or less a glorified administrative assistant, that's fine, but the contract was for $150,000, and I was afraid when I heard this that the City of Phoenix might call him and ask for their money back when they found out he wasn't lobbying.

>> Howard Fischer: But the fact is, if you talk to Norris NORDVOLD, he said, we got what we expected. We wanted him to open doors. We're a bunch of Democrats sitting here in Arizona. We needed contacts with the Republican congressional delegation. He brought us access. Is that lobbying? Again, now we're down to the definition of what constitutes lobbying. I think the more troubling thing in someways is what happened with Qwest. He did agree to give up both contracts but he said now he just doesn't have the time. The Phoenix contract goes back even before he was a candidate. I mean, when -- even before he set up his own little shop and was working with someone else. The Qwest contract comes after he announces a candidate and he was supposed to basically schmooze community leaders. Here is a guy who was trying to get people to support the idea of Qwest getting long-distance services, the so-called 271 proceeding, because Qwest is very interested in having a governor who supports 271. Jane Hull supports the 2 71 procedure. Janet Napolitano does not. So I think that's going to be more problematic for him in the long run, somehow, what was Qwest buying other than getting a governor who supports 271.

>> Michael: Speaking of Janet Napolitano, certainly one of the week's other developments and it led to a whole lot of other ripples, Robbie, were the telephone calls being made, the anonymous telephone calls being made and Matt Salmon was accused by the Napolitano camp of being behind that. He vigorously denied it. Fill us in.

>> Robbie Sherwood: I think that the technology that exists for these automated phone calls is so good that we may never know, in fact, who did it, but Janet Napolitano and Democratic chairman Jim Peterson have their suspicions and they announced them, without any real evidence, but they said that they suspect the Salmon campaign or the Republican party or else people connected to them or they at least -- they know who did it or -- know somebody who knows who indict. In any case, they told them to cut it out. That really rubbed Bob Fannin, GOP chairman, the wrong way and Salmon demanded an apology. They said that those accusations are souvenirland Russ.

>> Bob Robb: And it's an implausible campaign. The Salmon campaign has a deep allergy to the social conservative issues for fear of being placed in the box of in tolerance and -- intolerance and losing crossover moderate Republican votes. So the Salmon campaign has been running afraid of social conservative issues even though it may help them attract rural Democrat votes. So it's kind of implausible they would surreptitiously arrange to put forth an issue that they are afraid of.

>> Michael: Robbie, one other thing that occurred to me on the story because apparent will he these telephone calls were made without the required disclaimer, you would leave an awful lot of finger prints if either the GOP officially or the Salmon campaign were doing this. That would be a pretty dumb mistake to make knowing that somebody's probably going to blow the whistle on you.

>> Robbie Sherwood: A horrible, horrible risk to take at that level of politics for the reward. But the fact is the phone list that they use, and they believe that it was a targeted list of people who voted early in the primary, only two entities get that list. It comes from the Maricopa County elections department and it's provide to do the parties. Only the Republican party and only the Democratic party were given a list. Now, that list is shared, and the number -- the people it's shared with is known by somebody, and amongst those people it was shared with or spread out with is the people who made this call. Whether or not they had anybody's endorsement at the top, you're right, it's probably implausible.

>> Howard Fischer: One of the interesting things about this whole thing is it's fairly clear from the evidence we have that this phone call, this woman calling, this Sarah Phillips s fictitious. She claims she had given up her baby and then she found out the state, DES, had placed it with a gay couple, she demanded it back, was told that Janet has a gay agenda and therefore she wasn't going to get it back. DES doesn't get involved in voluntary adoptions anyway. And nobody can find any record of Sarah Phillips. But somewhere lost in all this, is the fact that of the four gubernatorial candidates, only one supports the current policy of allowing gay couples to adopt, and that's Janet Napolitano and that's something she didn't want to address in all of this.

>> Robbie Sherwood: Clarification on that slightly is no candidates in the race are gunning to change the law, which has been the same since 1956. Any adult Arizonan is eligible for adoption. But Janet is the only one that thinks that gay adoption in any way is a good idea or acceptable idea.

>> Michael: All right. Let's see, Bob, we started trotting out Matt Salmon came out with his budget plan this week. Targeted it at how you take care of the current problem, correct?

>> Bob Robb: Well, both '03, the current fiscal year, but probably more specifically what do you do for next year's budget deficit, which some estimates have as large as a billion dollars. Like the other two, it really doesn't measure up to the task at hand. Napolitano is about $500 million short of the anticipated deficit. She bridges witness a committee. Mahoney balances the books but with $400 million of phony revenue that's not there. Salmon put on the table a little bit more in state budget cuts rather than the 10% that Governor Hull has already ordered and that Napolitano has supported. He adds another 2.5% that wouldn't be across the board, it would be discretionary but he doesn't idea where. Then he has a hodgepodge of ideas, administrative savings and various other things that will save some money but an unspecified amount. The new idea he put on the table was looking at things which the state owns and seeing whether any of those are marketable to raise some cash. Veterans memorial coliseum is being -- is kind of the centerpiece of that idea, which most people believe has relatively limited opportunity at the state level.

>> Michael: Let's shift to the clean elections developments this week, Howie. Clean election development number one, Matt Schaefer got canned. Who is Matt Schaefer and why did he get canned?

>> Howard Fischer: Matt Schaefer up until a couple days ago was the deputy director of the clean elections commission. He is an MBA, very knowledgeable about numbers. Matt ran afoul of his boss, Colleen Conner. Talked on the show whether Matt Salmon had delayed filing and reporting some his expenses. This is critical because Matt is a quote-unquote non-participating candidate. He is running on private funds. Once he reached a certain threshold of 400 and some thousand dollars in the primary, everyone else who was running clean, I.E., springer and Bayless, gets a dollar for dollar match. You delay the reporting, you delay their funding. Matt looked through and concluded that while they had failed to detail all expenses with that a few exceptions in aggregate they had been reported on time and nobody, in fact, was delayed in getting the matching funds. He said it came down to this question that I know we hate discussing, cash versus accrual method. We're not going to get into that.

>> Michael: oh, no, I like it.

>> Howard Fischer: Don't go there. So the clean elections commission clears Salmon, in essence, after the meeting Colleen Conner has a meeting with Jessica funk houser, state elections director who reports to Betsey Bayless, at that time a primary foe of Matt and according to Colleen's own report, Jessica says to her, you know, Matt's conclusion that either reporting method is acceptable is not in fact the law. All of a sudden Colleen says, what? That can't be the case. Puts Matt on leave, gags him, tells him not to talk to the press and immediately reopens an investigation, which is still open today on her belief that Matt still has not complied with the law.

>> Michael: On that latter point, Robbie, it has been a few weeks. Is the clean elections commission going to wrap that occupy or not?

>> Robbie Sherwood: They've been on a junket out of the country in Ottawa, Canada, until this week, but they have a meeting Tuesday. They have a lot of stuff on their plate. You would hope he it would get on there. It's kind of a cloud that hovers over a campaign and it would be unfortunate if Matt's campaign did nothing wrong and that cloud was allowed to hover for three weeks. Matt Schaefer, incidentally, he certainly believes he did nothing wrong in this case and is talking about that with his attorney right now.

>> Michael: Now, Bob, another clean elections-related development has to do with independent expenditure campaigns and Dick Mahoney wants some -- wants some money, he wants more money.

>> Bob Robb: Yes, and this attempt to develop an even playing field between the candidates is leaving -- leading to terribly complicated discussions and unfair results. The Democratic party launched an independent expenditure campaign against Matt Salmon. Names Matt Salmon and criticizes him. Matt is a privately financed candidate is a free fire zone so he gets nothing as a result of that. The Republican party responds with an ad which says negative things about Janet but positive things about Matt. Aha, that triggers matching funds for Napolitano and for Mahoney. Mahoney is saying, however, that the negative ads that the Democratic party ran against Salmon also ought to get him more money because its net effect is positive towards Napolitano even though it never mentions Napolitano. So this is what clean elections has wrought. The debate over who is helped, who is hurt and therefore who gets more money --

>> Robbie Sherwood: You can add the term express advocacy to the term of master's --

>> Bob Robb: The U.S. Supreme Court has always written that piece --

>> Howard Fischer: And it's even deeper than this. Because you have this one situation, as Rob points out, where Janet gets a match based on -- on the 200,000 Republicans have spent, not offset by the 700,000 spent by her own party attacking Matt. Would it seem to me that fairness would say, well, you got an independent campaign, let's offset until they get the 700,000 --

>> Michael: It's a bizarre result running in response to someone else's campaign gives the person you're running in response to more money.

>> Bob Robb: But ma hone ee and Napolitano get up to an additional $1.2 million in public funds depending upon what is spent on the Republican side of the equation, and one of the political dynamics is as a result of this, Salmon is very likely to be outspent two to one in this election between his own expenditures and independent expenditure campaigns on all various sides.

>> Michael: Speaking of money, Robbie, did we ever get a final count from the Republican party on what the President George Bush visit was worth bought to the party, Salmon, Rick Renzi up in Flagstaff --

>> Robbie Sherwood: I know what the goal was, it was a million for each but I'm going to have to punt to one of these guys and say if they know --

>> Howard Fischer: Well, the issue -- there was some funny -- the first night we were there we were told that the total was going to be $1.7 to $1.8 million divided up, but then we were told actually only 700,000 winds up for the Salmon campaign, there were some expenses, the Republican party, and then they have to parse it out, and theoretically we all have to wait for the White House to tell us exactly who is getting what money.

>> Michael: Just out of curiosity, was the GOP reporting this on a cash or accrual --

>> Howard Fischer: It was all under the table.

>> Bob Robb: What's interesting is there may actually be an incentive to attribute more to the party tune Salmon because anything over $615,000, Napolitano will get a match on. If the Republican party uses the money for get out the vote activity or multi-candidate mailings or communications, then she doesn't get matching funds. So what is reported may not represent the true political value of what was raised.

>> Robbie Sherwood: If they do that, that strategy, you may see some legal wrangling because there will be the impression if it's not real slating like that that those contributions for the party were bundled for Salmon-only benefit and that goes against the law. Mahoney is making that claim about the Democratic party and their fund raising for Janet. They're saying it's hogwash, we have a full slate of candidates, our money goes into a coordinated campaign. Snoops the problem with all these laws. Going back to 1986 when we pasted the first campaign finance limits, you're going -- it will take all of four minutes to find the loopholes to find the ways around it. And all does it is make our jobs harder as journalists.

>> Howard Fischer: Which is the benefit --

>> Bob Robb: There you go.

>> Michael: That's right. It's copy. Let's go back up to Northern Arizona. Continuing evidence that the Democratic national committee is not that enthusiastic about the George Cordova candidacy in CD-1.

>> Bob Robb: It remains to be seen. The Democratic party chairman, Terry McOff you will was in town, which is significant, and said that the first congressional district was going to be one of the leading targets in the country. And that they were going to spend millions on it. But that campaign now has been going since the primary, and the Renzi campaign is up and active and involved, and there's very little evidence of Democratic activity up there. So there is at least some suspicion they didn't like the outcome of the Democratic primary and maybe it will not get the priority that is at least verbally being suggested that it will get, that actions in this case speak louder than words.

>> Michael: In fact, Robbie, I had heard that had the Victor there been Fred Duval or Steve Udall that they were prepared to move in in force and have hesitated because of perceived concerns about the elect bill tea of -- electable of George Cordova.

>> Robbie Sherwood: You get the sense they had to go up and introduce themselves the day after the primary.

>> Michael: Howie, we have some poll results on Proposition 203, the marijuana --

>> Howard Fischer: How come you keep coming to me on the marijuana issue.

>> Michael: You're my go-to grass guy.

>> Howard Fischer: The prop 203 is interesting because essentially the results are almost statistically flat from back in July despite the fact that Rick Romley has been out there yelling, screaming, complaining to anyone who will listen that this is a horrible proposal. The last results we have show 53% of Arizonans supporting the idea of having the DPS give out medical marijuana, 2 ounces, to anyone, every month, who has a doctor's note, and the idea of reducing the fine to something along the line of $250 for anybody else who happens to have 2 ounces of dope. It's a traffic ticket.

>> Michael: Basically decriminalizing first and second possession?

>> Howard Fischer: Exactly. This is interesting because, I think, Romley felt this one was way over the edge with the DPS supplying it and he couldn't defeat another 96, he couldn't defeat the '98. He figured this was the year. One thing that happened today that's interesting is Grant Woods has cut an ad and now is running ads in favor of 203, and when the former Attorney General of the state says he doesn't see a problem with what's in this marijuana bill, 'think Romley has his work cut out for him.

>> Michael: But the poll result indicating --

>> Howard Fischer: 203, 53%. The eye gaming ads -- measures, interesting, no surprise here, prop 202, the 17 tribe initiative, is the only one that has a clear majority there. Somewhere below is that prop 200, the one sponsored by the Colorado River Indian tribe which gives a lot less money to the state. Then way down near the bought some prop 201, the one being sponsored by the tracks and a lot of folks say it's not going to happen.

>> Robbie Sherwood: You me the Joe Arizona ad is not catching fire?

>> Howard Fischer: I'm shocked.

>> Bob Robb: I think that lays a predicate. I think clearly the proposition 202 forces have succeeded in getting the public to begin differentiating its proposal from 200 as the one that has the most support among the Indian tribes. But I still believe even though the numbers aren't moving that the racetrack folks have identified a reason for Arizonans to pay attention to 201, particularly as the gubernatorial discussion continues to focus on the very, very deep budget deficit, and rather than saying it's fair, they're now saying, you need the cash.

>> Michael: That's right. Well, speaking of which, despite facing a state budget crisis, Governor Hull this week said she may not bring lawmakers back for a special session after the election. Howie, why is she leaning against that?

>> Howard Fischer: Well, she keeps saying, I am your leader, you will follow me! They keep saying, who? There's an election going on. And she has been exhorting them to come one a plan, to come up with ideas to make up the $400 million deficit in this current fiscal year, and they've said, yeah, we'll get around to it, maybe after the general election and she's at the point where she's saying, look, this may not happen. I can't wait to bring in a bunch of lawmakers, lame duck lawmakers, who may not have an agenda, may not care, may not show up, so I am going to do what I can to cut as much of the 400 million administratively. Come January 1 there's a new governor, come the second week in January there's a new legislature, let them deal with it.

>> Michael: Last night on the show the governor said she was actually a little worried about whether or not she could get the legislature in session and the legislature would actively work against some of the budget cuts that she's trying to work out, and in any event, lame duck session is always sort of a dicey kind of arrangement. You never know which way it's going to go.

>> Robbie Sherwood: No, it could be protracted and ugly. Particularly because she's asking for some new revenues, some new revenue propositions that failed to pass in the last session. Need two-thirds majority. And she may be right, some of the things she's talked about in her agency may not fly, but she's not telling us the things she's talking about. She's had an unspecified 10% cut. The agencies are coming to her with her ideas. She's looking at them and not sharing them. Now she's talking because she doesn't think she can get into a special session, she is upping that number of administrative cuts to $300 million, and I question -- I think we should be allowed to see what they're talking about so we know if this is feasible, what will the effect be?

>> Bob Robb: I think there may be an opportunity for a lame duck session if the Democrats lose control of the Senate as most observers anticipate, then there may be a desire on their part before they lose the amount of power they have to kind of shape where these cuts are going to go, and Republicans may have an incentive to do it just because the sooner you implement cuts, the more savings they occur over time. So I suspect the governor after the election is over will kind of gauge the temperature of the legislature. There may be an opportunity, and we're likely to see the subject revisited.

>> Howard Fischer: Well, there's one other scenario, though in terms of the election. Let's assume Matt Salmon is elected governor and the Democrats lose control of the Senate and remain the minority in the house, they're going to say, hey, it's their problem, let's let them worry about it. Why should we cooperate to make the next governor look good. Let him deal with it. Matt says he can do it with tax hikes, hey, have at it.

>> Robbie Sherwood: Knock yourself out.

>> Michael: Bottom line, that decision won't be made for at least a month or so.

>> Howard Fischer: At least.

>> Michael: Panelests we are out of time. At the end of most shows we invite you to log onto the Channel 8 website for the election we have added much more to the site. Here now is a visual tour of www.kaet.asu.edu. One of the most useful features you'll find on the website is full information about every proposition on the state ballot. Here is an example of how our website can help you determine your vote on a ballot proposition. First, go to the site at www.kaet.asu.edu. When you get there, click on the election 2002 emblem. Then click on Arizona ballot propositions. Let's say you wanted to find out more about Proposition 203. Click on that box. That will take you to a page with a summary, official ballot language, a fiscal analysis, and links to pro and con websites as well as other information. But there's a lot more to our site. Among the other features you'll find, my ballot a checklist of the propositions that you can print out and take to the voting booth. A links and resources page that includes sites where you can register to vote, find out which district you live in, request an early ballot, and find the location of your polling place. You can also view transcripts of all the shows we do on ballot propositions and request an e-mail reminder on upcoming shows. In addition, you can view Channel 8, ASU polls, on candidates and ballot measures. Monday on "Horizon," join us for a discussion on serious juvenile offenders. Juvenile justice experts say the change -- the state needs to change its approach to handling these youthful offenders. Tuesday join us for another "Horizon" ad watch. This time we'll be taking a look at ads from the gubernatorial campaign for truthfulness. Also on Tuesday, we'll take a look at proposition 103. That would prohibit the release of child molestors on bail. Wednesday, as a prelude to the groundbreaking PBS special on care giving and thou shalt honor. A local family featured in the special talks about how it affected their lives. Thursday, a debate between the candidates running for State Treasurer. Of course, next Friday, we'll all be back here at this markedly not roundtable. Thank you very much for joining us on this Friday evening. I hope you have a great evening. I'm Michael Grant. Good night.