The state’s Public Disclosure Commission is considering a complaint from a local government advocate alleging the Clark County Republican Party did not properly disclose its campaign expenditures.
The complaint was filed by Democrat Chuck Green and centers on a series of controversial mailers sent out by the Republican Party during the primary.
Green said he noticed a lot of mailers were sent out and assumed it was a costly effort.
“However, a search of PDC reports through August 27, 2016, indicate that the CCRP has reported no expenditures since May 2016, and there is no record of any such expenditures being reported for the development, printing, and postage to mail out these flyers,” the complaint reads.
The local party recently adopted a resolution spurred by the mailers. The mailers questioned Clark County Council candidate Jennifer McDaniel’s conservative bona fides, noting her support from some Democrats, while touting candidate Eileen Quiring as “a conservative we can trust.”
The resolution requires the county party to stay neutral during contested primary elections with more than one Republican candidate. That includes not sharing voter database information or using funds to promote one candidate over another.
“They seem to be spending a lot of time snubbing their own candidates with bipartisan support and forgot to comply with the law,” Green said.
Lori Anderson, with the state’s public disclosure commission, said the commission has made contact with the local Republican Party about the matter.
“We send the complaint to the Clark County Republicans, ask them to provide a response, that will go on the website, and we usually give them a couple of weeks and make a decision on how to proceed,” Anderson said.
Clark County Republican Chair Kenny Smith said he hasn’t seen the complaint. But he did say he had a difficult time with the public disclosure website recently and called the state in July trying to file the reports related to the campaign mailer.
He thinks he may have simply hit “save,” rather than “file.”
“My mistake,” he said.
