{"id":3638,"date":"2008-08-28T11:55:00","date_gmt":"2008-08-28T17:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/08\/sos-ag-put-nonprofits-in-an-unfair-position\/"},"modified":"2008-08-28T11:55:00","modified_gmt":"2008-08-28T17:55:00","slug":"sos-ag-put-nonprofits-in-an-unfair-position","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2008\/08\/sos-ag-put-nonprofits-in-an-unfair-position\/","title":{"rendered":"SOS, AG put nonprofits in an unfair position"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>New Mexico Youth Organized (NMYO) has been a bad, bad nonprofit. At least, that\u2019s the message from the attorney general and secretary of state. <\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Attorney General Gary King<\/a> is telling the group: You\u2019ve walked like a duck. You\u2019ve quacked like a duck. So you are a duck. And Secretary of State Mary Herrera<\/a> is saying: Because of that, you have to formally register as a duck (political action committee).<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

King has a message for other nonprofits as well: If you quack like a duck, we\u2019re going to make you register, too.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the problem: King and Herrera are telling nonprofits to avoid the line between issue advocacy and political campaigning or register as a political committee, but they aren\u2019t telling nonprofits where they believe that line is.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>It\u2019s like spanking a child for misbehaving without explaining to the child what he did that warranted a spanking and how he must change his behavior in the future. It doesn\u2019t teach him anything. All it does is encourage him to keep his head down and his mouth shut.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not saying that Herrera and King intend to hinder nonprofits\u2019 right to free speech. But attempting to enforce the rules in a way they\u2019ve never done before without explaining how they interpret the rules could frighten nonprofits into silence.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

I have no idea who\u2019s right in the fight over whether NMYO has crossed the line. I know the legal arguments of NMYO, because the group has released the letter it sent to the secretary of state<\/a> making its case. But I don\u2019t know a thing about the attorney general\u2019s legal argument other than his statement that it centers around the definition of the phrase \u201cpolitical purpose\u201d in the state\u2019s Campaign Reporting Act<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Herrera sent this letter<\/a> to NMYO on Aug. 18 informing the group that it is \u201coperating as a political committee.\u201d That followed a letter King sent to Herrera the week before advising the secretary of state that NMYO was in violation of the Campaign Reporting Act and must immediately comply.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

But Herrera\u2019s letter doesn\u2019t say anything about how NMYO violated the act. It simply states that the group committed the violation. Neither office will release King\u2019s letter, which includes the full legal argument that NMYO has crossed the line. King told me in a recent interview that he can\u2019t release the letter because it\u2019s subject to attorney\/client privilege and only the client, Herrera, can choose to release it.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Herrera\u2019s spokesman, James Flores, said in an interview that the letter won\u2019t be released \u201cany time in the near future.\u201d Asked how nonprofits are supposed to know how to avoid the line between issue advocacy and political campaigning, he referred to the Campaign Reporting Act. He also said groups that register as PACs are provided an information packet that tells them how to comply with the statute.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

How to interpret the act is the dispute in this instance, so that\u2019s no help. And the information packets are no aid to groups that are trying to avoid having to register as PACs.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Herrera needs to rectify the situation<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

So here\u2019s what nonprofits know: King says if they don\u2019t want to be required to register as PACs — and regularly report contributions and expenditures — they have to avoid walking and quacking like ducks. He says the problem is the mailers NMYO sent out shortly after the legislative session and two to three months before the June primary targeting several lawmakers, including some who were up for re-election. But neither office will say what specifically was wrong with those mailers.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Also public is the May 22 letter<\/a> from King\u2019s office to Herrera that kicked off this controversy. But that letter doesn\u2019t even refer to the mailers King says are the problem. Instead, it erroneously quotes a mission statement from a Web site that doesn\u2019t belong to NMYO to justify the claim that NMYO has been involved in political campaigning.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Finally, nonprofits know that there is a threat. Before Sept. 2, Herrera\u2019s letter states, NMYO must register as a political committee and explain its \u201capparent violation.\u201d The letter also states that the group could be fined $50 per day for a maximum of $5,000.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In other words, groups trying to avoid the ire of the state agencies are being given no guidance on how to do that, so they\u2019re left with a choice: Keep your head down and your mouth shut or risk having to register as a PAC and pay a stiff fine.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

That isn\u2019t fair, and it certainly isn\u2019t in line with the intent of the First Amendment. Herrera needs to immediately rectify the situation by releasing the AG\u2019s letter or another document that lays out its legal argument or provides guidance to nonprofits.<\/p>\n

\n

By way of disclosure, I also write for the New Mexico Independent<\/a>, which is owned by the Center for Independent Media<\/a> in Washington<\/st1:State><\/st1:place>. When the group was starting up its New Mexico<\/st1:State><\/st1:place> news site earlier this year, the Center for Civic Policy, of which NMYO is a part, helped it locate funding sources. The Center for Civic Policy has never tried to use that fact to influence anything I have written.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New Mexico Youth Organized (NMYO) has been a bad, bad nonprofit. At least, that\u2019s the message from the attorney general and secretary of state. Attorney General Gary King is telling the group: You\u2019ve walked like a duck. You\u2019ve quacked like a duck. So you are a duck. And Secretary of State Mary Herrera is saying: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3638"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3638\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}