There is great irony in Senator Jeannemarie Devolites-Davis filing legislation which ostensibly brings "transparency" to the land development process in Fairfax County. This is the same State Senator that has routinely received large contributions ($5,000+) from businesses that formerly sought access to the Government Reform Committee (the US House committee with jurisdiction over procurement) which was chaired at the time by her husband Tom Davis (R-VA).
A look at JMDD's contributors as listed on the VPAP website illustrates this issue:
Affiliated Computer Services, Inc. (Dallas, TX) - $10,367
Pinkerton Computer Consultants (Trevose, PA) - $7,500
United Parcel Service (Atlanta, GA) - $6,500
Shenandoah Electronic Intelligence (Harrisonburg, VA) - $5,000
U.S. Strategies Corp (West Palm Beach, FL) - $5,000
Innovative Defense Strategies, LLC (Washington, D.C.) - $5,000
Why are these companies giving huge contributions to a member of the Virginia legislature, which has no role in national defense or national intelligence? Might it be that they were seeking access to Federal contracts awarded by the good Congressman's Committee?
If Senator Devolites-Davis really was concerned about "conflicts of interest," then she would return any donations received from companies or individuals that had a concurrent or foreseeable financial interest in the decisions of her husband's Congressional committee. If she doesn't, then she has no credibility on any issue involving ethics or "transparency."
UPDATE: Andrea has made some great points. I need to clarify that these fundraising numbers are just a drop in the bucket because they are just the highlights from THIS cycle.
$5,000 last election cycle and $5,000 the cycle before.
Peter Sirh, who formerly worked for Tom Davis, now lobbies for JDD donor Innovative Defense Strategies. He also moonlights for JDD's boss, ICG Government.
IDS also helped pay for the Reform Committee Christmas Party.
This is blogging at its best: Shining light on something the MSM would never pay attention to.
* To influence its air mail interest, USAIR has donated $25,000 to Tom Davis's PAC; this PAC is JDD's biggest donor. USAIR has contributed to no one in VA except Tom Davis.
* Davis's wife has accepted $17,000 from UPS.
In another example, JDD also collects form Dan Mattoon, who worked with Tom DeLay on the K Street Project when Tom Davis was in the office next door at the RNCC. Mattoon donated to both JDD and Tom Davis.
With all that money in the bank, you'd think she'd have a better haircut.
Example #1 Devolites for Delegate
Top Donor from 1997-2003 *drum roll please* Tom Davis Va Victory Fund giving a whopping $92,042.
Example #2: Top Donor #3...at $55,616 was The NRCC (National Republican CONGRESSIONAL Committee), Which Tom "I also swear I didn't have an affair" Davis Chaired at the time, wonder the NRCC was dolling out so much money for a VA Delegates race. (looking at This Link You can see that Jeanmarie is the second biggest recipient EVER of NRCC money in Virginia races (after only Gilmore)...interesting indeed.
1) Affiliated Computer Services has also contributed $1K to Mark Warner and $10K to Citizens for Better Transportation, a NOVA business group that worked in support of the 2002 sales tax referendum.
2) United Parcel Service has made numerous contributions to a whole variety of folks over the years, among them:
- $2K EACH to the Kaine Inaugural Committee, Creigh Deeds, Adam Ebbin, Al Eisenberg, and Mary Margaret Whipple;
- $5K to the VA Legislative Black Caucus;
- $5,629 to Brian Moran;
3) Shenandoah Electric Intelligence has been a major GOP contributor to a wide variety of GOP campaigns and PACs, with their contributions to Sen. Devolites-Davis being one of their smaller ones.
4) U.S. Strategies Corp. gave $10K to Don Beyer.
Scrutiny of a candidate's contributors, is, of course, fair game. Let me dare suggest that highly selective scrutiny and the listing of only certain contributions from individual contributors may not be.
For example, it's true postal reform generated a lot of money for some politicians, including Davis and his Democratic counterpart, Waxman. The question is what did it get the payors? Waxman continued to push for hearings, subpeonas, and conference committees with the Senate to get the matter resolved. His staff complained about how long it took to get the job done. Now that he's chair, he is pushing for accountability. It is hard to see how he was influenced by the money.
Committee Chairman Tom Davis, the only person who could call meetings, issue subpoenas, and appoint conference committee members from 2000 to 2006, sat on the issue for 10 years so he could strong arm the donors into giving to his wife's campaign and into hiring her firm to represent their interests.
Watergate taught us to Follow the Money here and