A single donor helped a political action committee pay for polling for Jackie Biskupski's campaign, according to a recent financial disclosure form.
Alliance for Better Leaders has made two coordinated expenditures with Biskupski's campaign totalling the maximum allowed amount of $7,500. Those in-kind expenditures, one for polling, appear on Biskupski's campaign disclosures, but not on the AFBL disclosure for the most recent period that ended in July.
The PAC did not register with Salt Lake City, as required by law until July 21 after a UtahPolicy.com report revealed they had not completed the necessary paperwork. The first in-kind contribution to Biskupski came on May 29, nearly two months earlier.
The PAC took in $12,000 in donations during the last period, all of it from one donor – Marcia Price. Price has already donated $250 to Biskupski's campaign, which is well below the $7,500 individual donation limit to a mayoral candidate. That means she can give another $7,250 during this election cycle.
However, Price's donation to the AFBL are unlimited. In fact, the only limit for AFBL is how much they can spend in conjunction with Biskupski's campaign. They've already hit that limit, the aforementioned $7,500. However, they can still make unlimited independent expenditures to support Biskupski.
This incident highlights a gigantic hole in Salt Lake City's campaign finance laws. An individual or PAC is limited on how much they can give to a candidate. But, individuals can give unlimited donations to a PAC, or two or even 10 PACs. Each one of those PACs can make a $7,500 coordinated expenditure with a candidate meaning if they file the right paperwork, a donor could theoretically make unlimited donations to a candidate in this year's mayoral campaign.
Further analysis of Price's donations shows she made a $6,300 donation to Becker's campaign on July 27 of this year, which is six days after her involvement with AFBL came to light. Price has maxed out her donations to Becker for this cycle after previously giving $1,200 in March.
Alliance for Better Leadership did not respond to a request for comment.
