The D.C. Board of Elections on Wednesday tossed out $16,000 in fines that had been levied against Janeese Lewis George’s mayoral campaign, rejecting claims from campaign finance regulators that she had impermissibly coordinated with local unions ahead of the June primary she ended up winning.
The ruling is a long-awaited win for Lewis George, albeit one that now seems relatively inconsequential. Despite the rancor that the original investigation by the D.C. Office of Campaign Finance stirred up only days before the primary, she handily defeated challenger Kenyan McDuffie and is expected to win the November general election.
The initial OCF investigation claimed that the close relationship between Lewis George’s campaign and local unions — so close that union staff took leave from their jobs to work on her campaign — amounted to illegal coordination, notably because it allegedly involved a union-backed committee that raised more than $1.5 million to run ads supporting her candidacy.
But her campaign argued that there was no actual evidence that it illicitly coordinated with unions and that a firewall existed between campaign staff and their union jobs. After hours of discussion on Wednesday, the board’s three members unanimously agreed.
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“You have no evidence to show there was impropriety,” said board Chair Greg McCarthy to officials with OCF, which regulates and investigates campaign spending during local elections.
In a statement, Lewis George said she welcomed the board’s ruling and said the investigation wasn’t handled properly.
“OCF’s order violated D.C. procedural requirements, included multiple false statements about its own investigation, misrepresented the campaign’s statements and positions, offered no evidence in support of their conclusions, and was simply wrong on the law,” she said. “And it was not the first time OCF had filed a flawed order in the days just before a contested election.”
Lewis George was referring to a similar incident in 2022, when OCF declared only days before an election that At-Large D.C. Council member Elissa Silverman had misspent public campaign funds on a poll. Silverman ended up losing that election to McDuffie, and months later the Board of Elections tossed out the OCF findings against Silverman.
That history seemed to work its way into Wednesday’s hearing, when McCarthy pressed OCF attorney William SanFord on why he unveiled the investigation and fines late on a Friday only four days before the primary.
“We had no motivation to try and influence the election and issue an order to embarrass a candidate in that cycle,” SanFord said.
“It just happened to be four days before the election?” McCarthy said.
“That was not a consideration,” SanFord replied.
In a statement, Ward 1 council member Brianne Nadeau welcomed the board’s decision, while reiterating that she had asked the D.C. Inspector General to look into the way OCF handled the investigation into Lewis George’s campaign.
“I’m glad that the Board of Elections reviewed the information before them and concluded that there was no evidence of any wrongdoing by the Janeese Lewis George campaign. My request of the Inspector General was to determine how it came about that findings rooted in no evidence came to be issued in the 11th hour of a campaign this time and during prior campaigns. I believe my request remains relevant,” she said.
Lewis George added her own criticism of OCF. “D.C. voters deserve a fair election process that inspires confidence and where all rules are consistently and fairly enforced,” she said.
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