Roundhouse Roundup: A Richardson Campaign Mini-Reunion

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
April 28, 2011


For a second, in a hotel room in downtown Santa Fe one morning this week, I thought I might have stumbled into an organizational meeting of the Bill Richardson 2012 committee.

Contarino in New Hampshire, January 2008

Among those sitting at a table with me were Dave Contarino, who managed Richardson's presidential and gubernatorial campaigns and served as chief of staff for most of his first term as governor; Amanda Cooper, Richardson's former "political director" who also was a major honcho in the Richardson campaigns; and Jim Noel, Cooper's husband and Richardson's last secretary of the New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department.

But no, the ex-governor wasn't there. And the meeting wasn't about him. Contarino and crew had arranged interviews for billionaire businessman and former New York gubernatorial candidate Tom Golisan, a leader of an organization called National Popular Vote.

Contarino said he's now doing public relations and political strategy work — as he did for years before hooking up with Richardson.

Flunking the electoral college: Basically, Direct Popular Vote is pushing for a compact among states that agree to cast their electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes nationally.

Eight states, plus Washington, D.C., have signed on, representing a total of 77 electoral votes. Golisan said they're working on California, which would bring in another 55 electoral votes. The compact wouldn't take effect until there were enough states signed on to reach the 270 electoral votes needed to win the White House.

New Mexico, like most other states, uses the winner-take-all system to determine who gets our five electoral votes. So, if a candidate wins the state by one vote — or, say, by 366 votes, which was Al Gore's margin over George W. Bush in 2000 — he or she gets all five electoral votes.

During the past state legislative session, the New Mexico House passed a memorial asking the secretary of state and the attorney general to "study and compare the current electoral college system and the national popular vote system" and to report their findings to the Legislative Council by November.

But, as Barry Massey of The Associated Press pointed out in a story published Wednesday, the proposal to join a compact with other states won't get much traction with the current administration in Santa Fe.

He quoted Scott Darnell, a spokesman for Gov. Susana Martinez, as saying, "The current system helps ensure battleground states with independent-minded voters, like New Mexico, play a significant role in electing U.S. presidents. Currently, presidential candidates visit the state frequently and must listen and respond to the unique concerns of the state, from our national labs to our pueblos, and the governor believes that serves New Mexico well."

Though Golisan, a registered Republican, said opposition to the idea has been coming from members of his party, Darnell's argument — that the electoral college guarantees presidential candidates pay more attention to "swing" states like New Mexico — is embraced by members of both parties in battleground states.

Golisan, however, said the perceived value of such attention is exaggerated. "What has it really gotten (New Mexico)?" he said when I asked him about that argument. "That's a fleeting thing," he said, arguing that despite the past several elections, New Mexico might not always be a battleground state. "You could wake up one day and be North Dakota."

That probably sounds worse than it really is.

Another common argument is that under a direct popular-vote system, candidates would only concentrate on areas with large populations. But Golisan contends that candidates still would advertise in small markets like New Mexico because television advertising is cheaper in smaller markets.

Boy, that's a relief. I'd sure hate to have to watch fewer campaign ads on TV.

Here's a video of Golisan talking about the direct election compact.

Foy Expands Whisteblower Suit

Former state Educational Retirement Board investment officer Frank Foy has expanded his "pay-to-play" lawsuit to include local investment broker Marc Correra, his father Anthony Correra, former Bill Richardson pal Guy Riordan and several of those involved in the New York investment scandal, including the indicted Hank Morris

Foy has in a lawsuit claimed that former Richardson chief of staff Dave Contarino, State Investment Officer Gary Bland and ERB director Bruce Malott pressured the ERB and SIC to make investments totalling $90 million with a Chicago company called Vanderbilt. The investments went bad -- though Marc Correra made a couple of million in finders fees on the deals.

This new turn of events should be interesting for Albuquerque lawyer Sam Bregman. He represents Malott's accounting firm, named as a defendant in this case, as well as Marc Correra in another matter.

Kate Nash is covering a press conference, which should be strarting about now. Meanwhile, below are the latest filings in the case. (I don't know why it shows an error sign. There should be no trouble downloading or reading the documents):

Corrected Austin Amended Complaint w Exhibits-Errata Corrections Made as FILED

Defendants in Foy Case Won't Turn Over Documents

Here's another case of the state refusing to turn over documents related to the investment scandals. This time it's in the "discovery phase" of the Frank Foy whistle-blowing suit.

State officials as well as the Chicago-based Vanderbilt Financial, which lost $90 million in investments from state pensions and public trust funds, have told the court they won't turn over discovery documents requested in Frank Foy's pay-to-play suit against former Bill Richardson chief of staff and campaign manager Dave Contarino, state Investment Officer Gary Bland, Educational Retirement Board chairman Bruce Malott and others.

In a motion filed in state District Court in Santa Fe last week, Victor Marshall, attorney for Foy, who is a former ERB investment officer, said, "All of the defendants have refused to answer any interrogatories or produce any documents whatsoever, even the most basic documents concerning the transaction giving rise to this lawsuit."

In his response to Foy's discovery motion asking for various documents, Bland said the requests were "vague, overly broad and overly burdensome." Vanderbilt, in its response, uses similar terms, which the plaintiffs call "boilerplate" language.

See my story in the New Mexican on this HERE.

MORE ON CONTARINO/VANDERBILT

Here's Kate Nash's full story regarding Dave Contarino being named as "John Doe #2" in the Vanderbilt civil suit (and the wild press conference where that announcement took place.)

Here's video from KRQE:

DAVE DOE?

That's what lawyers in the Vanderbilt lawsuit say.

Read Kate Nash's story about that HERE.

And check out her blog about the shouting match that took place at the news conference when lawyers for other defendants showed up.

CDR SAGA CONTINUES

I did a story about the Justice Department subpoenas of records from University of New Mexico bond sales, which involved CDR Financial Products. These bond transactions, the first ones at least, took place before Bill Richardson was governor. See the story HERE.

The story also mentions that Albuquerque lawyer Paul Kennedy, a former state Supreme Court justice, is counseling former NM Finance Authority director David Harris in the grand jury proceedings. Kennedy, of course, said he couldn't comment on the case itself.

Though the national media furor is dying down somewhat, Bloomberg still is on the story. They report today that Richardson's former chief of staff Dave Contarino's name has come up in the questioning of at least one witness. It's been rumored that Contarino is one of the bigger fish the grand jury is looking at. I tried unsuccessfully to get ahold of the lawyer said to be representing Contarino yesterday but got no reply.

Contarino himself did email a comment to Bloomberg.

“As chief of staff and co-chairman of the Governor’s Finance
Council, it was my job to be involved in GRIP and many of the administration’s economic and financial initiatives,” Contarino said in an e-mail statement. “In all of my actions, I acted appropriately and I am confident that the investigation will bear out that fact.”

It's getting more interesting.