Democrats consider complaint over Chairez money

Martin Kuz

Thursday, Oct. 29, 1998 | 11:36 a.m.

Nevada Democratic Party officials are considering filing a complaint with the Federal Election Commission over what they call "illegal campaign contributions" received by Don Chairez despite uncertainty about whether the Republican congressional candidate has done anything wrong.

State Democratic Party Chairman Paul Henry said Wednesday that Chairez, who faces Democrat Shelley Berkley in Nevada's 1st Congressional District race, received more than $29,000 in donations designated for the primary election after Nevada's Sept. 1 primaries.

Under FEC regulations, candidates can accept such donations after the primary only if the money is used to retire a campaign's debt from the primary.

Henry also speculated that Chairez may have transferred $34,000 left over from his campaign as a District Court judge in 1996 to fund his congressional bid. The FEC prohibits funneling money from a city, county, district or state campaign into a federal race.

Admitting there was no way to corroborate the allegations at this point, Henry insisted Chairez should explain in detail what he has done with the primary donations and the remaining money from his judicial campaign. Attorneys for the state Democratic Party are weighing whether to lodge a formal FEC complaint, he added.

Chairez campaign manager Bob Spretnak said the primary donations Chairez received after Sept. 1 have been applied to his $36,000 primary-election debt. He also said Chairez had "absolutely not" used money from his judicial bid to fund his current campaign, although Spretnak is unaware of what happened to the $34,000.

The Berkley camp has previously pointed out that the FEC sent four letters to Chairez requesting amendments to his campaign finance reports. But Spretnak countered that the same number of requests have been made of Berkley -- an assertion backed up by the FEC's website, which shows the commission has asked for additional information from the Democrat on four occasions this year.

Spretnak characterized the latest volley of allegations as a ploy by Democrats to smear Chairez as the campaign winds down.

"I'm just amazed that in the last few days before the election that the best they can come up with is questioning our ability to fill out paperwork," he said.

Also Wednesday, Chairez failed to appear for a debate with Berkley at UNLV due to an illness that had him home "puking his guts out," according to a Chairez spokesman.

Berkley, a university regent, turned up anyway to discuss her platform and answer questions from the 75 students in attendance.