As Matt Stout of the Boston Globe shows today in Healey created a nonprofit to bankroll her transition into office. But, the donors are secret, and so is how much they gave her, Governor Maura Healey has joined the bi-partisan effort sanctify dark money in Massachusetts politics. Shame.
The Healey-Driscoll Transition Committee, Inc. paid for transition cost and even a retreat so staff could get together and figure out just exactly what it is they are supposed to be doing. The Committee was created as an IRS 501(c)(4) non-profit, meaning it doesn’t have to disclose its donors. You remember, like when Charlie Baker did the same thing, so it must be ok. Baker not only used dark money for his transition and inaugurals, he deployed it in fights to take over the Republican state committee, and even to run for governor. So many loopholes, so little time.
It’s legal. Right, we know that. It’s legality is so firmly established that we don’t even need a ruling from Sam Alito.
Transition costs, strategic planning, hiring decisions (“personnel is policy”—I read that somewhere)—nah, I can’t figure out why any anonymous interest would want to influence those functions of government.
Here’s the defense from Healey’s communications team:
“Like Governor Baker previously, Governor Healey established a non-profit transition committee to help build the new administration, all without relying on taxpayer dollars,” Corey Welford, a Healey spokesperson, said in a statement.
No no no no no no no no no. NO! I’m begging you, rely on taxpayer dollars. This is why we pay taxes.
Stories like this always remind me of Michael Kinsley’s iron rule of politics: politics: “the scandal isn’t what’s illegal, the scandal is what’s legal.”
“In the darkness of secrecy, sinister interest and evil in every shape, have full swing. . . . Publicity is the very soul of justice.”—Jeremy Bentham
(I write about dark money, democracy (more like, demise thereof), and oligarchy. My book, Dark Money and the Politics of School Privatization, is now in print)]