Anti-Senn ads part of national effort by Chamber

By Beth Kaiman
Seattle Times staff reporter

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The $1.5 million contribution by the United States Chamber of Commerce to a TV ad campaign criticizing state attorney-general candidate Deborah Senn is part of an effort targeting supreme-court and attorney-general candidates in 25 races around the country.

The Chamber was revealed Sunday as the sponsor of anti-Senn commercials that aired around the state beginning Aug. 30. The commercials, which are no longer airing, identified their sponsor as the Voters Education Committee, an organization virtually no one had heard of.

Stan Anderson, executive vice president and chief legal officer for the U.S. Chamber, said yesterday that companies doing business in Washington contacted the group with concerns that Senn might harm business interests in the state. He declined to say which companies or industries expressed concerns.

Anderson said national Chamber officials determined it would be "more effective" to have the commercials run with the name of a local organization rather than the Chamber's.

The Chamber's Washington state affiliate, the Association of Washington Business, did not learn that the national group was behind the attack ads until a phone message was left last Friday evening, said the group's president, Don Brunell.

"I guess I'm disappointed," Brunell said. "I would hope that if something is going to be some type of project ... in Washington state, there'd be some kind of collaboration. ... We're trying to figure out what's happening. It forces us to distance ourselves from a good partner."

The Greater Seattle Chamber also says it did not know of the ad campaign, adding it does not engage in partisan political activities.

Senn, who angered many in the insurance industry and others while serving as insurance commissioner from 1993-2001, is running against Mark Sidran, a former Seattle city attorney, for the Democratic nomination.

Metropolitan King County Councilman Rob McKenna faces Seattle lawyer Michael Vaska for the GOP nomination.

Samantha Sanchez, senior researcher at the nonprofit Money In State Politics, which gathers information on campaign spending, said the Chamber often "operates under the radar," by linking with little-known local groups.
 
The Chamber focuses on attorney-general and state supreme-court races, offices that are in a position to influence liability laws and other issues of interest to business, she said.

In some states, Anderson said, the Chamber is more upfront about its political involvement. In South Dakota, the Chamber is seeking to defeat U.S. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle. Anderson said he recently traveled to the state to publicly voice the Chamber's displeasure with Daschle, who has been key to stopping legislation to curb class-action lawsuits — legislation the Chamber supports.

In that race, the Chamber so far has spent about $400,000 on television ads, a big buy in a small market, Anderson said.

Karen Besserman, Senn's spokeswoman, said yesterday the contribution in Washington state shows "big, outside business interests" are trying to capture the campaign.

Reports reflecting the group's recent campaign spending are not yet available, for the most part, but Anderson put the organization's budget for state races at more than $15 million this year.

Last week, the Senn campaign complained about the ad campaign to the state's Public Disclosure Commission (PDC), which last Friday went to court to compel the group to reveal its contributors.

To head off a court hearing, Bruce Boram, director of the Voters Education Committee, agreed to reveal the donor list by Sunday.

Boram, a veteran Republican campaign consultant, has been paid $10,000 for his work on the campaign, according to reports filed with the PDC.

Boram maintains the group should not have had to file with the state as a political action committee, saying that as a 527 independent political committee — named for the section of the Internal Revenue Service code that governs those groups — Voters Education Committee needs only to list its contributors with the IRS. That deadline is next month.

The PDC maintains that at least one ad was clearly designed to persuade people not to vote for Senn, and therefore its sponsors must register as a political action committee. The agency insists the Voters Action Committee violated election laws and has filed a lawsuit.

Boram counters that the ad merely assessed Senn's performance as insurance commissioner and that sponsors of "issue ads" do not need to file with the state.

Voters Education Committee has filed suit against the state, alleging that the PDC is impinging on its right to free speech.

Beth Kaiman: 206-464-2441 or bkaiman@seattletimes.com. Seattle Times staff researchers Justin Mayo and Miyoko Wolf contributed to this report.