RPV chairman Pat Mullins issued a letter/press release on Thursday calling on Attorney General Mark Herring to launch an investigation into Terry McAuliffe’s appointment of his former consultant, Boyd Marcus, to the Virginia ABC board. The charge: this is a clear-cut quid pro quo…
The courts have already defined the standard for opening an investigation: the appearance of a possible quid pro quo. Under that standard, it certainly appears that Governor McAuliffe sold an office of the Commonwealth in exchange for an endorsement. The quid — Governor McAuliffe’s receipt of an endorsement that had a significant impact on the election — and the quo — Boyd Marcus’ appointment to a high-paying state job — are both present.
This story has been brewing for many weeks, and is wildly complicated. The Washington Post sheds light on one charge Mullins made in his letter — that McAuliffe approached a now-former ABC board member seeking her endorsement. If she backed McAuliffe, he would let her keep her job:
Immediately after the election, a Virginia Beach prosecutor asked state police to look into claims that McAuliffe had offered to keep ABC Commissioner Sandra Canada in her job if she endorsed him. Canada has declined to comment, but Harvey Bryant, now the former commonwealth’s attorney of Virginia Beach, confirmed that he asked state police to dig into the matter. The inquiry resulted in no charges.
“During the course of the gubernatorial campaign, my office received a complaint and I asked the state police to conduct a review,” Bryant said. “And they conducted that review and came back and briefed me, and we jointly agreed that no investigation was warranted.”
My understanding is that numerous reporters have tried to get a look (using FOIA) at the paperwork behind that investigation. They were all denied access.
I’ve also been told that once the State Police and reporters started looking into this matter, Canada either recanted her story about McAuliffe’s offer, or simply stopped talking. Julian Walker’s story adds this angle:
In the fall, The Virginian-Pilot investigated allegations by Republicans that McAuliffe had offered to keep Canada in her post if she endorsed him. Requests for documents filed with Bryant’s office and state police under open records laws were denied in November. At the time, neither agency would confirm that an investigation had occurred.
But Thursday, Bryant confirmed he sent a letter to the State Police about a month before the election asking the agency to look into a complaint he’d received a few days before.
He said that he could not reveal who the complaint involved, but that it did not come from Canada.
The timing of the complaint put both agencies in an uncomfortable position. The commonwealth’s attorney is an elected official, and Bryant is a lifelong Republican, as is Canada, he said.
“Both State Police and myself were very concerned that there be no perception that we were doing anything that would affect the election,” Bryant added.
One person I did talk to about this was the former consultant to the Cuccinelli gubernatorial campaign, Chris LaCivita. He released an email he received from Marcus during the campaign in which Boyd made the Cuccinelli campaign an offer: he would be happy to work for Ken for $75,000-$100,000. LaCivita never responded, but he also wrote this:
Boyd let several people know that part of his arrangement would also get him an appointment to the ABC Board, should McAuliffe win. That was something I made public with several reporters, back in August.
This would have had to be part of the deal , as Boyd knows that once you turncoat, you cant go back. His way of making a living had to change. Boyd worked for the state in the 80’s, and also as Governor Gilmore’s Chief of Staff. A six-figure board appointment would set him up nicely, – and – have a direct impact on his retirement, as retirement with the Commonwealth is based on your last three years of service.
I asked LaCivita whether he thought this amounted to a quid pro quo. He told me:
I think its pretty clear from any casual observance, that there was in fact a quid pro quo – you’d have to be an idiot not to see it. That being said, proving it is an entirely different matter.
Colorful, and, particularly in the last bit, true. Proving Marcus’s appointment was a quid pro quo will tough, particularly since it has come to light that Marcus was paid substantially more for his brief service to the McAuliffe campaign than was previously reported on VPAP.
And yes, there are rumors flying about that amount, too.
If we put all of these pieces together, they still don’t make a coherent picture. There’s a lot missing — crucially, the smoking gun that shows McAuliffe and Marcus making a corrupt bargain. Maybe it exists. Very likely it doesn’t. One would think neither man is so stupid as to put such an agreement in writing.
But we also live in a strange new world, where quids, pros and quos aren’t as solid as they once were. Former Gov. Bob McDonnell is wrestling with this new reality right now in federal court.
Because things have gotten so muddled, it’s very easy to understand why Mr. Mullins would urge Mark Herring to open an investigation. But Mullins is motivated not so much by his fidelity to the rule of law as he is by politics (which is, after all, his job).
What his letter may do, though, is give McAuliffe a reason to withdraw the Marcus nomination. McAuliffe has much bigger political battles ahead of him than an ABC nomination and limited political capital to spend. He could fight for Boyd. But he will lose. The chance Marcus will win House approval is zero. McAuliffe may see that his rookie resources are better spent on an issue that matters far more to him: Medicaid expansion.
It’s a test. And a trap.
