Campaign Violations Haunt Newly-Elected Lawmaker

Rep.-elect Ross Spano (R-FL) “is struggling to hire office staff as he relies on a controversial adviser: one of the friends at the center of a campaign finance scandal that is rocking the Florida Republican,” Politico reports.

“Spano, an attorney and outgoing state legislator with past financial troubles, recently admitted in a letter to the Federal Election Commission that he might have committed a campaign finance ‘violation’ in failing for two months to disclose $180,000 he accepted from two friends.”

“But if the FEC deems the ‘loans’ to be campaign contributions, they would exceed legal donation limits of $2,700 per cycle, per contributor. And experts say it could constitute a criminal violation by Spano and, potentially, the two people who gave his campaign the money — Cary Carreno and Karen Hunt.”