For Immediate Release: January 27, 2006
Contact: Ned Wigglesworth

DeLay/Cunningham/Doolittle Donors Violated Campaign Limits

Two Associates of Brent Wilkes Violated Campaign Law in 2002
TheRestofUs.org Files Complaints With Federal Elections Commission

Two business associates of alleged Duke Cunningham co-conspirator Brent Wilkes violated the $25,000 aggregate limit on federal political contributions in 2002, according to complaints filed today with the Federal Elections Commission by nonpartisan campaign watchdog TheRestofUs.org. William Bain Adams, an investor in Wilkes company Perfect Wave Technologies, and Max Gelwix, the President of Perfect Wave, each reported contributing $28,000 to the same federal political committees in 2002.

[*Correction: Because the FEC includes contributions to both joint fundraising committees and the ultimate recipient of the joint fundraising committee's donations, we double counted $2,500 both Gelwix and Adams gave to the 2002 Great Northwest Classic Committee. Both men still violated the $25,000 limit.]

"These guys clearly needed to put as much money as they could into the hands of politicians as quickly as possible, but that pushed them over the limit," said Ned Wigglesworth, analyst for TheRestofUs.org. "Most folks would laugh you out of the room if you told them they couldn't give politicians more than $25,000 a year, but then again, our campaign laws aren't designed for most folks - they're designed for the Brent Wilkes and Mitch Wades of the world."

Each man contributed the exact same amount to the exact same nine candidates and committees, in all but one or two instances on the same date. Along with longtime Wilkes attorney Richard Bliss, the two men were the sole individual contributors to the 2002 Great Northwest Classic Committee, a committee set up in 2002 to funnel money to Idaho Senator Larry Craig.

A complete list of contributions and recipients can be found in the accompanying complaints, as can links to the file images of the donations on the FEC website. The recipient committees were controlled by Reps. Tom DeLay, Roy Blunt, Duke Cunningham, Jerry Lewis, Benjamin Gilman, and John Doolittle, Senator Larry Craig, and congressional candidate Maria Guadalupe Garcia. These contributions would be legal today under the so-called Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, which lifted contribution limits and the aggregate limits.

"Recent changes jacked up legal limits to a level satisfactory even to the very powerful in our society and made it easier for folks like Brent Wilkes to give even more money directly to politicians," said Derek Cressman, director of TheRestofUs.org. "That doesn't excuse the apparent violation of federal law by these men, nor does it mean that all Americans shouldn't be asking of themselves and their representatives: what did these self-serving donors see in the politicians who they chose to give contributions to?"

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TheRestofUs.org is a nonpartisan campaign watchdog that called last July for Duke Cunningham's resignation due to bribes he accepted from Brent Wilkes.