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Núñez represents downtown Los Angeles, to the south of, and East LA in the state assembly. It is rumored he wants to run for Mayor.
It is not like Democrat Fabian Núñez, Speaker of the California State Assembly, is some bogus politician with bad intentions and total self-serving motives. I am not going to argue with him for looking into universal preschool, high speed rail and global warming solutions for California; in fact, I applaud those efforts. Yet, the recent LA Times investigative exposé on the 46th District Assemblyman's luxurious world travels paid for by campaign funds is starting to boil my blood.
The spending, listed in mandatory filings with the state, includes $47,412 on United, Lufthansa and Air France airlines this year; $8,745 at the exclusive Hotel Arts in Barcelona, Spain; $5,149 for a "meeting" at Cave L'Avant Garde, a wine seller in the Bordeaux region of France; a total of $2,562 for two "office expenses" at Vuitton, two years apart; and $1,795 for a "meeting" at Le Grand Colbert, a venerable Parisian restaurant.Nuñez also spent $2,934 at Colosseum Travel in Rome, and paid $505 to the European airline Spanair.
Other expenses are closer to home: a $1,715 meeting at Asia de Cuba restaurant in West Hollywood; a $317 purchase at upscale Pavilion Salon Shoes in Sacramento; a $2,428 meeting at 58 Degrees and Holding, a Sacramento wine bar and bistro; and $800 spent at Dollar Rent a Car in Kihei, Hawaii.
[snip]
"There's not too big a difference," [Núñez] said, "between how I live and how most middle-class people live."
While these are not tax dollars he's spending, there's still an issue here. Doug Heller of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights in Santa Monica told the Times that "when his campaigns are funding [the luxurious expenses], you have to wonder: Who does he owe for this lifestyle? That's the problem."
Good question, who does he owe? The health insurance industry is one suspect. Núñez has received $136,000 for his travel fund from health insurers and their lobbyists. He is also working with Gov. Schwarzenegger on the health insurance reform bill that would require every Californian to buy coverage, but wouldn't require insurers to cap the cost according to Carmen Balber, also of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights, who spoke to Steve Lopez for his Sunday column.
Lopez' must-read piece finds that some of his campaign donors are having trouble with the spending revelations:
Barry Broad, who represents the Teamsters ($15,900 in donations to Nuñez) and other labor groups, says it's hard to ask members to keep digging into their pockets for campaign donations when the working stiffs open their paper and see that Nuñez is frolicking around the world like he's playing with Monopoly money.
So what does Núñez spokeswoman Beth Willon have to say about this? She told the Times that "the expenditures were properly disclosed and described as required by law." Can we say stonewall? And should Willon, an employee of the state, be wasting tax payer dimes defending the Núñez campaign, a private entity? Nevertheless and whatever the case be, Willon should be excited to defend such questions with facts, numbers and good reason.
Her stock answer only tells the people something bony is hiding in the closet and that has something to learn from the edifications of Luke Ravenstahl, the 27-year-old Mayor of Pittsburgh. And that is reason enough for me to say "no" the next time he runs for office.
Photo by Forward Together PAC via Flickr on a Creative Commons License
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My mom has a word for people like Fab Nunez: "Poverty Pimps" - they conspicuously consume yet are good at "wearing" the cultural clothing of their blood (or constituency) while living up in the parlours of Paris (Middle Class, indeed.)
Sad, hubris isn't isolated to the country club elite of the GOP.
I heard on npr that he is defending the expenses by saying that in order for him to represent the los angeles community, it is important that he is well-traveled and "worldly" so that he may bring a broader perspective to his position.
They also reported that none of the contributors thus far have complained, which I thought was interesting.
Sure Fabian is disingenuous in his people's-champ posturing, but his campaign contributors gave him all this money so he could obtain the Baller Status he'd need to get elected and re-elected. At least he's not squandering taxpayer dollars, though CityBeat called him on some legislative hijinx about that a few weeks ago: http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=6239&IssueNum=225
while this certainly isn't frugal traveling (i don't really expect these guys to be staying in hostels), the dollar amounts quoted above certainly aren't extravagant or luxurious. Your call for Núñez to go is a bit hasty and irresponsible to say the least. These are not taxpayer dollars. There is nothing illegal or even immoral going on here.
Nunez is speaker of the California Assembly - which means he controls one of two bodies that set the budget for a state with $100 billion/year budget (not counting bond money, etc.), and this reporter's got his panties in a twist about a lousy trip to Europe?! Paid for with freaking campaign funds!
He reported these expenditures to the people, and his campaign donations are posted on the internet - not exactly "stonewalling" there, is it?
I have no doubt that money influences decision makers in Sacramento. Every politician in this state would be screwed, come election time, without their special interest group buddies to run to for campaign dollars.
Why not push for a publicly funded elections instead of blaming politicians for fundraising - an activity that *every* non-millionaire politician has done in this country since we started having elections?
http://www.caclean.org/
That is a real solution to this mess - provide politicians with a chance to advertise themselves at election time without compromising their values to pay for ads, mailers, and stupid parties for special interest groups.
And you wonder why politicians have the reputations they do with the common person. Bah...
I don't think there is much of a story here.
If we are going to start condemning politicians for their conspicuous consumption of campaign budgets I suspect we will rapidly find ourselves running out of officeholders.
This, to me, is just a local version of John Edwards' $300 haircut. Yes, there are ridiculous expenses that politicians and their campaigns incur, but we can't blame the individuals without taking into account structural factors as well. Our political system expects certain things of individuals if they are to successfully run for and maintain a public office. The truth is that his use of funds is probably perfectly legal and astonishingly common-- that is the subtext of the message from the spokeswoman you contacted.
Now, if you want to take on the systemic issue of campaign funds and their use on luxury commodities (travel, haircuts, fancy suits, hotel suites) that would be great. But showing an example of a politician doing what every politician does (and believes that they are expected to do, right or wrong)... that just isn't a story.
Because he is the speaker of the assembly, however, I can see how his behavior could draw more scrutiny than that of other assembly members. I can also see how his comment about living a nearly middle-class life looks disingenuous next to the expenses that he has acknowledged incurring. However, I am assuming that you don't actually know much about the private life of Mr. Núñez. That is, you can tell me about how nice his business and campaign trips are and that he has awesome meals and wears expensive suits when he is on the job, but you probably know very little about how big his house is, what schools his children attend, how often he eats out with his family, how much he has set aside for retirement, etc. His salary -- at around $130,000 -- is also well above "middle class", but we don't know how he actually lives his life, do we? He didn't say that he has the same concerns as middle class people, or that he himself was middle class at all -- he said that "[t]here's not too big a difference between how I live and how most middle-class people live." He could be right, I really have no way of knowing how he lives his life, I just have a sense of how his campaign spends its money. Those are really two separate issues that are being conflated here.
Now, you may know more about Mr. Núñez than I do, that I will grant. I am, however, aware that he is the child of migrant workers from Tijuana and worked for the local AFL-CIO body before receiving his BA in his early 30s - well into his career. It sounds to me like he might have some insight into the experience of the middle class, even if he is no longer.