Huckabee request on ethics dismissed
Posted on Saturday, June 21, 2008
The Arkansas Ethics Commission has rejected former Gov. Mike Huckabee’s request to delete a reference to his admitting to breaking the law.
The commission Friday released a letter it sent Huckabee’s lawyer, Kevin Crass, on May 21.
“Your request is denied,” commission Director Graham Sloan wrote. “It is specifically noted that the language in question was not unique to the letter of caution issued your client.” Huckabee of North Little Rock was governor from 1996-2006. He unsuccessfully sought the Republican presidential nomination this year but has landed a job as a commentator on Fox News.
On May 2, the commission issued a letter of caution against Huckabee for failing to disclose the names of the people who gave money in 2006 toward his official portrait.
Crass disclosed the donors in April after the commission found probable cause that Huckabee broke a 2001 law requiring disclosure of gifts to a public official on behalf of the state.
The letter of caution, the commission’s slightest public sanction, signed by Chairman Larry Ross of Sherwood, says that Huckabee acknowledged violating the law.
Crass then requested the wording change, saying that Huckabee agreed to the letter of caution finding him in violation of the law but never acknowledged that he broke the law.
Sloan’s letter said that “for more than 10 years, such language” acknowledging a violation “has been routinely included in public letters issued in cases resolved by written offers of settlement.” He wrote that the decision was made after he presented Crass’ letter to Ross.
“We are disappointed that the issue was not put to the full commission as I requested,” Crass said Friday. “The governor did not acknowledge a violation of the law in his acceptance of a settlement. We have not decided on a next step.” The disclosure requirement is in Act 239 of 2001, which Huckabee signed into law.
That law allows the governor, lieutenant governor, secretary of state, treasurer, auditor, land commissioner and attorney general to receive “gifts, grants and donations of money or property on behalf of the state for any lawful public purpose.” It requires the gifts to be reported quarterly to the commission.
The portrait was publicly unveiled in November 2006. It is hanging in the Governor’s Conference Room in the state Capitol.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in January discovered the existence of a “special events fund” in the governor’s office during Huckabee’s tenure that he used to accept donations for the portrait.
On April 18, Huckabee revealed that 61 donors, including agency heads, lobbyists and board appointees, gave about $ 31, 000 for the portrait.
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