Dumbest Attack Yet From Desperate Downer Camp

Today marks a new low from the Hunt Downer campaign just five days before Saturday’s GOP primary in the 3rd District congressional race, one which reeks of total desperation.

No, we’re not shilling for Landry. This one is really that bad. Any idiot could smack it aside, and only a fool would have wasted time and energy trotting it out.

Today’s attack?

Landry paid his company nearly $40,000 from his campaign account

SOUTH LOUISIANA – The Downer campaign recently discovered that Jeff Landry paid nearly $40,000 out of his campaign account to his own company, even using the campaign’s money to pay for his employees’ “payroll.”  Landry relies on this company for over a third of his personal income. Recently, the Downer campaign posted a “lie” on their website www.JeffLandryLiedtoYOU.com detailing issues Landry has had both in the past and present with the FEC regarding campaign financing.

Below is how Landry paid himself nearly $40,000:

• 4/7/2010 – Disbursement of $6,271.08 to UST Staffing for “payroll for Jan thru Mar”, See page 79 of http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?_10990876908+0 and page 79 of http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?_10931096941+0 .
• 7/8/10 – Disbursement of $8,260.00 to UST Staffing, See page 23 of http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?_10931107232+0 .
• 7/16/10 – Disbursement of $4,956.48 to UST Staffing, See page 23 of http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?_10931107232+0 .
• 7/28/10 – Disbursement of $3,888.91 to UST Staffing, See page 24 of http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?_10931107232+0 .
• 8/16/10 – Disbursement of $9,467.77 to UST Staffing, See page 76 of http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?_10931318081+0 .
• 8/26/10 – Disbursement of $4,799.08 to UST Staffing, See page 76 of http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?_10931318081+0 .

                Below shows how Landry is connected to the company; he is the soleowner, registered agent, and earns annual income from UST Services (including over $50,000 last year and $36,000 this year through May):

• “UST Staffing” is the trade name for “UST Environmental Services, LLC.”  (See official Louisiana Secretary of State record at http://coraweb.sos.louisiana.gov/commercialsearch/TradeServiceSearchDetails_Print.aspx?TradeServiceMainID=90073 ).
• Landry is the sole owner of “UST Environmental Services, LLC.”  (See official Louisiana Secretary of State record at http://coraweb.sos.louisiana.gov/commercialsearch/CommercialSearchDetails_Print.aspx?CharterID=550328 ).

Landry’s Financial Disclosure Statements dated January 18, 2010 and May 17, 2010state:

• On Schedule I (Earned Income) that Landry earned $36,000 in the “current year to filing” and $53,000 in the “preceding year” from “UST Environmental Services, LLC.”  He lists the type of income as “Self employment inc.” (self employment income – what he paid himself).

On Schedule IV (Positions) – he says that he was a “Member” (owner) of “UST Environmental Services, LLC.”  (See http://huntdowner.com/sites/default/files/landry927.pdf).

Downer’s campaign manager Buddy Boe, who cooked up this latest monstrosity, had this comment to punctuate the campaign’s release…

“Jeff Landry’s contributors might be surprised to learn how he is using their financial contributions.  Why is Jeff paying his own company nearly $40,000 and paying employees of his company from his campaign account?   This is just another example of how Jeff Landry operates.  This sort of questionable financing is exactly why Washington is broken. We’ve said since the day after the election that Landry has been lying to the public regarding his positions on key issues and things in his past, and has repeatedly lied about Hunt’s record,” said Buddy Boe, Downer’s campaign manager.

We decided to do a little digging, and what we found out is this – Landry’s company has a staffing component to it which can process payroll, handle FICA and so on. Political campaigns use payroll or employee leasing companies to handle paid campaign staff all the time. It would make no sense whatsoever, if a candidate had a company capable of doing that work, not to keep it in-house rather than to farm it out to somebody else.

From this, Boe has attempted to concoct a scandal. This is their big push in the last week of the campaign.

There’s a word for political action like this. The word is “chickenshit.” And while it’s our guess that Downer’s role in this kind of garbage is that of an absentee landlord rather than Chief Chickenshit Shoveler, it reflects on his character and fitness for political office that he allows this sort of petty, irrelevant trash to be spread in his name.

It’s hard to talk to anybody who isn’t disgusted by this congressional race. Both candidates are good men, respected in their communities, and both would be an improvement over Charlie Melancon as the 3rd District’s congressional representative. But voters in Saturday’s primary have been reduced to holding their nose while voting, mostly because of the scorched-earth campaign Downer has been running since getting his brains beat in during the first primary.

And today it’s not just dirty, it’s comically stupid.

Downer’s campaign filings indicate that he either doesn’t report income from his campaign staff or that he “1099′s” his people. He paid Boe $5500 for “consulting” work from Aug. 9 to Sept. 12, for example, which means Boe is on his own to pay taxes.

Let’s hope Boe does a better job accounting for his income to Uncle Same than he’s done “consulting” for Hunt Downer. And let’s also hope this is the last time we see his fingerprints on a major Louisiana political campaign.