Tom Brune
04/22/23
(Newsday) Last week, the liberal advocacy group End Citizens United filed FEC complaints against D’Esposito and LaLota for each transferring $1,000 from their state campaign funds to their federal campaign funds, which federal election law prohibits. “The law is intended to prevent corruption and undue influence over our leaders. These aren’t one-off mistakes; they appear to be calculated moves,” End Citizens United’s president, Tiffany Muller, said in a statement. Kappel and other campaign finance experts agreed federal law prohibits that transfer of funds. The End Citizen United complaint also alleged D’Esposito broke federal election law as a Hempstead Town Council member after declaring his candidacy for Congress in March 2022 by spending his local campaign funds to help his federal campaign. With three years to go before the next town election, the complaint said, D’Esposito’s local fund spent nearly $100,000 for a golf fundraiser to raise his public profile, opened a P.O. box in Washington D.C., and paid for ads, cellphones, office rent and volunteer expenses. Capp denied D’Esposito violated any federal election laws and called the complaint “a blatantly misleading and baseless partisan attack.” Kappel said it was one of the most common complaints to the FEC, and the interplay between local and federal campaign spending ranks as one of the most complicated issues.