Irony, as mayor to address spending watchdog
Webber spent record amount in Santa Fe mayoral campaign
New Mexicans for Money Out of Politics, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to combating the “corrupting influence” of private dollars in politics and governance, announced Monday the top fundraiser in the history of Santa Fe city elections will speak at an all-day conference later this month.
The group’s president, Bruce Berlin, acknowledged the “apparent irony” of the inclusion of Mayor Alan Webber, whose campaign raised almost $320,000 from individuals and businesses, a recordbreaking sum that exceeded the combined total of the three other privately financed campaigns in the race by more than $110,000.
“I understand that the mayor believed that the very limited amount of public monies available to candidates with less local name recognition forced him to raise his own campaign funds,” Berlin said in a news release. “Who better to talk about getting money out of politics than someone who knows firsthand how broken the system is?”
Webber said during the campaign that his haul represented donors’ endorsement of his character and fitness for the mayor’s office rather than a bid for influence.
“At the national level, I think we’ve all learned money in politics is a pollutant,” he said in January. “At a level of the mayor’s race in Santa Fe, I would like to get it out, but I don’t think it has the same tainting effect.”
Of the five mayoral candidates, only City Councilor Ron Trujillo qualified for the $60,000 public campaign finance disbursement.
The New Mexicans for Money Out of Politics conference — free and open to the public, though preregistration is required — will also host the president of the Albuquerque Tea Party among other speakers, according to the group’s news release. The conference subject is “achieving a fair political system.”