Conn. judge: Public campaign grants can pay for child care

A Connecticut judge has ruled that candidates for elected office can use public campaign funding to pay for child care while they’re campaigning, clearing the way for more parents to run for office in the state.

The plaintiff, Caitlin Clarkson Pereira, a Fairfield mother, ran for state representative in 2018. The state agency that oversees campaign finance laws rebuked her attempt to use public election grants to cover child care. The grants can be used to pay for travel and other expenses produced by a campaign.

“I am elated that the court ruled in our favor,” Clarkson Pereira said after the Thursday ruling from

Superior Court Judge John L. Cordani. “We have gone multiple election cycles without knowing the final verdict, keeping countless candidates from entering races

because the expense of child care would be such a burden.

“I have always been confident this was the answer we should have received from the beginning, and it’s past time Connecticut officially joins all the other states that allow such an expense.”

In August 2018, Clarkson Pereira, a Democrat, filed Connecticut’s first formal request to use a public campaign grant to pay for election-related child care. She was the mother of a 3-year-old, trying to balance parenting and her first run for elected office.

The State Elections Enforcement Commission denied Clarkson Pereira’s request, but she continued to fight. She sought a declaratory ruling from the elections body. In April 2019, the commission ruled public campaign funds from the Citizens’ Election Program cannot be used to pay a babysitter while a candidate is on the hustings.

A month later, Clarkson Pereira sought to overturn that ruling by filing a complaint in state Superior Court in Bridgeport.

Cordani decided “campaign funds may generally be spent to pay for child care costs incurred by a candidate as a result of campaigning as long as such payments are a direct result of campaign activity, reasonable and customary for the services rendered and properly documented by the campaign.”

The State Elections Enforcement Commission “struggled over” whether campaign funds should be permitted to cover child care expenses, said Michael J. Brandi, SEEC’s executive director and general counsel, on Friday.

“The Commission respects the court’s decision and has tried very hard not to overstep its regulatory role, which is why we’ve proposed legislation to clarify precisely this area of the law,” Brandi said. “Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, the legislative measures didn’t move forward this year.”

Cordani found child care was a necessary campaign expense for others covered by the public election grants.

“Allowing reimbursement of child care expenses that arise solely as a result of the campaign and would not have existed absent the campaign serves the public policy embedded in the foregoing statutes of encouraging all types of people, including those with small children, to run for public office to ensure that all segments of our population are represented

in our government,” Cordani wrote. “Similarly, it ensures that candidates with small children can play on an even playing field in the campaign as compared to candidates without small children.”

Clarkson Pereira was supported in her pursuit to change the ruling by the Federal Election Commission chair, Ellen L. Weintraub, and several state lawmakers and officials.

Weintraub said Friday the ruling was “some real progress that will make it easier for parents — and especially (let’s face it) moms — to run for office.”

Clarkson Pereira’s attorney, Alexander Taubes, of New Haven, who took the case pro-bono, said “The court’s ruling will benefit the entire state of Connecticut and candidates struggling for fairness nationwide.”

The commission already allowed candidates financing their campaigns through privately raised funds to use those monies to cover child care.

The Federal Election Commission allows Congressional candidates to use campaign funds to pay for child care. States including Wisconsin, Minnesota, Texas, Alabama and Arkansas also permit campaign funds to be spent on child care.

Brian A. Pounds / Hearst Connecticut Media file photo Rich Jacobs, of Fairfield, is handed campaign literature by Parker Pereira, then 3, daughter of 2018 candidate Caitlin Clarkson Pereira, during an afternoon of campaigning. In 2018, Clarkson Pereira was barred from using public election grants to pay for child care.