Election official hits Callaway with more fines

EDMONTON Alberta’s election commissioner has heaped more fines onto a one-time UCP leadership candidate, slapping Jeff Callaway with $70,000 in penalties.

The latest set of fines, highlighted in a cascade of grey on the commissioner’s website, brings the total penalties around Callaway’s campaign to more than $168,000.

Callaway’s heftiest fine is $15,000 for having “colluded with a third party, Robyn Lore, to circumvent a contribution limit.”

Next up is an $8,000 fine for accepting a $60,000 contribution that the election commissioner’s office says Callaway knew — or should have known — was from a prohibited person or entity.

He was also fined $5,000 for knowingly making a false statement on a leadership contestant financial statement filed with Alberta’s chief electoral officer.

Then there’s a slew of 21 fines of $2,000. Each of those are for giving cash to someone, then accepting donations to his campaign for the same amount from the same person, or from a person with the same last name.

Alberta laws prohibit third-party, union and corporate donations, which means you can only give your own money. You’re not allowed to take funds from a business or another person and donate on their behalf.

Three other people were also fined a total of $21,100 Wednesday in connection with Callaway’s campaign. Callaway could not be reached for comment Thursday.

The largest penalty went to Callaway’s campaign manager Randy Kerr, who was fined $10,000 for donating funds given to him by another person.

Jennifer Thompson was fined $5,850 for giving Callaway’s campaign $3,900 given to her by Energize Alberta Corp., and Darren Thompson was dinged $5,250 for donating $3,500 in cash given to

him by somebody else.

MORE TROUBLE

Callaway was at the centre of allegations he ran a so-called kamikaze campaign during the 2017 UCP leadership race.

The idea was Callaway would launch verbal attacks against Brian Jean — Jason Kenney’s major rival for the top UCP job — that the now-premier wouldn’t be able to say. He did so repeatedly during debates and media interviews.

Kenney said in March it was clear that’s what Callaway was doing, but denied any involvement in the plan despite repeated, high-level communication between his campaign and that of his rival.

Leaked emails showed regular communication between Matt Wolf (Kenney’s former deputy chief of staff, who was once behind the official Twitter account for Kenney’s office and a senior member of his leadership campaign staff) and Callaway’s campaign director Cameron Davies.

The emails showed months of communication between Wolf and Davies, including proofs of ads and memes, research, timelines of ad drops, strategy tips and talking points.

Davies has since been slapped with multiple fines by the election commissioner over his role in the Callaway campaign.