A Democratic-linked political action committee is accusing three freshman House Republicans of violating federal campaign finance law.
New York Reps. Anthony D’Esposito, Nick LaLota, and Marc Molinaro "appear" to have unlawfully transferred $4,000 combined between their state and federal committees, according to the left-leaning advocacy group End Citizens United, which filed three separate complaints in mid-April against the congressmen and is calling on the Federal Election Commission to launch an investigation.
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"The law is intended to prevent corruption and undue influence over our leaders," Tiffany Muller, president of End Citizens United, said in a statement. "These aren’t one-off mistakes; they appear to be calculated moves."
D’Esposito, LaLota, and Molinaro assumed office in January. LaLota was a New York state Senate candidate in 2020 but ended up being ruled by New York's top court to be unable to run since he was also an elections commissioner in Suffolk County, Newsday reported. He won the 1st District congressional seat in 2022, to replace outgoing Rep. Lee Zeldin, who ran for governor.
D’Esposito, whose 2022 win was widely viewed as a major upset in a district that had not elected a Republican since 1995, was previously a councilman in Hempstead, New York. Molinaro was county executive of Dutchess County, New York, between 2012 and 2023, after serving in the county's legislature and the New York State Assembly.
In March 2022, LaLota's federal committee received $1,000 from the Suffolk County Republican Committee, earmarked "from [a] verified source," according to campaign finance disclosures. D’Esposito's federal committee pulled in $1,000 in March 2022 from Citizens for D’Esposito, his state committee, filings show. Similarly, Molinaro's federal committee received $2,000 combined from his state committee in 2021 and 2022, according to End Citizens United.
However, a candidate's nonfederal committee is "prohibited" from transferring "funds or assets" to his or her federal election committee, according to the FEC, which notes that direct contributions constitute a "transfer." End Citizens United alleges there is "irrefutable evidence" that the lawmakers ran afoul of this regulation.
"At no point has the D’Esposito campaign used funds in a manner inconsistent with campaign finance laws, and this complaint is nothing more than a blatantly misleading and baseless partisan attack," Matthew Capp, a spokesman for D’Esposito, told the Washington Examiner.
In its complaint against D’Esposito, End Citizens United cited a federal rule in connection to "excessive and impermissible in-kind contributions" to argue that D’Esposito's state campaign illegally used funds on print and advertising, rent, cellphones, volunteer expenses, and mail services in Washington, D.C. Further, the advocacy group cited his state campaign's payments for fundraising services to a vendor later paid by his federal campaign.
"Additionally, the state committee spent over $97,000 in connection with a golf fundraiser reported to have a speaker advocating for Mr. D’Esposito's election to U.S. Congress," the complaint read. "Despite spending thousands of dollars on these expenses from his state committee, Mr. D’Esposito was neither campaigning for, nor was he seeking ballot access for, any New York state or local office in the 2022 election cycle."
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The complaint added: "Thus, there is no logical reason that his state committee needed to make payments for a campaign office, print and online advertising, cell phones, printing, fundraising, or volunteer services. Rather it seems more likely that Mr. D’Esposito made these payments in connection with his federal campaign — his only active campaign at the time."
The Washington Examiner reached out to the LaLota and Molinaro campaigns for comment.