.
Attorney
General Race Rife with Collusion
Charges
by
Ken Freed
Democrat
incumbent Ken Salazar and Republican
challenger Marti Allbright facing tough
allegations from Green candidate Sunny
Meynard.
.
Incumbent
Democratic Attorney General Ken Salazar
increasingly finds himself under attack by
Republican challenger Marti Allbright and
Green backrunner Alison "Sunny"
Maynard.
Salazar's standing
as a consumer advocate is disputed by the
Green Party's Sunny Maynard (rhymes with
yard), a natural resources attorney like
Allbright, but usually on the other side.
Maynard claims
Salazar did a "sweetheart deal" with Phil
Anschutz to settle Qwest's liability for
unfair consumer practices. She questioned
how a complaint filed with the district
court on August 15 producing a signed
consent decree on August 16.
"My past affiliation
with Phil Anschutz had nothing to do with
the terms of this settlement," Salazar
said, explaining the three-parts of the
agreement.
After more than a
year of investigation, Qwest agreed,
first, to pay a one million dollar damages
award to the state of Colorado. (The cost
of the investigation was not disclosed.)
Second, Qwest agreed to pay
"restitutionary awards" to its 1.8 million
Colorado consumers, provided they file a
complaint by December deadline. Third,
Qwest agreed to change its customer
pricing and billing practices.
"I'm not sure if the
total settlement will get into the
hundreds of millions," Salazar said, "but
it will be pretty big."
Maynard criticized
the small $ million fine, given the
offenses admitted, citing a similar $38
million fine in Florida, plus
restitution.
Salazar responded,
"Sunny Maynard has no clue what she is
talking about. If you compare our
settlement with Qwest to the ones in
Oregon and Washington, we got many times
more for consumers in Colorado than in
those other states."
Maynard responded,
"Why were there no criminal charges filed
against any Qwest executives?"
Her explanation is
simple. Qwest was represented in the
settlement by the Denver law firm of
Brownstein, Hyatt & Farber (formerly
& Strickland). Salazar's campaign
finance manager is Steve Farber. His
partners are major contributors to
Salazar's campaign.
Responded Salazar,
"My relationship with any of those people
had nothing at all to do with the
settlement. Our people behaved just as
they would with any other law
firm."
Maynard observed
that Marti Allbright is on leave of
absence as a senior attorney from
Brownstein, Hyatt & Farber, which she
had joined in 2000. "Whether the Democrat
or the Republican wins," she said, "guess
which prominent Colorado law firm will
still control the Attorney General's
office?"
Allbright said her
leave of absence had nothing to do with
Farber and others in the firm backing
Salazar, that her relations are good.
"Gail Norton is another Republican who's
on leave of absence from the firm, and her
relationship with them is very
good."
Interior Secretary
Gail Norton and a top aide on Sept. 17
were found guilty of four counts of civil
contempt for "fraud on the court" by a
federal judge who found they'd withhold
evidence in a dispute over trust accounts
held for Native Americans.
Maynard said she's
still waiting for anyone affiliated with
Brownstein, Hyatt and Farber to be
prosecuted by the Colorado Attorney
General's office, such as those liable for
the Summitville mine leaking cyanide into
the Animas River. "Seems like I'm the real
law and order candidate in this
race."
Salazar said
Maynard's litany is not his biggest
concern. "The most significant challenge
for me right now is the few multi-million
dollar friendships financing Marti
Allbright's campaign. We have more than
500 contributors helping us to put
together our campaign, but she has a
handful of donors like [Republican
chair] Bruce Benson making it their
business to defeat me. I suppose he's
concerned I may win and then decide to run
for some future political
office."
Allbright resisted
questions about her campaign finances.
Given a report of about $350,000 worth of
television time ordered for the last weeks
of the campaign, the source of funding not
yet named and the ad time not yet paid.
Asked twice, Allbright would only reply,
"My last filing with the Colorado
Secretary of State shows me at around
$100,000."
As for concerns
Salazar will run for higher office if
reelected, is he willing to sign a pledge
to fulfill his term, as Democratic
gubernatorial challenger Rollie Heath
keeps demanding from incumbent Governor
Bill Owens?
"I'm about 98
percent certain I would complete my next
term," he replied, "baring something
coming up with my family, so, yes, I would
sign a pledge on those terms."
(NOTE: Libertarian
AG candidate Dwight Harding was in Zion
National Park and unavailable when this
story was prepared.)
Originally
written in September 2002 for The
Colorado Statesman, but story was
killed by the publisher after the Salazar
and Allbright campaigns both objected to
being "cross examined"by me, asking the
questions raised by Meynard, who later
alleged the same happened at other
publications across the state where her
concerns were being treated credibly.
Please decided for yourself if there was
collusion between the campaigns.
(c) 2002-03 by Ken Freed
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