2015-05-22

Citizens Clean Elections Commission Requests Text Message Data for Investigation of Arizona Corporation Commissioner Bob Stump Checks and Balances Project has received a request from Arizona’s Citizens Clean Elections Commission for text message records that indicate that Commissioner Bob Stump of the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) may have assisted with dark money funding for two winning, pro-utility candidates in last August’s primary election.

Our original research that uncovered who Stump had been texting with in the weeks leading up to the primary election was derived from records provided by the ACC in response to our records request.

Electioneering of the type possibly indicated by Stump’s text logs may be illegal under Arizona law and could call into question Forese and Little’s elections. We have sent our data to the Elections Commission.

As detailed in our most recent post, Stump exchanged hundreds of texts with Scot Mussi of the Arizona Free Enterprise Club, Arizona Public Service executive Barbara Lockwood, and, among others, candidates Tom Forese and Doug Little, who won the primary and general elections against candidates that supported low-cost, consumer solar.

 

Scott Peterson is executive director of the Checks and Balances Project, a national watchdog that seeks to hold government officials, lobbyists and corporate management accountable to the public. Funding for C&BP comes from pro-clean energy philanthropies and donors.