By Adam Pagnucco.
County executive candidate Mithun Banerjee, who was not invited to attend the candidate forum sponsored by the Montgomery County Renters Alliance and Montgomery Community Media (MCM) last night, has filed a suit against the latter organizations in Montgomery County Circuit Court. Banerjee claims that he was unfairly excluded from the forum and that the renters alliance and MCM, both of which are 501(c)(3) nonprofits, violated their nonprofit status by doing so.
First, some background. Banerjee is a Silver Spring resident and businessman who filed for executive on May 23 and established a public financing committee to run for executive on June 6. He sent me a statement about his campaign which I published on June 16 and has set up a website laying out his platform. His opponents at this writing include fellow Silver Spring resident Celeste Aroha and Council Members Andrew Friedson, Evan Glass and Will Jawando.
All five candidates attended a September 19 forum sponsored by the Latino Democratic Club. However, according to Banerjee, he and Aroha were not invited to attend the forum sponsored by the renters alliance and MCM last night. Banerjee produced an email from renters alliance Executive Director Matt Losak to Friedson dated July 24 inviting him to the forum. He believes Jawando and Glass received invitations on the same date.
The invitation from Losak to Friedson’s campaign dated July 24.
Banerjee also produced an email from Losak to the county executive candidates dated October 4 stating:
Greetings, County Executive Candidates. In order to be eligible for the Renters Alliance candidates forum on Wednesday, candidates will need to demonstrate that they have achieved public financing status and/or $250,000 in campaign donations. If you have achieved either of these requirements, please let me know.
Note that these requirements were not cited in the July 24 email printed above.
Banerjee was unhappy about what he believed to be the vagueness of “achieved public financing status” and he asked Losak about that, producing an email chain that he included as an exhibit to his complaint. In response to Banerjee’s protests, Losak wrote to him, “Mr. Banerjee, our eligibility requirements are very simple and stated clearly. I am sorry you do not understand them.”
As of July 24, Banerjee, Glass and Jawando all had active public financing accounts. If the existence of an account was the invitation threshold, then all three would have been eligible for invitations. If the invitation threshold was certification for public matching funds, State Board of Elections records show that Jawando was certified for matching funds on September 8 and Glass was certified on September 30. So under that criterion, none of the three were eligible as of July 24. If the invitation threshold was $250,000 in campaign contributions, Friedson would have met that easily but Banerjee, Glass and Jawando would not have met it as of July 24 since they had not yet filed campaign finance reports.
Banerjee is suing the renters alliance and MCM for $870,170 in punitive damages (the maximum public matching funds distribution for county executive candidates allowed in the county’s public financing program) and he petitioned the circuit court for an emergency order requiring his attendance at the forum. Whatever the status of that petition, Banerjee was not included in the forum.
Banerjee also alleged that MCM and the renters alliance, both 501(c)(3) nonprofits, violated their tax status by excluding him from the forum. As I have noted in a previous post, the IRS states that “all section 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office.” Banerjee contends that excluding him from the forum constitutes illegal intervention against his candidacy.
In addition to MCM and the renters alliance as organizations, Banerjee has included the members of the renters alliance’s board as individual defendants.
I am asking MCM and the renters alliance for on-the-record comment about this suit. In the meantime, Banerjee’s complaint can be downloaded below.