A conservative watchdog group is accusing Maryland Senate candidate Angela Alsobrooks, a Democrat, of unlawfully using state campaign funds to boost her federal bid.
Americans for Public Trust, a Virginia-based nonprofit organization, filed a complaint Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission against Alsobrooks, demanding the agency investigate the candidate’s finances. The FEC, Americans for Public Trust said, should look into whether Alsobrooks violated federal rules by spending roughly $18,000 on fundraising expenses from a state committee tied to her role as executive of Prince George’s County, Maryland, only after Alsobrooks became a U.S. Senate candidate in May 2023.
“It’s illegal for a candidate to use preexisting state campaign funds to jumpstart their race for federal office,” said Caitlin Sutherland, executive director of the watchdog group. “Publicly available information suggests this is precisely what Ms. Alsobrooks did, and a pattern of payments like this absolutely warrants an FEC investigation.”
The complaint comes on the heels of Alsobrooks taking down Rep. David Trone (D-MD) in the Senate primary by almost 63,000 votes. She will face off in the November general election against former GOP Gov. Larry Hogan.
The watchdog’s complaint zeroes in on $18,000 that Alsobrooks’s state campaign sent to Rice Consulting, a limited liability corporation that calls itself “Maryland’s top fundraising firm for Democrats and organizations.” The state campaign committee raised just $560 in 2023.
Meanwhile, in 2023, Alsobrooks attended or held a combined seven fundraisers for her Senate bid, the complaint said.
On June 22 of last year, Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser hosted a private Georgetown fundraiser for Alsobrooks that raised north of $100,000, the Washington City Paper reported. That same day, the state committee for Alsobrooks paid roughly $17,000 to Rice Consulting for fundraising expenses, financial disclosures showed.
“The only disbursements made by Ms. Alsobrooks’ committees during this period that could be construed or categorized as ‘fundraising expenses’ appear on Ms. Alsobrooks’ state-level campaign committee reports,” the complaint said. “In fact, a search of the FEC database indicates that Alsobrooks for Senate did not make a single disbursement for ‘fundraising’ until June 30, 2023, and only after hundreds of thousands of dollars had been raised in support of her U.S. Senate campaign.”
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In response to the complaint, Alsobrooks spokesman Connor Lounsbury denied that state campaign funds were used for the candidate’s Senate bid.
“This was money spent by Angela’s state committee as part of a regular cadence of payments to Rice, which has handled her county campaign fundraising, compliance, and consulting for years, for services rendered prior to her federal campaign launch and solely in connection with state campaign committee activity,” Lounsbury said to Politico.