Big Contributions to Putnam Democrats Irk Republicans

A measure of how much pundits think the New York State Senate could shift Democratic after next week’s election is the emotion swirling around a pair of donations to the Putnam County Democratic Committee.

The story’s been featured in the Daily News twice, covered by The Journal News’ Politics on Hudson blog, and explained by the Mahopac News.

The contributions are legal, the State Board of Elections told the Mahopac News. It’s apparently one of the many loopholes that make campaign finance reformers tear their hair. There are no limits on contributions to party committees, and no limits on what party committees can give candidates.

The money went to Justin Wagner’s and Terry Gipson’s campaigns.

The former is vying with Terrence Murphy for Greg Ball’s seat in the 40th Senate District. The latter, the incumbent in the 41st District, is being challenged by Sue Serino.

The donations came from outside the county. Donors included four New York political action committees, unions, a Texas businessman and John Catsimatidis,who ran against Bill de Blasio for New York City Mayor in 2013 and told the Daily News that he made the $50,000 contribution to the Putnam Democratic Committee at de Blasio’s request. The Daily News also reported that a real estate developer the paper did not name donated but was “uncomfortable” about it.

Both sides weighed in on the controversy.

Serino, a Republican, is calling for a federal investigation.

The Murphy campaign characterized them as ”money laundering, pay to play and shaking down permit applicants to funnel money to Justin Wagner.”

Gipson told The Journal News the fervor “is just another attempt to distract from the fact that Sue Serino’s campaign is being propped up by wealthy New York City landlords and private New York City charter schools.”

Putnam County Democratic Chairman Ken Harper told YourMahopac.com, “We have competitive races this cycle in our county and we are working within the rules of the elections law to support candidates and win a Democratic State Senate majority.”