Story Photos
 Dino Rossi, left, talks to reporters as he stands next to former Republican Sen. Slade Gorton on Wednesday in Seattle. Ted S. Warren / The Associated Press
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Rossi gives deposition in fundraising lawsuit
Wednesday, October 29, 2008 11:44 PM PDT
By Gene Johnson
The Associated Press
Printable version
E-mail this articleSEATTLE — A clearly miffed Dino Rossi began the final week of his campaign for governor in his lawyer's office Wednesday, answering questions under oath for a lawsuit brought by supporters of his Democratic opponent, Gov. Chris Gregoire.
The Republican candidate once again denied allegations that he illegally helped coordinate the political fundraising of the Building Industry Association of Washington, his biggest third-party supporter. A transcript of the deposition was replete with tense exchanges and a reported stare-down.
"What's going on here is a farce," Rossi told the lawyers who were questioning him.
A King County Superior Court judge said Monday that the public interest demanded Rossi answer questions before Election Day about the lawsuit to give him a chance to confirm or dispel the allegations. The case was brought against the BIAW by two former Supreme Court justices, Faith Ireland and Robert Utter, both of whom have donated money to Gregoire.
The justices argue that if Rossi helped coordinate the BIAW's fundraising, the organization should be constrained by state limits on direct campaign contributions — $3,200 per election cycle — rather than the more than $6 million it has spent so far to back Rossi with independent expenditures.
Their claim centers on calls Rossi made to officers of a BIAW affiliate group, the Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish Counties, in spring 2007, at a time when that group was balking at contributing to the BIAW's war chest.
Rossi said that when he made the calls, he couldn't have been coordinating campaign fundraising because he was still months away from deciding whether to run again, after his 133-vote loss to Gregoire in 2004 in the closest gubernatorial election in U.S. history. Instead, he says, he was just trying to get the groups to work together because they had similar goals — supporting small businesses.
Mike Withey and Knoll Lowney, the justices' lawyers, argue that Rossi was in fact a candidate, because he consented to the BIAW raising money on his behalf. In June 2007, Rossi was the guest speaker at a BIAW board of directors meeting where the organization's president announced how much money had been raised for the governor's race — and that recent polling showed Gregoire leading Rossi 47 percent to 43 percent.
"The only person that can make me a candidate is me," Rossi responded.
The BIAW also says it did nothing wrong.
The deposition didn't shed much light beyond what each side has already argued, and was notable primarily for its sniping. At one point, Rossi's lawyer, Mike Patterson, accused Withey of trying to stare him down, and Withey threatened to call the judge over what he called "obstructive" delaying tactics by Patterson, who repeatedly objected to questions, sometimes saying they were outside the scope of the deposition, lacked foundation or were just "harassment."
At times Patterson talked about the "decorum" of the legal profession, but he also insulted Lowney, saying "I know you're not a trial lawyer." He suggested that a lack of experience was the reason Lowney found his objections frivolous.
For his part, Withey told Patterson during an off-the-record portion to "shut the f--- up" — a comment Patterson recounted as soon as the proceeding went back on the record. Withey later said he meant it in jest.
"This has been the most obstructive deposition I've ever participated in," Withey said, noting his 36 years as a lawyer. "It's made a mockery of the four hours that we've arranged for. We're going to move the court to impose sanctions on Mr. Patterson."
"I probably participated in more depositions than you ever thought of participating in and I've certainly tried more cases than you ever have, OK?" Patterson responded. "I'm not here to see lawyers that are being paid by Christine Gregoire use this (as a) political campaign and to ask questions that are geared to the press."
Withey and Lowney are Democrats, but they say they are not in fact being paid for their work on the case. They could seek to force the BIAW to pay their fees if they win.
"You can't just lie about things like that when you're a lawyer," Lowney said of Patterson's accusation that Gregoire is "directly or indirectly" paying him. "A deposition is a court proceeding."
There are clear connections between the lawsuit and Gregoire's political allies.
Fuse Washington, a nonprofit group acting as press agent for the plaintiffs, recently received a $35,000 political action committee donation from Evergreen Progress, the major pro-Gregoire independent spending group.
Evergreen Progress, in turn, is headed by a Gregoire donor, Rick Desimone, and bankrolled mostly by the national Democratic Governors Association and labor unions. The group has spent more than $6 million to support Gregoire and oppose Rossi.
After the deposition, Withey and Lowney said it gave them a fuller understanding of Rossi's connection to the BIAW's fundraising efforts. Rossi, however, called it a "joke."
"Unfortunately it was a joke that took a chunk out of my campaign," he said.
Related article:
Campaign finance suit a 'nuisance,' Rossi says during Longview stop
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