April 05, 2007 07:03 PM UTC

Robocall Scandal Compounded By Apparent Dishonesty

•  
• by: Colorado Pols

It’s almost always worse than the “crime,” after all, as the Rocky Mountain News reports:

E-mails contradict a lobbyist’s claim that his well-heeled organization had nothing to do with a deceptive phone-call campaign conducted in March.

The calls warned voters that a construction-defects bill in the legislature favored trial lawyers and would raise taxes.

The e-mails, obtained by the Rocky Mountain News, are between a Virginia company that produced the calls and William Mutch, lobbyist and director of Colorado Concern.

“Thank you for the call yesterday regarding the pending legislation that Colorado Concern may want to try and influence in Colorado,” the Virginia executive wrote to Mutch. Later e-mails include ideas for scripts for the calls. Mutch last week told the Rocky that Colorado Concern, a consortium of the state’s most powerful business leaders, had nothing to do with the calls. He said a developer who is chairman of the group was behind the calls, but was acting independently.

Mutch did not return calls or e-mails on Thursday.

Both Mutch and Steve Durham, lobbyist for the Colorado Association of Home Builders, have been named in an ethics complaint filed with legislative leaders over the calls.

In March, the calls went to senior citizens in certain Democratic districts. The seniors were told their local lawmaker supported a bill that would increase taxes. No such bill existed at the time. The bill eventually introduced, House Bill 1338, does not increase taxes.

Where before it just looked like garden-variety political hardball, lying about who is behind the calls stands to make many more people look bad — from Bill Mutch and Steve Durham to those who hire them.