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Colorado Springs Gazette: Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold sent $2.8 million in federal emergency COVID-19 mitigation funds — almost half of the CARES Act cash allocated to her office — to a politically well-connected, Washington D.C.-based public relations and lobbying firm to produce a set of TV ads to educate Colorado voters about the 2020 election procedures.
Attorney General Phil Weiser directed around $250,000 to no-bid contracts for a handful of his campaign contributors or their firms, from a pot of money controlled by his office that's intended to help protect consumers from fraud.
Both are examples of government spending that has little to no oversight, from what are called “custodial funds,” which end up with state agencies to spend, but which don’t come from the state legislature's general fund budgeting process.
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A spokesperson for Weiser confirmed that $262,000 in no-bid contracts went to firms headed by a handful of attorneys who made large campaign contributions to Weiser’s campaign.
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Griswold received millions of dollars in federal funds in 2020 as part of the CARES Act, aimed at mitigating negative effects on election participation caused by the global coronavirus pandemic.
Almost half of the $6.6 million spent by her office went to The Glover Parker Group, a Washington D.C.-based lobbying and PR firm, to produce TV ads to promote voting in the 2020 election. Although an initial no-bid contract was penned in August 2020 for $1.8 million, additions and changes to the contract over the next few months led to a total of $2.8 million directed to the firm.
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