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CONTACT: Evan Lips, communications director
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BOSTON — Massachusetts Republican Party Chairman Jim Lyons said today he believes the Democrats’ latest scheme to bar minority parties from having any say in campaign finance director appointments is just the latest move towards ensuring that Massachusetts remains a one-party state. 

“This proposal further proves that the Democrats are shameless and will stop at nothing to maintain their stranglehold on power in the commonwealth,” Lyons said. “This is an obvious power play to eliminate any say that the minority party has when it comes to selecting the next OCPF director.” 

Current state law mandates that the chairs of both political parties, in addition to the governor, the secretary of state, and the “dean of a law school located in the commonwealth, to be appointed by the governor,” have equal votes when it comes to appointing directors of the state Office of Campaign and Finance. Selections of directors must be unanimous.

The proposal, slated for a House vote later today, creates a new 5-member appointing commission comprised of the governor, secretary of state, attorney general, and two others who “shall be appointed by a majority vote of the governor, attorney general and the state secretary, one of whom shall be an elected municipal official and one of whom shall be an elected county official.”  

“Just this past spring we saw the current OCPF director ignore a hard deadline to enforce a campaign contribution law leveling the playing field between unions and business owners,” Lyons said. “The only remedy we had at our disposal to address that situation, had the delay persisted, was our appointing authority.

“If the Democrats succeed in ramming this scheme through, you can kiss that balance of powers goodbye.”