TN Gov. Bill Lee seeks ethics panel advice on travel payments
Following threats from Democrats of an ethics complaint over his travel to Florida paid by an outside group, Gov. Bill Lee is asking the Tennessee Ethics Commission to clarify whether accepting such payments is allowed under state law.
If the panel finds Lee’s travel payments were illegal or unethical, he is pledging to repay the funds, according to a letter sent by Chief Ethics Counsel Erin Merrick to ethics commissioners on Friday.
In July, Lee traveled to Marco Island, Florida, to be the keynote speaker at a conference of Alliance Defending Freedom, a group behind a handful of controversial new state laws. ADF, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, and its partner 501(c)4 organization both employ Matthew Lorimer, a registered lobbyist in Tennessee.
State ethics laws prohibit members of the executive branch from accepting gifts, including travel reimbursements, from lobbyists and their employers.
Expenses for the trip paid by Alliance Defending Freedom totaled about $1,900, according to the governor’s office.
Lee told reporters this week that he does not intend to repay the travel expenses paid by the outside group.
In response, the House Democratic Caucus has threatened to file an ethics complaint against Lee to force the governor to repay the funds.
In the letter sent Friday, Merrick asks the Ethics Commission for guidance on whether 501(c)3 organizations whose employees are registered lobbyists may pay for executive branch officials’ travel.
“Governor Lee is committed to ethics and transparency,” Merrick writes.
Lee’s trip was not announced publicly, nor was it documented on any of his social media accounts. The only mention of Lee’s travel to the ADF conference outside his office schedules obtained by The Tennessean through a records request is an expense noted on campaign finance disclosures.
“Should it become clear from the Commission’s guidance that the Governor did not comply with the ethics statutes despite his efforts and intention to do so, then Governor Lee will correct this mistake by paying back his expenses,” Merrick wrote.
Before the event, Lee’s team repeatedly confirmed Alliance Defending Freedom is “neither a lobbyist nor the employer of a lobbyist,” the letter states. The letter asserts that the group acted “with complete independence” from its advocacy arm in hosting the event, and that Lorimer “did not know of the Summit speakers until many months after invitations were extended and accepted.”
“Matt Lorimer is a registered Tennessee lobbyist on behalf of ADF Action. He is also an employee of Alliance Defending Freedom. Nevertheless, Alliance Defending Freedom is not an employer of a lobbyist for the purposes of Tennessee ethics law,” Merrick argues, citing state laws defining “employer of a lobbyist” as an employer who retains a lobbyist “to engage in lobbying on [their] behalf.”
The letter also asserts that Alliance Defending Freedom and ADF Action are “meaningfully different” in “all the ways that matter,” emphasizing different corporate structures, separate bank accounts and financial records, and different missions and bylaws.
ADF Action’s leadership team is made up entirely of ADF’s senior leadership, and the two entities share an address and employees, including Lorimer, according to tax filings.
“Neither the Governor nor his team received information before or since the event that causes us to believe that a lobbyist or an employer of a lobbyist indirectly paid the Governor’s expenses,” Merrick writes.
At the recommendation of the Ethics Commission, Lee’s team is also working to expand the ethics training required for all members of his cabinet.
Ethics Commissioners last week dismissed a complaint against Education Commissioner Lizzette Reynolds that alleged she had illegally accepted travel payments from a group that lobbies the legislature, finding that because she repaid the funds, there was no reason to take the case further.
Reynolds last year traveled to two out-of-state conferences hosted by ExcelinEd — her former employer and a national school choice advocacy group — with expenses paid by the organization. ExcelinEd, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, and its partner 501(c)4 organization, ExcelinEd Action, both employ Miranda Williams, who is registered as a lobbyist in Tennessee.
After The Tennessean first reported the travel, Rep. Caleb Hemmer, D-Nashville, filed an ethics complaint against Reynolds, alleging that in accepting the payments, she skirted ethics rules. Reynolds then paid back about $2,000 in travel expenses and was reimbursed by the state.
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