While Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, constantly called for spending cuts to reduce the federal deficit, his campaign spent and borrowed heavily this year - increasing its already huge deficit.
Although he doesn't face election for five years, disclosure forms show his campaign spent $396,000 during the first six months of 1993 - more than what most full-fledged House campaigns cost. Meanwhile, Bennett raised only $136,000 in donations.To help make ends meet, Bennett has personally loaned his campaign $200,000 since his election this past November (that was three times more than his Senate salary of $66,822 for that half-year period.)
Those new loans were on top of $2.9 million the multimillionaire had already sunk personally into his 1992 campaign - including $1.7 million in nonrefundable donations and $1.2 million in still-outstanding loans.
Some expenses paid by his new deficit spending this year include:
- $4,900 for "senatorial pen sets." His press secretary, Mary Jane Collipriest, said they are "gifts to visiting dignitaries and other individuals. He does not believe the government should be expected to pay for this expense and has chosen to use campaign funds."
- $40,559 for six months' worth of airplane tickets (or nearly $1,700 a week), which Collipriestsaid were for Bennett and his staff for fund-raising and transition activities after his election. (Rep. Karen Shepherd, D-Utah, who also was newly elected and had to cover similar transition costs, spent $1,940 on such air fares in that time).
- $8,800 in hotel bills (including at the Waikiki Gateway in Hawaii and the elite Waldorf Astoria in New York), plus $6,563 for rental cars (or about $270 a week). Shepherd's campaign, by contrast, spent $1,604 on hotels and none on rental cars.
- $911 in penalties and interest to the Internal Revenue Service - and $506 in such penalties to the Utah Tax Commission - for underpaying the 1992 taxes for his campaign employees, giving Bennett sort of his own "Zoe Baird" problem. Collipriest said Bennett's own auditors discovered the underpayment and corrected it.
- $118 in parking tickets to Salt Lake City for campaign employees, but not for Bennett himself.
- $10,075 for campaign computers, programs and consultants.
- $20,766 in campaign office payroll for six months (not counting payments to consultants or the $27,352 in current and past-due employee taxes, penalties and interest).
- $47,055 to Michael Tullis, the campaign committee director, for consulting.
- $3,814 for three fund-raising dinners at posh Washington restaurants.
- $738 for new locks and a security system at his campaign office. That may not be too interesting, except Bennett is considered by many Watergate books to be the Washington Post's Deep Throat informant in that scandal - which began with a break-in at the offices of the Democratic National Committee.
With such spending, is Bennett asking the government to do as he says and not as he does when it comes to deficit cutting? Col-li-priest responds that the heavy spending was to pay off 1992 campaign bills, for transition before he took office (when he had to pay all his own bills) and for fund-raising.
Bennett has said he spent more than planned on his campaign last year - and is still paying it off - in part to respond by heavy spending by others in that campaign. For example, Republican candidate Joe Cannon still owes more than $6 million for his failed campaign.