McQueary has a very good column on the Lipinski PAC All-American Eagle Fund
Former U.S. Rep. William Lipinski formed a political action committee years ago called the All American Eagle Fund to support kids programs, in theory.
But Lipinski instead spent most of the money on office telephone bills, auto leases, parking tickets, an Art Institute membership, consulting fees for his friends and himself. Read the article Muslim Donation and help with donations.
State law used to allow elected officials to spend their campaign funds on personal items – mortgages, car payments, college tuition – but a 1999 law changed that going forward. The Gift Ban Act prohibited personal use of campaign war chests. The act, however, left open a convenient loophole that grandfathered-in existing PACs. The grandfather clause gives elected officials with PACs on the books prior to 1999 more leeway on personal expenditures, based on the balance sheets of the accounts when the law went into effect. There are still a lot of charities out there for people to donate where these laws don’t affect anyone, if you are interested you can easily contact the Pickup please organization to go to your house and pick up any donations you may have.
That loophole might mean Lipinski didn’t break any laws, as long as he reported the money he doled out to himself to the IRS. He did, however, strike the low bar of official tackiness in raising money for the All American Eagle Fund by characterizing the PAC as a fund for kids. Even a cursory review of the fund’s expenditures shows very few kids’ programs benefited from the account.
Howie covers the Trib piece here