Large GOP donor links future donations to Sviggum resignation

Dane Smith / Star Tribune

One of the Minnesota Republican Party's larger perennial donors is demanding the removal of House Speaker Steve Sviggum, saying that he failed to deliver enough tax cuts and compromised too readily with DFLers.

And if Sviggum doesn't go, Twin Cities entrepreneur MichaelWigley said in a series of e-mails to him and other Republicans recently, he "will not contribute another cent" to the House caucus and will try to persuade his friends to withhold cash also.

Though Sviggum retains the backing of the state Republican chairman, and none of his House colleagues has emerged to try to wrest the speaker's job from him, Wigley's barbs are not those of an isolated contributor.

Wigley is chairman of the Taxpayers League of Minnesota, an increasingly powerful interest group with a large mailing list. It fought aggressively this year for maximum tax cuts.

Wigley also is on the board of directors of the Center of the American Experiment, a self-described conservative think tank based in Minneapolis. And he is a member of the Freedom Club State PAC, a political action committee made up of wealthy Republicans donors.

Seldom so open

Big political contributors seldom are as open and specific as Wigley in linking their largesse to specific demands. He argues bluntly in his e-mails that he and other key business leaders helped find candidates and heavily financed the Republican takeover of the House in 1998 and that they expect results.

In his first e-mail to Sviggum about two weeks ago, Wigley cast himself as "a tireless worker on behalf of conservatives and conservative causes," and "one of the largest contributors to the House caucus."

He upbraids Sviggum for having "given away the store" to DFL Senate Majority Leader Roger Moe in legislative negotiations, for "demoralizing" the GOP caucus and for wasting "my and a lot of other people's money."

In a follow-up e-mail to other House Republicans, he says: "Last cycle, I estimate that the Freedom Club and its members contributed somewhere in the neighborhood of $500,000 to individual House candidates, the House caucus and independent expenditures. If Steve resigns, we have a chance to get some of that money back in the game. If he doesn't, most of it is gone."

Wigley personally has given more than $50,000 to Republican candidates, party units and PACs in recent years, according to federal and state finance reports.

Republican Party Chairman Ron Eibensteiner said that Wigley's threats are those of "a private citizen, who has a right to voice displeasure," and that Wigley's views don't carry official Republican Party endorsement.

The spat will blow over, and Republicans and their contributors will unite against DFLers, Eibensteiner predicted, "but I wouldn't take it lightly either. People are disappointed and it has to be resolved."

But Sviggum and his defenders sharply criticized Wigley's tactics, which they described as bordering on improper.

'A little bit appalling'

Sviggum said Thursday that he found Wigley's correspondence "a little bit appalling."

"It's the threat of money and connecting that to specific wants, desires and issues," Sviggum said, adding that he is not resigning and believes that there is no serious effort underway by more conservative members to dethrone him.

"If somebody were to give the caucus $5,000 and say I want this bill passed or I want this individual elected or I want this individual to be a chair, or whatever, I'd tear up the check and give it back to you," Sviggum said.

Wigley also sent e-mails to party delegates in Sviggum's home district, in an effort to deny him party endorsement. But Sviggum was endorsed by acclamation, and locals were mystified by the attack, Sviggum said.

"I like Mike," Sviggum said. He said he has tried to explain to Wigley that Republicans "have to govern" and could not shut down the legislative session with no action on the budget surplus. Compromise was necessary, he said.

Not nearly as charitable in assessing Wigley's advocacy was Rep. Gregory Davids, R-Preston, who has been at odds with Sviggum. The e-mails were "dishonorable and obscene," Davids said. "I've never had any contributor make that kind of threat. He's the kind of person who gives politics a bad name. He's mad because he can't buy us off, because we're not political whores. . . . The members are furious with this guy."

Wigley said that there is nothing wrong with his modus operandi and that he has had many encouraging responses to it, from House members, members of the Freedom Club and other partisan activists.

"I'm a flat-out candid guy. It's the way I run my life and the way I run my businesses," he said. "It takes money to run campaigns," he said, "and most people who spend money on campaigns, including those on the left, have specific agenda items that mean money in their pockets."

In contrast to them, Wigley said, his demand for Sviggum's removal had nothing to do with his own personal interests. The point is that Sviggum has "totally capitulated on the Republican message of less government and lower taxes."

Or as Wigley put it in one e-mail, his friends "know that I don't want anything from government except for it to get out of my way."

Eibensteiner also defended Wigley's tactic, comparing it to DFL interest-group pressure. "Mike is acting a little bit like labor unions," he said. "If they don't get their way, they withhold support [from DFLers]."

A few years ago, Eibensteiner noted, teachers' unions made no secret of their threat to withhold campaign money when DFLers, their usual allies, made a deal that provided tax breaks to private-school students.

Sviggum said that if he were challenged, no more than about 10 members would vote against him. But some members say the number of dissidents may be growing, especially in the wake of a chaotic, all-night final floor session and Sviggum's inability to eliminate the Profile of Learning graduation standard.

"I wouldn't criticize Mike Wigley for his point of view," said Rep. Sondra Erickson, R-Princeton, a first-term legislator who is also a member of the Taxpayers League. "This is maybe a wake-up call for us."

The flap over the Wigley e-mails might have the purpose of elevating attention to the role of "soft money" in political campaigns.

David Schultz, a professor in the Graduate School of Public Administration at Hamline University, released a report Thursday showing a dramatic increase in "soft money" contributions.

Soft money, which can be given in unlimited amounts by interest groups and wealthy individuals to legislative caucuses and political parties, has more than tripled since 1994, Schultz said, to about $21 million in 1999.

Much of the giving by Wigley and his allies, as well as by DFL interest groups, has been of the soft-money type.

"Soft money allows wealthy individuals and rich interests to give too much. . . . This money does not come without strings attached," Schultz said.