What was expected to be a quiet battle in the Delaware gubernatorial race has turned into a fierce contest ahead of next week’s primary election, with the leading candidate embroiled in allegations of campaign finance misuse.
SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
A seemingly quiet race for Delaware governor has turned into a fierce battle ahead of Tuesday’s primary, with the leading candidates embroiled in allegations of campaign finance misuse. Delaware Public Media’s Sarah Petrowicz reports the race has spiraled into one of fraud and outside influence.
Sarah Petrowitch: Delaware’s Democratic Lt. Governor Bethany Halllong is considered a leading candidate to succeed term-limited Gov. John Carney and quickly garnered the governor’s endorsement when she announced her candidacy last year.
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JOHN CARNEY: I know Bethany Hall Long better than anyone, and she is remarkably well-prepared to be the next governor of Delaware.
Petrowicz: She served as a council member for nearly 20 years and was Carney’s No. 2 since 2017. But just two weeks into her campaign, staffers began raising questions about her financial reports. They found that more than $200,000 in campaign funds had been paid to Hall-Long’s husband, who was her campaign treasurer at the time, between 2016 and 2022. She said the money was loan repayments.
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BETHANY HALLLONG: If there’s inaccuracies, misinformation, mistakes, they will be corrected. That’s where we are. We’re working to make sure that we get those corrected. But at the end of the day, I want to be very clear that we’re confident. We’ve loaned more money to this campaign than has ever been paid back.
PETROWITCH: But the Delaware Department of Elections said the couple paid themselves more than $30,000 more than they should have received. Delaware’s Democratic Attorney General, Kathy Jennings, agreed with the department’s decision not to prosecute, saying the state’s campaign finance laws are too narrow to prosecute.
Kathy Jennings: The analysis that the elections department did was accurate, and it’s very hard to prove.
Petrovich: The uncertainty surrounding her campaign has opened the door for Democratic candidate Matt Meyer, a lawyer and former teacher who has led New Castle County, where Wilmington is located, since 2017.
Matt Meyer: I’m astounded by the level of corruption of my opponents, and it reminds me of why I got into politics in the first place.
Petrowich: He describes Hall Long as a symbol of the Delaware way of doing things — a political tradition that relies on personal relationships — and an outsider to longstanding practices. He says Meyer’s conduct is far worse than reporting errors and that she has benefited from out-of-state money and big corporate donations.
Hall-Long: Dark money is trying to buy this Governor’s office. Delaware is not for sale.
Petrovich: Two PACs have spent a combined $2.4 million this year attacking Hall-Long or supporting Meyer, but Meyer has said she wants no association with those groups.
Meyer: There’s more outside money being poured into this race than Delaware has ever seen, and that’s wrong.
Petrowich: University of Delaware professor Paul Brewer says getting campaign messages to Delaware voters in the first place is a challenge, making it hard for candidates to differentiate themselves in the primary.
Paul Brewer: So they tend to campaign on the basis of their background, their experience, their personal stories, or, as in this case, potential scandals.
Petrowich: Colin O’Mara, the current CEO of the National Wildlife Federation, is the third Democrat running in the race and says he’s running to address Delaware’s low literacy rates, high health care and housing costs, and vulnerability to climate change.
COLIN O’MARA: But what I realized is that this race wasn’t really about that. This race was about negative attacks, about big dark money. It was about every issue except the issues that need to be solved in this state.
PETROWITCH: Polls are scarce, but internal surveys have shown the race has tightened in recent months. There are three candidates running in the Republican primary, but Delaware hasn’t had a Republican governor since 1993. I’m Sarah Petrowitch, NPR News, Dover.
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