Murphy uses re-election fund to aid book sales

Stung my tumbling book sales, bad reviews and a lackluster marketing campaign by his publisher, U.S. Representative Patrick Murphy, D-PA, has turned to his re-election committee to help promote his controversial memoir, Taking the Hill, research by the Majority Accountability Project (majorityap.com) has found.

Murphy created the website murphytakingthehill.com to promote the book, and a search of the domain name’s registration records found it was his campaign committee that registered the site - listing his campaign office address, phone number and a paid staff member as the website’s contacts. A previous advisory opinion issued by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) indicates that action may violate federal campaign finance laws.

In 2006, then-U.S. Representative J.D. Hayworth, R-AZ, sought permission from the FEC to include a link to Amazon.com on his campaign website allowing visitors to purchase copies of his book, Whatever It Takes.

The FEC responded by noting that “under the (Federal Election Campaign) Act and Commission regulations…neither the candidate nor the candidate’s authorized committee may convert contributions accepted by the candidate to the personal use of the candidate.”

“The expenses associated with marketing a book that a commercial publisher has published and for which it pays royalties to the author are expenses that exist irrespective of the candidate’s election campaign or duties as a holder of Federal office,” they wrote. “Therefore, under 2 U.S.C. 439a(b)(2) and 11 CFR 113.2(e)(5), contributions accepted by a candidate may not be used to fulfill these expenses.”

The FEC did, however, allow Hayworth to include the Amazon.com link, further ruling that “the proposed use of the Committee’s website is limited to the addition of a de minimis amount of material to an otherwise substantial website.”

Unlike Hayworth, Murphy created a site solely for the promotion of his book, rather than adding a link to his existing campaign website.

BOOK CONTROVERSY
Murphy’s use of campaign resources to promote the book continues a pattern of questionable ethical and legal issues surrounding the freshman Democrat’s memoir. While House members are specifically forbidden from accepting advance royalties on books, Murphy received a $100,000 advance for his book just days before that ban took effect.

Extensive research by majorityap.com found that Murphy’s deal was brokered by a politically-connected literary agent, who once worked with Ari Emanuel, brother of former Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) chair Rahm Emanuel. At the time Murphy received his advance, House records showed the Pennsyvlania Democrat –whose election was a high priority for Emanuel and the DCCC – was as much as $765,000 in personal debt through outstanding credit cards, student loans, and two mortgages on his primary residence.

Murphy’s six-figure advance was more than what U.S. Senator John Kerry, D-MA, earned in actual sales on his Presidential-campaign year biography, A Call To Service. Studies by the New York Times, Associated Press and others found that most Congressional memoirs earn only a fraction of what Murphy was paid.

Murphy has been criticized at home for ethical questions surrounding the size and time of his advance, and the fact that questions have never been answered on when Holt Publishing agreed to publish his memoir, or how much the publishing house paid for rights to the book.

While the Bucks County Democrat was paid by his agent in December, 2006 (before taking office), Publishers Weekly didn’t announce the deal until May of the following year. That’s the same month Murphy first spoke publicly about his plans to author a memoir and the same month Murphy’s personal financial disclosures, showing the $100,000 advance, were to become public.

 

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