Maine Republican Party officials said Friday that they will file a complaint with the Federal Election Commission alleging that Democratic U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree violated election law when she flew on her fiance’s private jet to a fundraiser in New York City.

Federal election law prohibits congressional candidates from traveling on non-commercial aircraft unless they fly on a plane owned by a family member. The law does not recognize a fianc?s a family member.

Pingree is running for a second term in Congress. Her spokesman, Willy Ritch, told The Portland Press Herald this week that none of the many flights she took on S. Donald Sussman’s jet was for campaign purposes.

GOP spokesman Lance Dutson said the complaint with the FEC will center on a trip that Pingree took from Portland to White Plains, N.Y. on Sept. 13, before an evening fundraiser in Manhattan. The plane left later that night for Washington, D.C.

“Chellie traveled with her partner Donald to New York on a day he had business there,” Ritch said in a statement issued Tuesday. “So he was traveling for business reasons and Chellie went along with him. Chellie also visited her son and drove to a campaign event in New York later in the day. The flight to New York was personal and no campaign or taxpayer funds were used to pay for it.”

The Maine Republican Party says its complaint will ask the FEC to levy a fine equal to the standard charter rate of the jet, as well as a punitive fine.

 

Copy the Story Link