The Carpionato Group contributed to the cost of a campaign mailer that supported Cranston Mayor Allan Fung and Rhode Island House Speaker Nicholas Mattiello in 2016.
The mailer was paid for by a group called Progress RI, which was chaired by Richard Ferruccio, the president of the Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers. The mailer identifies the “only donors” as Tasca Automotive Group, Carpionato Group and Cardi’s Furniture.
“This is further proof that Carpionato is very active politically in the City of Cranston, the same city where they developed Chapel View, and where they gave Allan Fung discounted and free rent for his campaign headquarters,” said John Marion, executive director of Common Cause of Rhode Island. (Marion spoke before WPRI-TV reported Wednesday that the Carpionato Group provided rent-free campaign headquarters in recent years to Cranston Democrats.)
While a campaign mailer that supports both a Republican mayor and a Democratic House speaker is somewhat unusual in Rhode Island, it’s noteworthy for other reasons, too.
Marion said the Progress RI mailer is an example of the type of increased campaign spending unleashed by the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision in 2010. Two years later, Common Cause pushed for a law requiring any group that spends more than $1,000 on independent expendtiures (with some exceptions) to report any donors who contribute more than $1,000.
Progress RI filed two reports with the Elections Board in 2016 about independent expenditures (here and here). At that time, Marion said, “Progress RI reported to the Board of Election that none of their donors gave more than $1000, and therefore were, if true, not reported to the Board. However, Progress RI did list the top three donors on the mailer, including Carpionato, even though under the law they were not required to.”
A Carpionato spokesman did not respond to a request for comment about the 2016 mailer.
After a WPRI-TV report raised questions about Fung’s tenancy at Carpionato’s Chapel View complex through three election cycles, Gov. Gina Raimondo, GOP gubernatorial candidate Patricia Morgan, and Common Cause filed complaints with the state Board of Elections, asking the BOE to investigate the matter.
Meanwhile, Ferruccio said he probably will not be repeating his leadership role with Progress RI in the 2018 election cycle. “It became more complicated than I thought,” he said, due to some of the nuances of the state’s campaign finance laws.
In 2014, the Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers was among the relatively few public sector unions that endorsed Raimondo for governor. Ferruccio said he expects RIBCO to endorse Raimondo for re-election in the next week or so.
