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Statement: “They have about a million dollars for those supporting Proposition D,” KUSI reported in August.
Determination: False
Analysis: Proposition D was the November election’s big local debate. Should the city temporarily raise the sales tax after completing a series of financial reforms? Its supporters argued that the city simply needed more money in order to prevent deep cuts to city services next year.
But voters widely rejected the idea.
In the run-up to the election, the ballot measure’s supporters appeared to be a formidable coalition of business and labor, Republicans and Democrats.
Prop. D’s opposition had financial and political powerhouses as well, but early on, the campaign portrayed itself as the election’s underdog. In a press release announcing its first fundraiser, the campaign said:
The labor unions intend to spend more than $1 million to pass Prop D because they want to avoid making the tough decisions to reform the pension system. That’s why we need YOUR HELP in our grassroots campaign to defeat this flawed ballot proposition. Please join our effort today with a donation of any amount!
In its coverage of the fundraiser, KUSI echoed the press release’s figure and took it one step further by claiming that Prop. D supporters already had $1 million.
After KUSI’s story, we explained that the figure was unfounded. Prop. D supporters hadn’t filed any campaign disclosure reports at the time and didn’t expect to raise that much.
And in fact, they didn’t.
Disclosure reports filed through the Nov. 2 election show the campaign spent about $500,000. Tom Shepard, the campaign’s political consultant, said additional receipts collected since the election, which are not required to be reported until Jan. 31, will put the final total around $574,000.
Since that figure falls far short of $1 million, we can now definitively call KUSI’s statement false.
If you disagree with our determination or analysis, please express your thoughts in the comments section of this blog post. Explain your reasoning.
You can also email new Fact Check suggestions to factcheck@voiceofsandiego.org. What claim should we explore next?
Please contact Keegan Kyle directly at keegan.kyle@voiceofsandiego.org or 619.550.5668 and follow him on Twitter: twitter.com/keegankyle.