GOP leaders say Link broke Illinois election law

Turning a campaign issue into a legal one, Lake County Republican leaders have formally accused Democratic state Sen. Terry Link of breaking state election law by not properly completing financial disclosure paperwork.

In a complaint filed Wednesday with the Illinois State Board of Elections, county GOP chief Dan Venturi and Waukegan Township Republican Chairman David Pfeifer claim disclosure reports Link submitted earlier this year did not include payments to two campaign workers who have been charged with forging names on Link's candidate petitions.

Link, a four-term senator who also leads the county's Democratic organization, has denied wrongdoing in that matter.

The complaint also questions more than $87,000 in expenditures that are mentioned on financial reports Link filed this year and in 2007, but aren't itemized. State law requires payments of more than $150 to be itemized on the forms.

For the forms to be properly completed, Link would've had to pay hundreds of vendors less than $150 each, which the complaint called "an unlikely scenario."

Reached Thursday, Link said he was aware of the complaint but hadn't read it. He maintained he's followed the law and angrily lashed out at the Republicans for playing what he called "gutter politics."

"If these idiots want to keep (pursuing) this witch hunt, I'm going to file a libel suit against them," said Link, of Waukegan. "I'm done with the harassing and misleading the public."

Link is running for re-election in the 30th District, which includes much of eastern Lake County and a small portion of Cook County. His Nov. 4 opponent is Republican Keith Gray of Mettawa, a business owner who serves on the Rondout Elementary District 72 school board.

The fraud allegations mentioned in Venturi/Pfeifer complaint have dogged Link for nearly a year. Venturi and Gray repeatedly have jabbed at Link over the matter, as have local political pundits and bloggers.

Kenneth Davison, of Waukegan, and Jerry Knight, of Zion, pleaded not guilty to forgery and perjury charges stemming from the case.

They're accused of faking dozens of signatures on Link campaign petitions filed ahead of this past February's Democratic primary.

Questions about the disputed signatures surfaced late last year when a political foe unsuccessfully tried to knock Link off the ballot.

Link has not been charged. Authorities said he cooperated with the investigation.

The names of Davison and Knight don't appear on Link's 2008 financial disclosure reports, but Link has said they were among the people hired to gather signatures for his candidate petition.

According to this week's complaint, Pete Couvall, the former vice chairman of the county's Democratic Party, acknowledged Link paid him to help prepare the paperwork and that he, in turn, hired workers such as Davison and Knight.

Venturi and Pfeifer maintain Knight, Davison and other campaign workers paid by Couvall need to be identified on Link's forms.

Venturi suggested their absence from the forms might be a deliberate attempt by the Link campaign to hide the payments.

"I think Senator Link wanted to distance himself as much as possible from both of those guys," he said.

Link insists the law is on his side and said the elections board already has ruled he didn't have to specify the payments to Knight and Davison.

The payment to Couvall is well documented and sufficient, Link said.

Venturi and Pfeifer also questioned the nearly $47,000 in political expenditures Link didn't itemize on the semiannual disclosure form he filed this summer, and the roughly $40,000 in expenditures he didn't itemize in July 2007.

"It is possible (the expenses were properly recorded), but I don't think that it's likely," Venturi said.

Link said the non-itemized expenses included donations to churches, charities and Scouting organizations, as well as meals and other legitimate purchases.

"Do I have a lot of these? Most definitely I do," Link said. "I don't sit on my (campaign) money like everybody else does."

Link did itemize more than $61,000 in expenses on the semiannual expense report he filed this summer, and nearly $17,000 worth of expenses on the report filed a year earlier, records show.

The Venturi/Pfeifer complaint requests the board force Link to update his campaign disclosure forms to indicate the payments to Davison and Knight and itemize the expenses questioned by the GOP.

A hearing on the matter hasn't been scheduled, Venturi said.