To vary that old TV shibboleth about the thrill of victory vs. the agony of defeat, sometimes there are a fair number of agonies associated with victory. As one example, many a victorious politician has had to grapple with resultant financial difficulties. Often enough, the pay the winner receives for his newly acquired public responsibility is less than the income source he left behind.
This is true, for example, in the case of newly installed DA Steve Mulroy, who upon assuming office basically had to take a pay cut from his former job as the Bredesen Professor of Law at the University of Memphis. And, like numerous other electoral winners, Mulroy finds himself saddled with a sizable campaign debt. Fundraisers during the course of a campaign are fundamental to the process of election. Equally commonplace these days is the post-election fundraiser designed to help retire the aforesaid campaign debt.
One was scheduled for Mulroy on Monday night of this week at the Tennessee Brewery by helpful angels Billy Orgel and Craig Weiss. And, as is typical when the beneficiary is a new office-holder, the number of good-willed benefactors can constitute something of a Who’s Who, political-wise. The co-hosts for the Mulroy affair included 9th District Congressman Steve Cohen, Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris, state Senator Raumesh Akbari, former Shelby County Mayor Bill Morris, the several Byrd brothers of longtime Democratic provenance and the Bank of Bartlett, and J.W. and Kathy Gibson.
• ’Tis the season for feasts aplenty, but for some in the political world, the menu is replete with humble pie and side dishes of crow. One such unfortunate is former state Senator Brian Kelsey, who, as was noted last week in the Flyer, had his law license suspended by the Tennessee Supreme Court as a consequence of his having pleaded guilty in November to two felony charges stemming from a campaign finance case. Further action on the law license could be forthcoming from the Tennessee Board of Professional Responsibility, the state’s formal disciplinary body for such matters.
After asking for and receiving several postponements of a pending trial, Kelsey had resolved upon a plea agreement in the wake of co-defendant Josh Smith’s entering a plea of guilty. The offense involved essentially a conspiracy to illegally recycle funds from the state senator’s state-government campaign fund into a fund to fuel a federal campaign — what turned out to be an unsuccessful race for the District 8 congressional seat in 2016. Both Smith and Kelsey face sentencing on June 9th. According to the Tennessee Journal, “Kelsey would face at least 18 to 24 months in prison under calculations included in the plea agreement. His penalties are enhanced because he was the ‘organizer, leader, manager, or supervisor’ of the criminal activity.”
Kelsey could be eligible for a reduction upon a proper assumption of responsibility for his actions. But prosecutors have indicated that if Kelsey is insufficiently contrite in his allocution and other conduct before he is sentenced, they would seek to tack on an additional nine months in prison.
Interestingly enough, the American Conservative Union, which was involved in the channeling of Kelsey’s campaign funds but was not itself subject to indictment, recently rated the Tennessee legislature as the second-most conservative in the nation and Kelsey, while still in office, as the third most conservative member of the state Senate.
• Karen Camper, an announced candidate for Memphis mayor in 2023, has evidently decided not to relinquish her duties as state House Democratic leader next year, having accepted a vote of reelection to that post from her Democratic caucus members.