Overview
- Under a Sept. 10 agreement, Patrick McDermott must pay $7,500 personally by Oct. 1, his campaign will forfeit or pay $28,881 in installments, and he will forgive a $10,000 loan to his committee.
- OCPF determined $31,705 in spending since August 2022 primarily advanced McDermott’s personal business future, and it flagged campaign payments tied to a 2024 event for a nonprofit he founded as not permitted.
- Invoices for disputed costs were addressed to McDermott or his dissolved real estate entity, with vendors including 10X Stages, Power Professionals, Meetup Pro, and Mastermind.com for services like teleprompter software and media consulting.
- Regulators said the roughly $37,000 in unlawful spending equaled about one-third of the campaign’s outlays since August 2022, a period when the committee reported limited fundraising and about $1,500 cash on hand at the end of August.
- McDermott said the purchases were intended to modernize campaign operations and acknowledged dual-use concerns, and he has not been criminally charged as OCPF said it will not refer the matter to the Attorney General.