By David Farmer,Staff Writer

Despite claims to the contrary, there’s nothing ordinary about two $5,000 contributions made by the state Democratic Party to a Rhode Island U.S. Senate candidate.

Questions were raised earlier this week by reports from the Associated Press and Bangor Daily News reporting on questionable donations made by the Democratic parties in Hawaii, Massachusetts and Maine to the Senate campaign of Matt Brown in Rhode Island, who is running in the Democratic primary.

A review of Federal Election Commission and Maine campaign disclosure forms shows that the Maine Democratic Party seldom makes cash contributions to candidates seeking office.

Going back to 1998, commission forms show only one cash gift to a candidate, other than those made to Rhode Islander Brown on Dec. 31.

In 2000, the party contributed $2,500 to Mark Lawrence, who was running as a Democrat for the U.S. Senate from Maine.

While the party reported spending money while working with Lawrence, Rep. Michael Michaud and former Senate candidate Chellie Pingree, only Brown and Lawrence received cold, hard cash.

The Maine party donated $10,000 to Brown. About two weeks later, the Maine party received a $6,000 donation from Rhode Island businessman Richard Bready, who had already reached the legal contribution limit of $4,200 to Brown.

Bready made similar gifts to all three state parties after they donated to Brown. The gifts have been criticized as a way for Bready to avoid legal limitations on campaign spending by funneling money through other state parties.

According to Maine Democratic Party Chairman Pat Colwell, Brown’s campaign is returning the $10,000, and the state party is returning the $6,000 gift from Bready.

“Even though we have met the letter of the law and feel that we are in full compliance, we’re returning the contribution,” Colwell said Thursday.

When asked whether it was unusual for a state party to contribute to candidates in other states, Colwell said it was a fairly common practice.

Records indicate otherwise.

“It’s common,” Colwell said. “But in that time frame, Maine has been more a targeted state,” and it’s possible money was flowing in rather than out.

Colwell pointed out that the state’s Republican Party has made contributions to out-of-state candidates in the past, which is confirmed by Federal Election Commission reports. In 2002, the state GOP gave $5,000 each to four out-of-state candidates for the House of Representatives: Othell Maxie Burns in Georgia, Tom Cole in Oklahoma, Steve Pearce in New Mexico and Rick Renzi in Arizona. In 2001, the party gave $5,000 to Randy Forbes in Virginia. Most recently, the Maine Republican Party gave $500 to Sen. Rick Santorum in Pennsylvania.

To date, there have been no complaints about those contributions or any allegations of wrongdoing, said Julie Ann O’Brien, the executive director of the Maine Republican Party. O’Brien, who has only been in her current job for about a month, said she didn’t think it was common for state parties to give directly to out-of-state candidates.

Further, the questions raised about the Democratic contributions translates into more scrutiny by Republicans. “We’re looking into the ethics of it right now,” O’Brien said. “When something comes up like this on our side, we will look at it very closely. It doesn’t seem right to me.”

Colwell called the decision to get involved in Rhode Island politics a mistake, playing it off with a joke. “Frankly, the mistake I made was getting involved in the dog-eat-dog politics of Rhode Island.”

Colwell attributed the foray into foreign waters to a relationship with Rich Pelletier, who works for Brown’s campaign. Pelletier is the former executive director of the Maine state party.

“There is a relationship with Rich,” Colwell said. “He asked. I’m not sure if he leveled with us. I wasn’t aware that it was a primary. If I had known, I’m not sure we would have gotten involved.

“We made a mistake getting involved in Rhode Island politics,” Colwell said. “We’re fixing it.”