Brandon Todd and Muriel Bowser campaigning for Todd’s 2015 special election. (Via Facebook)

First missing information about campaign contributors, and now a missing file … what exactly is going on with these headlines about Ward 4 Councilmember Brandon Todd? And what impact could it have on other members of the Green Team, the nickname for allies of Mayor Muriel Bowser?

Who’s Brandon Todd again?

He’s the Ward 4 councilmember, who first ascended to the dais in a special election in 2015. He was handpicked as a replacement by Muriel Bowser, whose seat was open after she became mayor. Todd had been working for Bowser when she was Ward 4 councilmember as her constituent services director and served as the finance director on her successful 2014 run for mayor.

During the 2015 special election, he got more than 40 percent of the vote versus his 14 opponents, with help from a Bowser endorsement and a big campaign chest. (We’ll come back to this election soon—it’s a big part of the brewing hooplah.)

Todd won his seat for a full term in 2016, the only Green Team member on the council to survive the June primaries. Still, his primary win over challenger Leon Andrews (who he also faced in the special election) wasn’t as decisive as one might expect, given his incumbency and fundraising advantage.

Now, he’s the chair of the Committee on Government Operations, which is largely tasked with overseeing the executive office of the mayor (not a bad place for the mayor to have an ally!)

The Audit

In early April, The Washington Post reported that an Office of Campaign Finance audit of Todd’s 2015 special election found some discrepancies.

The OCF investigation took a year and a half. Here are some of the key findings (you can read the report in full below):

• Todd’s campaign did not provide documents for more than $102,000 in reported campaign contributions—about a quarter of his total fundraising haul
• The campaign didn’t report $34,139 in contributions
• The campaign failed to report 19 expenditures totaling $30,123 and nine bank fees totaling $6,307
• The campaign continually missed OCF deadlines in responding to the audit, despite being granted multiple extensions

Appearing on The Kojo Nnamdi Show in mid-April, Todd repeatedly pledged that he would get to the bottom of the matter.

Can we chalk it up to a beginner’s screw-up? Not really. Todd’s campaign treasurer, Ben Soto, was no newbie—he was Bowser’s 2014 campaign treasurer, as well as the treasurer for the controversial FreshPAC, the since-shuttered pro-Bowser political action committee. Plus, Todd himself was Bowser’s finance director during her 2014 mayoral run.

Still, Todd told NBC Washington’s Tom Sherwood when news of the audit first broke that “we have begun to provide the Office of Campaign Finance with the documents they requested, and I am confident this will be resolved very quickly.” So far, that hasn’t been the case, though Todd said in a letter to constituents today that he’s submitted all of the required reports and has requested that OCF close the 2015 investigation.

Meanwhile, reporting from the Washington City Paper at the end of April uncovered another strange facet of the whole ordeal: no one seems to remember the details about the largest expenditure during the special election—to a New Jersey firm offering get-out-the-vote services.

The Plot Thickens

In statements, Todd and Soto make it sound like the whole thing is no big deal. But it’s not just the rushed 2015 special election in question.

As WAMU first reported, OCF is also looking into Todd’s 2016 reelection campaign. Turns out, there was some key information missing from those 2016 reelection reports to OCF, too. The Post says that a vast majority of the contributions listed in the report—nearly 1,200 of the 1,400—did not include the employer or work addresses of contributors.

How normal is this? Not very. The Post says that the five other councilmembers elected in 2016 combined omitted addresses for nine contributions. Oooof.

Plus, dozens of Todd’s contributions exceeded the $500 legal limit for individuals, per The Post’s review.

Now It Gets Really Weird

Turns out, one of the key documents at play in the audit into Todd’s campaign has vanished from the OCF offices, The Post reported on Thursday. Seriously. It’s gone.

OCF told The Post that this won’t affect the audit, because, after all, it’s 2017 and most of the information is backed up. But still, how weird is that?

So What Happens Next?

OCF’s lawyers have the power to fine Todd’s campaign, and are apparently considering doing so.

Also, D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine told City Paper that he’s considering his options, which could mean a probe into Todd or working with the U.S. District Attorney on a case.

Some are calling for the Judiciary Committee to look into the matter of the missing file, like D.C. political consultant Chuck Thies (Thies is a close ally of Vincent Gray, who Bowser defeated for mayor in 2014, and Thies has a serious grudge against Green Teamers.)

“The Committee has been following this situation closely in our oversight capacity of the Office on Campaign Finance,” says Ward 6’s Charles Allen, the chair of that committee. “I have asked the Committee to inquire into the timeline for OCF’s own audit and about their processes in place. We already have a Committee hearing scheduled on July 10 to cover several bills around campaign finance, and I fully expect these issues will be discussed.”

And, of course, this could have reverberations well beyond Todd.

First of all, some people—Todd’s election opponent Leon Andrews key among them—are wondering why this information didn’t come out during his 2016 campaign. The Post reports that a majority of the council supports a bill to prevent that lack of disclosure from happening again.

But what does this mean for Bowser’s reelection in 2018? Well, it’s unfurling at the same time as another controversy—that the former chancellor of D.C. Public Schools gave a mayoral appointee, and some other well-connected folks, special treatment in the school lottery. The mayor’s fingerprints aren’t directly on either of these situations, but it’s not a great look.

Office of Campaign Finance Audit of Brandon Todd by Rachel Kurzius on Scribd

Updated with comment from Charles Allen.