Attacks in PA-6, some fact and some fiction, signal a heated race

The race between U.S. Rep. Jim Gerlach (R-West Pikeland) and Bob Roggio has turned nasty, with each campaign trying to paint the other as ethically suspect. Accusations have been leveled about both sides' finances, but no knockout blows have been landed.

In the process, a race that was supposed to be an afterthought during an election cycle filled with far more competitive Congressional battles has instead become one of the most heated campaigns in the state.

It started last month with the Gerlach campaign lodging a formal ethics complaint accusing Roggio of filing an incomplete and misleading federal financial disclosure form. That led the Roggio campaign to admit a minor error and amend the disclosure form to include income the candidate earned working for U.S. Sen. Bob Casey's 2006 campaign.

Things grew far more contentious when both the Gerlach campaign and the National Republican Congressional Committee started accusing the Democrat of having a "sweetheart deal" on his campaign office space in Malvern. In claiming that Roggio was paying below-market rent on the office space, the Gerlach campaign said it amounted to an illegal campaign contribution from the building owner, who is distantly connected to a neighbor and campaign contributor of Roggio's.

"There's been a deal cut," Gerlach political director Mark Campbell insisted in an interview last week. "There's a sweetheart scam going on here, and the fact is the Roggio campaign can't explain it. They can put up whatever smoke screen they like."

There is, however, no evidence to support the Gerlach campaign's assertion. Campbell had cited a brochure for the office complex advertising a rate of $22 per square foot, significantly more than the Roggio campaign has been paying. But Mitchell Reading, a broker for the building, said that rate was for "much higher-end" space on the third floor, as opposed to the first-floor offices occupied by the Roggio campaign, which he said goes for closer to the approximately $14 per square foot being paid by the campaign.

"It's definitely not a below-market rate," Reading told PolitickerPA.com.

Roggio campaign manager Liz Conroy has consistently accused the Gerlach campaign of playing "dirty politics."

"Jim Gerlach is trying to make this an issue to cover up the fact that he's the one with the real ethics problem," Conroy said. "He understands that this is going to be an election about ethics, and Bob Roggio is ready and willing to engage in that kind of a discussion because he knows he's going to win. They're pulling at strings to distract from his ethics record.

"[Gerlach] just doesn't want to talk about the issues," she added.

Part of that record the Roggio campaign has attacked was the record $120,000 federal fine levied on the Gerlach campaign last year for clerical errors made in reports following his re-election in 2004.

"Yes, Jim Gerlach made a clerical error in 2004," Campbell said. "We brought it to the FEC's attention. We dealt with it."

The Roggio campaign did err, however, in not accounting for deferred rent payments as debt in its recent July quarterly campaign finance report. Conroy described it as "compliance confusion" that would be corrected. Check invoices provided by the Roggio campaign show they have paid rent in full. The Gerlach campaign is not satisfied.

"We still contend that there's something fishy going on here," Campbell said.

Assessing how competitive the race will be is proving increasingly difficult. The race was expected to be an easy one for Gerlach, even in an increasingly Democratic 6th Congressional District where he has faced serious political challenges. Roggio is far less well-known than Gerlach's previous opponents, and internal poll numbers released by the Gerlach campaign continue to show him a lead of almost 30 points. Roggio's campaign dismisses those numbers, saying the flurry of attacks should signal a tightening race.

"When they start to get nervous, you'll see a lot of releases, they'll put out an internal poll that shows some insurmountable margin," Conroy said. "That's not what we're seeing. This race is getting closer."

The Gerlach campaign, for its part, continues to try and paint the Roggio campaign as ethically suspect, even incompetent.

"Maybe now, finally, the Roggio campaign will understand that sometimes when you file your FEC reports, mistake happens," Campbell said. "The bottom line is those who live in very small glass houses shouldn't throw stones."