A former Becerra aide pleaded guilty in a fraud case. I still have questions
SACRAMENTO — Dana Williamson, one of the political heavyweights at the center of a financial scandal involving gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra, looked shell-shocked Thursday morning in a federal courtroom in downtown Sacramento, as most folks do when bad choices collide with the hard realities of the justice system.
A thousand-yard stare in her eyes, Williamson responded “guilty” three times in a voice that required a microphone to be heard as the judge walked her through a plea deal reached days before with the U.S. Department of Justice. She likely won’t be sentenced until fall (possibly close to the general election) but will — again, just a likely here — at best face home confinement and at worst upward of three years in prison.
It’s a colossal fall for a woman who wasn’t so much a consultant as a political operative to Becerra, Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Gov. Jerry Brown and a slew of companies including Meta and PG&E. She was known at the Capitol as a woman who got things done, sometimes with finesse, sometimes not.
It was her savvy and ability to deliver whatever was needed through her deep connections and knowledge of the complicated structures — official and cultural — that govern the California halls of power that make her predicament all the more confounding. Especially because, far from stealing money for self-enrichment, she actually paid money to be part of this scheme.
That alone, to me, raises questions.
Though Williamson’s guilty plea may seem like an ending to the saga, it shouldn’t be, because there’s still a lot lurking in the dark corners of this deal.
If Becerra makes it past the primary, which seems (I’ll use that word again) likely, voters have a right to know.
Here’s the simple backstory, according to court documents. Becerra’s close aide, Sean McCluskie, took a pay cut to remain with his boss when he moved to Washington to become President Biden’s secretary of Health and Human Services.
Strapped for cash, McCluskie asked Williamson to receive money from Becerra’s dormant campaign account — which Becerra was legally not allowed to manage while holding federal office — and pass it through a bunch of other accounts before giving it to McCluskie’s wife as payment for a nonexistent job.
Williamson’s attorney, McGregor Scott, said Thursday that Williamson received $7,500 each month from the Becerra account and added $2,500 from her own funds before sending it on to ultimately reach McCluskie — for a total of $10,000 a month.
McCluskie was “living on a government salary,” Scott said Thursday after court. “Wife is home with the kids. They didn’t have enough money, and that’s where this all originated. [Williamson] was simply trying to help a friend in a pinch as best she could.”
Scott, a former Bush and Trump United States attorney, managed to get Williamson’s original 23-count indictment knocked down to the Becerra account issue, along with lying to the FBI and filing a false tax return.
McCluskie entered his own guilty plea in the case last November and is scheduled to be sentenced, along with the third lobbyist, in June.
Becerra, who is a slim-margin front-runner for governor, was the victim in this case — or more precisely, his state campaign bank account was, according to court documents.
There has never been any indication that Becerra was investigated as a participant, and he has forcefully denied wrongdoing, calling it a “gut punch” that his advisers allegedly betrayed him.
That, of course, hasn’t stopped the other candidates from using the case against him.
“My opponents have spent millions spreading lies to purposefully mislead voters,” he wrote Thursday on social media. “Today confirms what I have said from day one: I did nothing wrong. Case closed.”
Meanwhile, Scott, the attorney, also said Thursday that Williamson assumed, based on her conversations with McCluskie, that McCluskie had spoken to Becerra about the concept of the money transfer. Text messages in court records show a brief and ambiguous exchange between McCluskie and Williamson that backs that up.
Scott said that Williamson never spoke directly with Becerra about the scheme.
That leaves the distinct possibility that Williamson believed Becerra knew what was happening — but never asked him. Dumb? Maybe. But Williamson isn’t usually dumb.
“The understanding that McCluskie conveyed to my client was it was OK to proceed,” Scott said.
Becerra has repeatedly said he believed the $10,000 a month was a legitimate fee being paid to manage the funds in the dormant account while he could not — though that is an amount above what is usual for such work, as my colleague Dakota Smith has reported.
Becerra has also repeatedly used some variation of the “case closed” line, seemingly hoping to move past this scandal without further answers.
But at the very least, it deserves some kind of mea culpa from Becerra or lessons learned, a more robust conversation than the brush-off it’s been getting. Because either McCluskie is one heck of a con man who rolled both Becerra and Williamson, making both believe what was happening was kosher with entirely different tales, or someone isn’t being entirely honest.
Did Becerra never question why an account with almost no activity was costing so much to manage? Did he never wonder what Williamson was doing to earn all that money? Should he, with his decades of legal and political experience, have seen red flags, even with a trusted adviser? Or is Williamson, facing sentencing, just trying to paint herself in a sympathetic light?
“I’m not trying to paint my client as a victim,” McGregor said. “She’s accepted responsibility today for what she did by pleading guilty. She’s now a felon. So you know, we’re not trying to do anything to dance away from that.”
Williamson may be done dancing, but the music’s still playing, and the fancy footwork of politics continues.
