Local Government TV

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Political Consultant Tom Severson: Sleaze Exposed by Unlikely Source

Earlier today, I told you about the the unemployment compensation claim against political consultant Tom Severson. He lost, and here are the "Findings of Fact" made about a year ago by the Unemployment Compensation Board of Review. It casts a glaring spotlight on the dark world inside the largest political consulting firm in Penssylvania.

FINDINGS OF FACT:

1. Claimant was last employed as director of operations for Precision Marketing, Inc. from August of 1998. Claimant's last day of work was October 18, 2006. Claimant was last salaried at $875 per week;

2. The employer operates a political consulting firm, which, among other services, helps plan and implement campaign strategies for political candidates throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and conducts voter demographic and preference surveys.

3. Claimant quit the employment after an incident occurring on his last day, while the owner/president, and several coworkers were conversing over lunch in the company's break room.

4. The owner was discussing politics, and declaring that he planned to "kill" his political enemies. The employer further added that one day he would "stab these people."

5. Claimant was, however, upset by these remarks, and stated to the employer "you better be careful who you pull a knife on."

6. The employer then responded to claimant that "one day I'll sneak up behind you and stab you."

7. The claimant was threatened by the employer.

8. Claimant departed the lunchroom, and several minutes later, had collected his belongings and threw his keys on the lunch table in the presence of the entire company declaring "I don't work for assholes".

9. The employer responded with "f__k you", and claimant departed.

10. In September of 2005, the company vice president was eating in the lunchroom and the president opened a knife and lunged within an inch of the vice president's neck.

11. About 5 years earlier, the president discovered that an employee of another employer that was assigned to one of the campaigns that the employer was working on had destroyed voter registration forms.

12. The present[president] brandished one of his knifes at the offender and directed him to leave the office and never return.

13. In May of 2005, the president compared the claimant's homes, cars and wives with the claimant. The employer then told the claimant f—k you, your wife, daughter, son and entire family.

14. The president would give gifts of knives to employees for their protection.

15. In one incident, about two years earlier, in an attempt to avoid it being publicly known that the employer also occasionally represented local Democratic candidates (the employer primarily works on behalf of Republic[Republican] Party interests), the employer suggested that claimant sign his name to a bulk mailing permit to be taken out by a tenant/neighboring business on the employer's premises, with whom the employer contracts a good deal of printing work.

16. Claimant, believing-that such signature was unlawful or unethical, refused to comply but was not disciplined or threatened with discipline although he was addressed with profane language.

17. The claimant quit his employment because he feared for his safety and he could not complain to anyone in authority as there was no one above the owner/president.

18. Claimant was subsequently employed in a temporary position by [redacted], but did not earn a sum equaling or exceeding six times his weekly benefit rate ($2,982) in that later employment.

17 comments:

  1. Talk about dumping!
    mean = mean / v

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  2. Next question is, what exact tipping point is there that R's turned against severson? They were more than willing to lie down with this wolf when he worked only for them. Is the Morganelli connection the tip of it? Politics makes strange bedfellows!

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  3. Chris,

    All along, there have been Rs who have publicly condemned Severson's sleaze tactics. These include GOP chairs like Charlie Roberts and Larry Kisslinger. They include Judge Giordano (before he was on the bench) and former county councilman Jim Hemstreet. These condemnations were in some cases made before Severson started working for Morganelli.

    The truth is that he was spawned by the Republicans, but when he got dirty, many of them publicly condemned him. He does still get a lot of work from the state committee, and ironically worked a campaign that tried to defeat the Secretary or assistant secretary of that group, Peg Ferraro.

    Some Rs are still willing to lie down with this consultant, and so are some Dems. This really isn;t about either political party, but is instead about the dark world of political consulting.

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  4. Is it true the State Republican Party still owes Severenson? They are not condemning him as you locals are. And is it true Judge Giordano is condemning him also? I really think you are broad brushing thru innuendo and supposition this situation. Get the real facts, not just hearsay.

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  5. Bernie, what Rs are using, or have recently used him? You may have addressed this, and if so, I beg your pardon - (and a link?).

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  6. Angler,

    1) Severson has ties to the Republican state committee and to senate Rs. I believe he may have lost his contract, at least briefly, with the state house Rs. State Rs, to my knowledge, are not condemning or praising Severson. Most of this never hits the MSM. It is only in the last election cycle that both local papers began to pay attention to the sleaze.

    2) I have a quote from Judge Giordano, before he was a judge, that ran in the papers in 1994. "I never heard anything good about the guy. ... It's sleazeball politics, and he's the leader of the pack." So what I say is true.

    3) Last week (11/26) I posted a great deal of the facts about this sleazeball. I've got them, with all kinds of nice links and everything. Here, I have a verbatim transcript as well as the findings of fact by a judicial body. I don't know what planet you're from, but that's not hearsay here on earth.

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  7. Severson is and always was sleaze! I was rhe first one to expose his sleazeball antics! others learned later that I was correct! How he continues with his sleaze, I'll never know? larry@kisslinger.com

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  8. Anon 6:00,

    In the LV's state house and senate races last year, the Rs who used him were Pat Browne and Doug Reichley. There is no indication that Beyer, Mantz, Dally or Wonderling used him.

    But, Severson has earned $10.3 MM from candidates seeking office since 2000, and most of this is R money.

    Locally, I know Severson was behind a last-minute negative (but truthful) mailer about Jeff Warren, presumably paid for by the Easton Republican committee. He worked Schimmel's contoller race. In LC, he worked for R defenders of Lower Macungie's status quo, and that campaign was a mess.

    Severson has also worked for a bunch of Dems, including state senator Lisa Boscola. That's right. In the last election, he worked hard to get one Dem elected to the state senate and another bounced.

    He has worked for Rybak in the smear campaign against Joe Brennan. He's also recently worked for Judge Roscioli, Judge Panella, Judge Baratta, DA Morganelli, Tony Branco, John Maher and Lamont McClure.

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  9. Bernie O'Hare said...
    Locally, I know Severson was behind a last-minute negative (but truthful) mailer about Jeff Warren, presumably paid for by the Easton Republican committee.
    Does this mean it was okay that the negative (but truthful) mailers were okay about Angle and Ferraro that you have ranted about? Does this mean it's okay for you to go both ways, and no one else can have an opinion that differs from yours? What does this mean Bernie?

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  10. He also did Julie Harhart's campaign including over 5K for "outreach" during the last 3 weeks of the campaign.

    But it gets worse... most of his work is listed for the Republican State Committee - what R's do is have the State Committee do all their mailings because it's cheaper (the state committee gets a special rate)

    Just go to the PA DOS site and do an expenditure search on Precision Marketing - then add up the numbers - it's pretty incredible - I can't believe he only paid his Operations Director 45K.

    see

    http://www.campaignfinance.state.pa.us/ExpenseSearchResults.aspx?RequestID=12871&SortOrder=0&StartRow=1&RowsPerPage=171

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  11. How about Julie "How do should I vote Craig" Harhart and Pat "left my wife for my driver" Browne? You forgot those two Republican sleaze bags.

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  12. I forgot Harhart, but Demothug thankfully picked up on it.

    I did not forget Browne and mentioned his name as among those who use Severson.

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  13. Angler,

    The negative campaign against Angle was untruthful and played on half-truths. In addition, there were the anonymous robocalls. Finally, the funding for those hatchet jobs was under the radar. It will not appear on campaign finance reports. i already have several of them and know that what was spent has not been reported.

    It's not my opinion that matters. You can explain it to the AG because that's where all of this is going. It's time that a prosecutor takes a cold hard look at the state's biggest policitcal consultant.

    But you'll forgive all his sins because he's working on your team for one election? How incredibly naive you must be.

    Incidentally, I have a letter that Joe Long sent to a lady denying that Dems were using Severson. He also publicly denied it to the media.

    Guess what? The finances tell a different story.

    Oopsie.

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  14. Bernie O'Hare said...
    "Incidentally, I have a letter that Joe Long sent to a lady denying that Dems were using Severson. He also publicly denied it to the media."
    I don't think Long would lie about that, and I doubt that you have a letter stating that. Mr. Long has always been open and truthful in my work with him.

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  15. "Mr. Long has always been open and truthful in my work with him."

    Really? Ask Mr. Long about the letter he sent to the lady in Washington Tp. in which he denied that local Dems were using Severson. It's the letter in which he started off by telling the lady he responded even though she said he would not.

    And what about his public statements to the press? Let's look at Joe Long's ridiculous denial that his local party was doing the negative mailers when the mailers themselves say they were paid for by the Democratic party. Come on! Look at denials made on November 1, and to the press.

    Ask a few other Dems aboiut how "open" and "honest" Long has been with them. He scheduled his own frickin' election before committeeman had even beenm notified they were elected.

    I heard he's stepping down. Maybe the Rs can prevail on him to stay on just two more years. By then the Rs will make a complete sweep in NC.

    Severson can't be justified, whether it's an R or a Dem who uses him. His smear tactics are anti-Democratic. But Long and the machine ran to him. They should all be ashamed, and so should you.

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