Prosecutors Protest Sweetser Ad Request

Sixteen Spokane County deputy prosecutors have criticized efforts to add their names to a forthcoming campaign advertisement supporting their boss, Jim Sweetser.

The prosecutors say they’ve been called at least once - and in some cases more than once - by people working to re-elect Sweetser to a second four-year term.

Most of the critics acknowledge supporting Steve Tucker, a former deputy challenging Sweetser for the $88,300-a-year job, in Tuesday’s election.

They say Sweetser’s efforts to get their endorsement amount to office blackmail.

“We’re fully able to make a campaign endorsement if we want to,” said one deputy, who asked not to be identified. “I don’t think it’s fair to be forced to take a public position in this race.”

On Thursday, Sweetser called the complaints an “11th-hour” tactic orchestrated by Tucker supporters.

Sweetser said he doesn’t care whether employees formally endorse him or not.

“It doesn’t make any difference to me,” he said. “People have their individual decisions, and I respect that.”

The complaints come during last-minute efforts by Sweetser to convince voters he’s not an office bully who has driven away talented attorneys, as Tucker claims.

About 40 attorneys in the prosecutor’s office are listed in a newspaper advertisement being prepared by the Sweetser campaign.

The prosecutor’s office employs about 65 attorneys.

Twelve deputies angered by the requests for endorsement talked with a reporter on the condition their names would not be used. Four more said they felt disturbed at being approached by campaign volunteers, but declined further comment.

Some said they felt their jobs were at risk or that they faced reprisals if Sweetser discovers they talked with The Spokesman-Review.

Most of the attorneys were contacted by phone by Tim Durkin, a deputy in the office’s civil division.

Durkin said he volunteered to make the calls because he felt the public needs to know that most of the office’s attorneys support Sweetser.

“All the press reports made it seem like this office is full of people unhappy about working for Jim Sweetser. That’s absolutely not true,” Durkin said.

The advertisement should appear within a few days, Sweetser said.

Deputy Prosecutor Ed Hay, one of those endorsing Sweetser, said he had no problem with being approached by Durkin.

“I can understand the perception of some that the request is invasive. However, these are professional attorneys who should show some moxie. They should say ‘no’ and expect that their answer will be accepted,” Hay said.

Several deputies said they dodged the question by insisting that they strictly avoid taking sides in political races.

Durkin said another eight attorneys would have added their names to the endorsement ad except they worried that they’d face retribution if Tucker is elected.

One deputy whose name is on the list of Sweetser supporters said she felt intimidated by Durkin.

“It wasn’t ‘Will you support Jim?’ It was ‘Jim Sweetser wants to know if you support him, yes or no,”’ she said, also asking not to be identified.

“There was no middle ground given to me.”

Countered Durkin: “That’s absolutely not true … None of the deputies were in any way intimidated or harassed.”

The female prosecutor said people in the office fear an indirect form of retaliation if Sweetser regards them as disloyal. “You find yourself in a job where conditions become so intolerable that your best choice is to leave,” she said.

Durkin said those concerns are exaggerations or a failure to understand that state law prohibits penalizing workers for not assisting a candidate for public office.

Sweetser said he finds nothing wrong with campaign volunteers asking employees if their names can be used in an advertisement.

“If you don’t ask, how can you produce something like this?” he asked.

Tucker, a Republican, has made office morale a key campaign issue.

“If elected, I just hope in four years I don’t have to go out to my employees and ask for their endorsement,” Tucker said.

“For the boss to do that to employees amounts to professional intimidation,” he said.

Tucker said deputies four years ago didn’t need to be cajoled into supporting Sweetser. When several ads appeared backing Sweetser against opponent Steve Matthews, deputies gave their names to those ads freely, he said.

Sweetser said the two campaigns are different. The support he got from deputies four years ago was directly triggered by a reprimand he received by former Prosecutor Don Brockett weeks before the election, he said.

Now that he’s in charge of the office, he’s no longer in a “peer-to-peer” relationship with the other deputies, he said.