Lawmaker Mia Bonta should not oversee the budget for the CA attorney general — her husband | Opinion

California Assemblymember Mia Bonta will now help determine the budget for California Attorney General Rob Bonta. If that sounds suspicious to you, then you’re in good company.

Let us explain: Rob Bonta is California’s attorney general. His wife Mia Bonta is an Assemblymember representing Oakland and other parts of the East Bay. Both are Democrats and leading voices in their party.

Mia Bonta has been appointed by Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon to chair a budget subcommittee that has responsibility for public safety agencies. Included in that mix is the California Attorney General’s Office.

While Rob Bonta was an Assemblymember, he made donations to his wife’s foundation that, while not illegal, raised ethical questions. Now Mia Bonta is the one skirting to the edge of proper, ethical practice.

Sacramento’s NBC affiliate KCRA broke the news about Mia Bonta’s appointment and Rendon’s defense of it. The Assembly speaker said he sees no issue.

“I believe Ms. Bonta will continue to be independent and unbiased in her legislative judgment, as she has been since starting her service in the Assembly,” Rendon said in a statement. The Assembly has a “robust and transparent budget process, designed with checks and balances to ensure the best possible budget is passed.”

The attorney general deferred any comment on the matter to the Assembly.

Maybe nothing unethical is happening between the Bontas, but the standard we hold our government to is not merely the absence of unethical behavior, it’s also avoiding the appearance of it, and right now, the Bontas are in a prime position for bias to creep in.

The attorney general and the speaker have clearly ceded responsibility, so It is up to Mia Bonta to make it right: She must immediately step down from the subcommittee.

Mia Bonta’s deflecting defense

In an emailed statement to the editorial boards, the assemblywoman said she does not unilaterally determine an agency’s budget. She also noted that she represents a community, Oakland, where gun violence is prevalent, so public safety and justice are key concerns for her.

Were those the only reasons for her appointment to the committee, then that would be fair. But she has a clear bias that should negate her appointment.

Mia Bonta said she and her husband are not the first couple in the state’s history serving in government, and that’s true. Family members are not prohibited from serving together in the same arena of politics in this country, but there must be no overlap between their powers.

But Mia Bonta’s defense of her situation was an obvious deflection of the topic.

“Almost within my lifetime there would have been the ‘appearance of impropriety’ for me to marry my husband of a different racial background,” she wrote. “I’m certain a woman voting ‘appeared improper’ as well in our recent history.”

What? The Bontas comparing their current situation, which is entirely self-made, to historically institutional racism and misogyny is not only an obvious diversion, it’s a blatant insult to the many people who have suffered — and continue to endure — under those rampant prejudices.

With this argument, Mia Bonta is attempting to deflect blame and play victim in what can only be described as an outright ploy to skirt the transparency we demand of our government officials.

Then she doubled down.

“There certainly are many examples in our legislative history where policy and budget chairs had spouses serving in another branch of government,” Bonta wrote. “Yet, I wonder if the reason I am being asked these questions is because I am a female legislator.”

This is, again, an obvious attempt by Mia Bonta to dodge inconvenient questions. These concerns should be asked of everyone who has a tie to another legislator for whom they might appropriate large sums of money, and frankly, is exactly what political journalists exist to do.

Her actions speak to the obvious: She is going to help legislate for her husband’s budget, and if she is not transparent about a potential breach of ethics now, then we cannot trust her to be transparent about her decisions on this subcommittee, either.

It is neither a racist nor a misogynistic question to query Mia Bonta about that conflict of interest, and to insinuate that it might be is a shocking abstention of the Bontas’ ethical duty to the people of California.

Mia Bonta is a gifted legislator who would sit on any number of other budget committees in the Assembly. She could help oversee any number of issues, such as education or transportation.

But being on the public safety budget subcommittee is inappropriate, considering her inherent tie to someone who would benefit from her presence there.

That should rule her out entirely.

Rob Bonta and past contributions

This is not the first time the Bontas have skirted the edge of good ethics.

While in the Assembly, Rob Bonta made repeated use of campaign funds to support nonprofits that his spouse either led or was part of.

CalMatters reported that he created a foundation in 2017 to support community projects and help deserving students. The Bonta California Progress Foundation donated $25,000 to a nonprofit called Literacy Lab. At the time, Mia Bonta was its CEO and was earning a six-figure salary. Rob Bonta said the donation was really just a loan, and promised to fix tax returns to show just that.

Besides the Literacy Lab, Rob Bonta used campaign funds to make donations to two other nonprofits that his wife directed or was part of. He got letters from two of the organizations stating the contributions would not pay her salary or benefits, CalMatters reported.

In addition to direct donations, Rob Bonta solicited more than $500,000 from contributors, such as Google and PG&E, between 2014 and 2016 for Mia Bonta’s nonprofits, said CalMatters. Such solicitations are called “behested payments.”

To be clear, Rob Bonta did not violate any campaign laws in these situations. But government watchdogs said they showed there’s a gap in regulations that should be closed.

Perhaps the Bontas really keep work and business separate, though that would stretch the realities of most in married life. But the fact that it could is too much for the people of California to gamble on.

Mia Bonta must ask for a reassignment. She absolutely can serve her district and help prepare the Assembly’s budget — just not that of her husband’s.