Chilling in the lobby

Will the Saint Louis Rams move to Los Angeles? Will the Chargers stay or join them there? Will taxpayers ante up billions of dollars for a new stadium anywhere? So many questions and so few answers for Chargers special counsel and lobbyist Mark Fabiani. The La Jollan has labored long in San Diego’s public subsidy seeking vineyard with so far nothing to show for it but a fat retainer. According to an October 15 disclosure, the onetime “master of disaster” for the Bill Clinton White House received $50,000 during the third quarter of the year to “assist with the franchise’s efforts to find a publicly acceptable way to finance and construct a new, Super Bowl-quality stadium in the San Diego region.” That’s $10,000 more than what Fabiani reported getting paid in the quarter before. He lobbied GOP mayor Kevin Faulconer, the report says. …

Padres ex-owner John Moores, who has the distinction of funneling campaign money to both Democratic ex-president Bill Clinton and the 2002 anti-affirmative action ballot measure of his fellow University of California regent Ward Connerly, as well as to 2012’s anti-labor union Proposition 32, is giving again. This year the biggest recipient is Jerry Brown, California’s Democratic governor who is heavily favored to win an unprecedented fourth term next month. Moores, whose address is given as Austin, Texas, and occupation as “Investor, Not Employed,” kicked in $25,000 on October 22. But that’s not all: Moores also gave $15,000 to Democratic state assemblyman Adam Gray’s “Valley Solutions Ballot Measure Committee,” and $1000 each to Republican assemblymembers Brian Jones, Rocky Chavez, Marie Waldron, and Brian Maienschein, along with Democrats Shirley Weber and Lorena Gonzalez. Democratic state senator Ben Hueso picked up $2000, as did his colleague Marty Block’s 2016 re-election committee. The GOP’s Joel Anderson got $1000. …

District attorney Bonnie Dumanis, who whipped mega-self-spending lawyer Bob Brewer to get re-elected, was left with a sizable bankroll in her campaign account, filings show. After raising a cool $287,790, she had $31,464 in cash on hand as of June 30. Donors included the local Republican Party, with a total of $160,000, and downtown lobbyist Ben Haddad, giving $700. Defense lawyer Michael Pancer came up with $200 and lawyer and ex-Charger Ron Mix gave $250. Pancer’s latest high-profile client was fellow defense attorney James J. Warner, who in July pled guilty to laundering $100,000 in marijuana-dispensary proceeds. Despite an infusion of post-election cash, Dumanis’s debts still totaled $81,384, including $50,000 in pending payments to the Gemini Group, run by her longtime political consultant Jennifer Tierney.