Are John Kasich and CHS Inc. Circumventing Campaign Finance Laws?

So John Kasich is traveling the country getting paid to speak at corporate events. Paid a lot, actually.

From Vegas to Minnesota, Kasich is raking in up to THIRTY THOUSAND DOLLARS a piece for these gigs. That’s more cash for a single afternoon’s work than many Ohioans make in a whole year. Nice work if you can get it.

And what exactly is John doing with all of this money?

Yesterday I discussed the possibility that he needed it to pay for his extravagant lifestyle. And that certainly does seem plausable. But it seems just as likely that John’s planning to use the cash to help finance his campaign for Governor.

Ohio has no limits on the amount of money a candidate (or a candidate’s spouse) can contribute to his/her own campaign. So, legally, he could use the income from his speaking engagements for his campaign.

This assumes, of course, that John isn’t using his speaking fees as a way to circumvent the limits on personal and corporate contributions by working out a deal with the company executives who hire him.

John Schmitz, for example, is the Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at CHS inc., the company paying Kasich big bucks to speak at it’s national meeting next week. Mr. Schmitz is also a big time Republican contributor, giving not only to local Republican candidates and the state party but also to national candidate and to the RNC.

So is it possible that Schmitz, knowing Kasich was strapped for campaign cash, worked out a deal where he could ‘pay’ him tens of thousands of dollars knowing he would be using the money for his campaign?

It think it’s certainly worth asking the question.