Ferguson delivers the laundry bill: Grocery Manufacturers told to pay $1.1 million

The Grocery Manufacturers Association was ordered Wednesday to pay $1.1 million in legal costs and fees to the State, on top of an $18 million judgment for laundering money in a 2013 Washington initiative campaign.

The legal costs represents the latest victory by state Attorney General Bob Ferguson over the influential Washington, D.C., lobby.

The state's litigation against the food lobby group is turning into perhaps the largest laundry bill in recorded history.

The GMA poured more than $14 million into a campaign to defeat Initiative 522, a measure that would have required the labeling of genetically modified foods and seeds sold in Washington.

But the money was laundered.  Big food industry firms were invited to put money in a "Defense of Brands" account to disguise their role in bankrolling the anti-522 campaign.  PepsiCo put up nearly $3 million, Coca-Cola and Nestle gave almost $2 million apiece.

Ferguson made the money laundering his first high-profile fight, long before suits against Comcast, Monsanto, and President Trump.

The GMA fessed up its contributor list even before the election.  (Initiative 522 lost narrowly.)  But Ferguson pursued the legal action on grounds that the food lobby violated Washington's campaign finance law. 

The AG has brushed off any thought of a cost-of-doing-business settlement with the food industry lobby.

"GMA willfully disregarded Washington state campaign finance law," Ferguson said, reacting to the legal fee order by Thurston County Superior Court Judge Anne Hirsch.

"The record setting penalty illustrates how egregious GMA's conduct was.  It has been a multi-year effort to hold them accountable."

The Grocery Manufacturers Association has been represented by some of the best bicoastal legal talent that a lobby can buy.

But Judge Hirsch has not bought their arguments.

Ruling in November that the GMA intentionally violated campaign finance law, Judge Hirsch ruled:  "In light of all the evidence in the record, it is not credible that GMA executives believed that shielding GMA's member as the true source of contributions to GMA's Defense of Brands Account was legal."

The chief evidence consisted of a series of internal memos in which the Grocery Manufacturers Association plotted its strategy, and worked out a way to shield big food companies from public embarrassment.

At one meeting of the food lobby's executive committee, the GMA's government affairs vice president noted that the fund would "shield individual companies from public disclosure and possible criticism."

The AG's office put extensive work into the case, notably senior assistant AG's Linda Dalton and Garth Ahearn, and Deputy Solicitor General Callie Castillo.

The ruling by Judge Hirsch compensates the public's law firm for its work.

"The state asked for over a million dollars in fees and costs," Judge Hirsch said.  "GMA presents three challenges to the State's cost bill.  The court rejects these challenges and awards the fees and costs as requested."