Representatives of a group called ArkLeg Bill Tracker have filed a complaint with the Arkansas Ethics Commission, alleging several violations of campaign finance law against prominent Republican state officials.
The complaints, filed September 19, alleges a conspiracy involving “multiple individuals and political action committees,” saying they “work in concert” and “willfully violated numerous provisions of Arkansas law.”
While the final decision rests with state ethics regulators, an investigation by Little Rock Public Radio found no evidence of illegal conduct. The complaints either lacked evidence, described legal donations, or personal objections to campaign finance law.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker, an online blog run by Janie Ginocchio and Scott Perkins, is described on their website as “a free, nonpartisan platform that puts the power of legislative knowledge into the hands of everyday Arkansans.” Their blog posts make similar arguments to the ethics complaints.
The Ray/Griffin Complaint
Perhaps the group's biggest complaint is over the relationship between the Republican Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin and a state lawmaker, Rep. David Ray, R-Maumelle.
Ray is listed as a “campaign employee” on several of Griffin's campaign disclosures, and is paid about $10,000 per expenditure. ArkLeg Bill Tracker estimates Ray has been paid “approximately $500,000” since 2021.
Griffin fully acknowledges Ray is his campaign employee. Ray has worked for Griffin since 2013, when he was brought on to run his national re-election campaign when Griffin was the U.S. representative for Arkansas’s 2nd Congressional District.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker says there could be a “quid pro quo” between Ray and Griffin, because Ray has sponsored laws giving the attorney general more power. In 2025, he sponsored Act 154. The law made it easier for the attorney general to reject grassroots ballot initiatives and proposed constitutional amendments. There is no evidence Ray deliberately passed the law to give Griffin more power.
State law says:
“No public servant shall receive a gift or compensation, other than income and benefits from the governmental body to which he or she is duly entitled, for the performance of the duties and responsibilities of his or her office or position.”
Any candidate violating the compensation law would not face harsh punishment. The penalty for the first allegation is a “written warning.” The Arkansas Ethics Commission could hold a hearing and issue a fine against a candidate, ranging from $50 to $3,500.
Ray fully denies any kind of inside dealings:
“This complaint might be the dumbest thing I've ever read,” he said in an email to Little Rock Public Radio. “These left-wing activists are attacking me because I’m an effective Republican legislator and they don’t like my politics.”
He said the existence of the complaint only makes him want to “work even harder to advance conservative policies and principles.”
Act 154 is in keeping with other positions Ray has held throughout his career. He teased the law in a 2024 interview with Little Rock Public Radio:
“It ought to be really difficult to amend the state constitution.”
Ballot measure canvassers often gather signatures in public spaces, like grocery store parking lots, local festivals, or even organized protests. Ray thinks these strategies are manipulative:
“People, largely I think, sometimes don't know what they are signing,” Ray said in the 2024 interview. “They are just signing something to get the clipboard out of their face.”
Alleged donation violations
In 2024, the campaign donation limit for Political Action Committees and individuals was $3,300. In 2025, it was upped to $3,500. Arkansas Code Title 7 limits how much a PAC or person can give per candidate per election.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker complained state Republicans and their PACs often give the maximum amount to both primary and general campaigns separately. This isn't illegal.
Base Point PAC is run by state Sen. Ben Gilmore, R-Crossett. In 2024, the group gave the maximum donation to Griffin: $6,600. The next filings show Griffin split the money between his primary and general election campaigns. The complaint calls it a “deliberate scheme to split an over-the-limit contribution.”
But the state’s “Rules on Campaign Finance & Disclosure” do not consider primary and general elections to be one election.
“A preferential primary election, a general primary election, a runoff election, a special election, and a general election shall each constitute a separate election.”
Splitting donations is common on state campaign documents.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker says politicians are illegally “coordinating,” by giving money to PACs and not candidates directly.
It is completely legal in Arkansas to give money to PACs.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker seems to disagree with the existence of PACs, which they call, “black boxes for dark money," leaving voters with, “no clear line from donor to candidate.
“This isn’t just clever bookkeeping,” ArkLeg Bill Tracker’s website says. They describe the money transfers as a “cash loop,” “funneling” donations from one lawmaker to the next. The law cited in the complaint is talking about an entirely different scenario. The statue says you can't give more than $50 to a candidate under a pseudonym.
Motley Rice donations
ArkLeg Bill Tracker says they found evidence of “straw donors” in the state Republican ecosystem. These allegations are made both on web posts and official campaign ethics filings.
A “straw donor" gives money to an organization indirectly and illegally. For example, it would be illegal to give someone money to donate to a campaign on their behalf. It would also be illegal for someone to give money and be reimbursed by their employer.
Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin runs the Jobs and Growth PAC, referred to as JAG PAC in the paperwork. Companies with tobacco industry ties have given money to his PAC. This includes Juul and Altria, the parent company of Philip Morris.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker wonders if Griffin is swayed by these donations, though his office has not had any recent litigation against tobacco companies. The Attorney General’s Office does oversee the disbursement of millions from the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement, a settlement with the nation’s four largest tobacco companies.
Griffin told Little Rock Public Radio denies the tobacco companies have any influence on him..
Motley Rice LLC is a South Carolina-based law firm that sued tobacco companies, as recently as 2015. Two of their attorneys, Serena Hallowell and Lance Oliver, donated to Gilmore Strategy Group PAC, which is run by Sen. Ben Gilmore’s brother, Jon Gilmore. Each attorney gave $3,000 in February and March, of this year. In May, Gilmore PAC donated $6,000 to Griffin--the same amount Hallowell and Oliver gave to Gilmore.
“This looks like a classic straw donor scheme,” one post on ArkLeg Bill Tracker’s website reads. “The firm’s lawyers give to a PAC, the PAC passes it through to Griffin, and the paper trail blurs the true source.”
The donation is only illegal if the attorneys are giving the money to the PAC at the behest of Motley Rice. Hallowell and Oliver told LRPR they were neither instructed to make the donation nor reimbursed by Motley Rice. They simply listed Motley Rice as their employer on the donation paperwork.
When asked about the these donations, Griffin told Little Rock Public Radio:
“A corporation can give to a PAC.”
‘Incomplete reports’
A separate ethics complaint from ArkLeg Bill Tracker is against Lt. Governor Leslie Rutledge and Secretary of State Cole Jester. The complaints allege paperwork errors.
Rutledge and Jester both made campaign purchases leaving the “description of expenditure” column blank on campaign documents. Both seemed to fill in the box after ArkLeg Bill Tracker noticed the discrepancy. These violations stretch the state’s ethics rules, but are minor and quickly remediable mistakes.
The group seems to take particular issue with Rutledge’s expense of thousands of dollars on two trips to TopGolf in 2025, which are documented in her public campaign reports. Rutledge reported spending over $500 at North Little Rock’s Simmons Bank Arena in March, corresponding with a bull riding event held at the arena and a Facebook post documenting she was there.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker says the "description" column on the purchase reports are not filled out. They provided Little Rock Public Radio with Rutledge's 2025 Q1 Quarterly Primary Report, dated in March. The document does not have that column filled out.
But on the Secretary of State's website, the same document does have the column filled in.
The report was "amended" in September, a few days after the complaint was filed. The box for “description” says “event venue/catering.” This isn't a detailed explanation, but is similar to other campaign documents Little Rock Public Radio Looked at.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker called the blank box “egregious,” saying Rutledge is violating the law by possibly using campaign money for personal fun.
ArkLeg Bill Tracker cites a law in the complaint that doesn't specify the description column has to be filled out. But the Arkansas Ethics Commission's Rules on Campaign Finance and Disclosure does say in rule 218, 'it is not sufficient to simply list the payee.'
The Arkansas Ethics Commission’s Rules on Campaign Finance & Disclosure does in Rule 218.
“It is not sufficient simply to list the payee.”
But the penalties are minimal. They include a warning, fines, or asking the campaign to amend the filings.
Prominent Democrats have left the description column blank in filings, including state House candidates Billy Cook and Robin McCray, and incumbent state Rep. Tara Shephard, D-Little Rock.
Griffin’s ‘reimbursements’
ArkLeg Bill Tracker says Griffin is using campaign money as a personal slush fund or “parallel wallet for himself and his inner circle.”
This allegation comes from the frequent use of the word "reimbursement” in his filings. Travel or food and beverage purchases are classified as “reimbursement.” This means he bought meals for campaign staff and was reimbursed by the campaign.
The complaint and blog posts frame these reimbursements as possibly nefarious. One post says “voters can’t follow the money if the receipts are shielded by ‘reimbursements.’”
ArkLeg Bill Tracker points to Rule 227 in the state’s Rules on Campaign Finance and Disclosure. This “allows the use of remaining campaign funds for legitimate expenses.”
But the rule they are pointing to actually says these reimbursements, including food and travel, are completely legal.
“The funds may be used to reimburse the officeholder or his or her staff for meals or lodging in connection with the operation of the office or future campaigns,” the rule says.
In a statement to Little Rock Public Radio, Griffin said the allegations are a “joke.”
“My campaign and political action committee go to great lengths to follow all applicable laws and rules, and I look forward to this frivolous complaint being dismissed.”
In a statement on Friday, October 3, ArkLeg Bill Tracker said the state Ethics Commission has agreed to mount an investigation into the allegations.
“To the officials who doubted our knowledge of Arkansas law: the state’s own Ethics Commission disagrees with you,” Perkins said. “We may be a new voice, but our work is built on a foundation of their own signed documents and old-school, shoe-leather reporting. This is just the beginning.”
