Former Rep. Liz Snyder, a Democrat instructor at the University of Alaska Anchorage who represented a portion of East Anchorage (then District 27) for barely one term, was given a $3,673 fine for giving her husband some money left over from her campaign as a “thank you” gift after the campaign was over.
What did she thank Sam Snyder for? Volunteering.
“Ms. Snyder violated campaign laws by (1) giving a prohibited thank you gift of campaign funds to her spouse who volunteered for the campaign, (2) failing to report the work that her spouse did as a debt to the campaign, and (3) not timely disbursing campaign funds after the campaign,” the commission ruled on March 11. “The Commission concludes that Ms. Snyder violated AS 15.13. l l 2(b) by giving her spouse a ‘personal benefit’ in the form of $2,000 thank you gift and AS 15.13.116 by failing to timely disburse or forfeit leftover campaign funds. The Commission dismisses the allegation that Ms. Snyder failed to report campaign expenditures when incurred for her spouse’s work; the campaign did not promise or agree to pay him in advance and reported the post-campaign gift. For the two violations, the Commission orders Ms. Snyder to pay civil penalties of $3,673.16-the amount of the prohibited gift and the contributions that were not timely disbursed.”
Snyder lost to Rep. Lance Pruitt in 2018 and won against him in 2020. This fine is for her 2018 campaign.
During her campaign, she enlisted her husband to be her campaign treasurer. After the campaign ended, Sam Snyder then set up his own company to provide campaign reporting for other liberal groups.
“The amount of the gift reasonably covered the hours that Mr. Snyder worked on the campaign. Although Mr. Snyder’s exact number of hours and the rate that he would have received as a paid treasurer is unclear, he estimated that he worked about five to seven hours per week over the seven months that his wife was running for office,” the final order from APOC said.
McDonald said he had brought it to Alaska Public Offices Commission several months earlier, and APOC contacted Snyder about the violation but would not file a complaint itself against her. McDonald filed the complaint himself a year and a half later, but it was not finally closed until last month.
Snyder’s financial finagling became an issue in 2020. She took the whole summer off in 2020 from her University of Alaska Anchorage, charging the university for her time, calling it a sabbatical and being paid by the state while she campaigned. Later, she kept her university job even while serving as a legislator, against state statute that prohibits state employees from simultaneously serving as legislators.
After serving for a year and a half, Liz Snyder lost interest in the work and the couple quickly and quietly sold their home in Anchorage and moved back to Florida, where she had come from originally. Her husband Sam is now listed as teaching journalism at the University of Florida.
