Kotek ally says he sought OLCC ouster at fundraiser

No, not that ally. Another one. But maybe them, too.

Mike Marshall, executive director of Oregon Recovers, a Portland substance abuse nonprofit, says he was the Tina Kotek fundraiser who convinced her to fire OLCC director Steve Marks. (Photo courtesy NPR/Eric Westervelt)

A former Democratic party operative and supporter of, and fundraiser for, Oregon Governor Tina Kotek announced Tuesday that it was in fact he who urged Kotek to fire Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission executive director Steve Marks earlier this year. The announcement by Mike Marshall, now the executive director of Portland addiction nonprofit Oregon Recovers, comes days after Marks notified Kotek that he planned to sue her for firing him at the behest of a different Kotek supporter and fundraiser, disgraced cannabis firm La Mota.

Marshall, whose online biography says he “spent the early years of his career learning grassroots organizing within the ranks of the Democratic Party [, working] at the presidential, congressional and city council levels to elect progressive policy makers,” probably believed he was doing his friend Kotek a favor when he told Oregon Capital Chronicle Tuesday that he first lobbied Kotek to fire Marks “in mid-October after a fundraiser in his home for her[.]” He also said he followed up with Kotek’s staff about the firing in December, after she’d won the election.

La Mota and its founders Rosa Cazares and Aaron Mitchell, whose rarely subtle government relations efforts have led to the resignation of Secretary of State Shemia Fagan and spawned a federal grand jury investigation, are political and legal kryptonite for Oregon Democrats.

Even before Marks last week threatened to sue Kotek, his firing looked, to some, like a possibly La Mota-inspired move. The La Mota crew gave Kotek $68,000 for her governor race and held a fundraiser for her at the founders’ home; they didn’t like Steve Marks because they viewed him as insufficiently supportive of the cannabis industry; Kotek fired Marks when the state was about to issue an audit that was critical of OLCC’s cannabis regulation, an audit that Cazares had reviewed and edited and about which Marks had been critical.

The solution? Marshall says it was his influence as a fundraiser for Kotek, not La Mota’s influence as a fundraiser for Kotek, that led to Marks’s firing.

Marshall, and Kotek’s team if they were in on it, appears not to have thought this strategy all the way through. First there is the problem that Marshall says he successfully influenced an important state staffing decision in a conversation with the now-governor at a fundraiser for her at his house. This is a pretty surprising admission that confirms Marks’s theory that he was fired by Kotek as a favor for people who supported her campaign. This is an appearance politicians and the people who hold fundraisers for them usually try to avoid and rarely declare via press release.

Second, there are reasons to doubt that Marshall’s lobbying of Kotek was the sole, let alone primary, reason she fired Marks. On January 24, just days before Marks’s firing, Marshall emailed Kotek’s staff. In the email, obtained by Oregon Roundup via public records request, Marshall invited Kotek or her wife, first lady Aimee Wilson, to speak at the Oregon Recovers advocacy day at the capitol, slated for February 1. Marshall observed the event was a good place for the governor to make any announcements related to substance abuse disorder and “a chance for the First lady [sic] to strat [sic] stepping into the public eye on this issue as she has indicated she wants to do.”

Marshall goes on to ask whether the governor’s budget would include a 50 cent tax on bottles of hard liquor, which he supported (Kotek included the tax in her budget but later dropped support for the tax). He advocates for a body outside the Oregon Health Authority to oversee substance abuse policy in the state, with “the right person” in that role “working in partnership with . . . the OLCC Executive Director, could really make rapid progress on the addiction crisis.” He urges a “better appointment of” OLCC Commissioners, who make up the agency’s putatively governing body. He does not mention replacing Marks.

Which might be why Marshall told Willamette Week’s Nigel Jaquiss on February 1, the day Marks’s resignation became public, that he “was surprised to hear Marks is out[.]” Marshall was in good company. Marks had survived the initial and typical round of agency head firings during the transition to a new governor, and was generally thought to be safe in his job. Whatever compelled Kotek to change her mind and axe Marks, it apparently was not any recent input by Marshall.

The third reason Marshall’s admission is unlikely to help Kotek is that it’s possible, even perhaps likely, that both he and Cazares suggested Kotek fire Marks. Legally, this works just fine for Marks, who only seeks to show that Kotek fired him as a payoff for campaign supporters - the more such supporters the better. Politically, Marshall has confirmed that allies of Tina Kotek, if not Kotek herself, are deeply concerned about the appearance that her firing of Marks was influenced by team La Mota.

Marshall has a close political relationship with Kotek, is aware of the first lady’s apparent desire to be in the public eye on substance abuse issues, and is a friendly correspondent with Kotek’s staff. Even if Marshall clumsily attempted to take the fall for the Marks firing without the input of Kotek or her people, this all looks bad for the reasons stated above. We may never know if Kotek was in on the desperate ploy. If she was, well, she’s more desperate than I thought.