This past week, the Stark/Swalwell campaign controversy heated up with a barrage of released press statements from the Eric Swalwell congressional campaign, demanding a retraction of local Congressman Pete Stark’s accusation of an alleged bribe Swalwell accepted from Tri-Valley developers, the Lin family.

The accusation rose from a debate last week hosted by the League of Women Voters between Swalwell, Stark and third congressional candidate Chris Pareja for the 15th Congressional District seat.

Stark accused Swalwell in the debate of accepting “hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes” from the Lin family for rezoning privileges. Swalwell denied these charges, calling them false, and within a few days after the debate released a statement demanding evidence or a retraction or he will proceed with legal action on grounds of defamatory remarks.

Stark’s campaign strategist Alex Tourk released a statement stating that Stark has been “attacked by Swalwell day in and day out for the past six months while focusing on the job at hand: defending universal health care, protecting social security and Medicare and jump starting the nation’s economy. This is politics, not a pony ride.”

Since then, Stark has not backed down from his accusations against Swalwell and in response, Swalwell released another press statement Tuesday, further pressing their threat of legal action.
According to that statement, the Swalwell campaign has retained attorney James Wagstaffe of Kerr & Wagstaffe LLP. The statement says Wagstaffe sent a letter to Congressman Stark yesterday asking for a retraction of his “false” accusations or face legal action.

Swalwell told The Pioneer after the debate last week that he never spoke to anyone from the Lin family but Stark says otherwise, pointing to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) financial filings as his evidence.

Stark further pressed that the FEC would be a reliable source but may require some “digging” when he addressed a citizen at his town hall meeting this past weekend.

According to those files there has been a total of $2,500 in donations to the Swalwell campaign last year by a Hong Yao Lin from Hillsborough and a Mei-Chun Lin from Pleasanton. It is not clear at this point if these two are related to the Lin family that Stark is referring too.

According to Swalwell, he has only accepted individual legal contributions. Neither Stark nor his staff at this point has released foolproof evidence of Swalwell accepting bribes.

Swalwell claims that the accusation is “of a desperate man who realizes more than ever that his 40-year reign may be coming to an end.”

After the debate Stark had allegedly used foul language against Swalwell, calling him a crook and that legal action will be taken against him, according to Pareja.

“It is the most ferocious I’ve ever seen Stark,” Pareja told The Pioneer. “But Swalwell has been attacking Stark for quite some time; it was only a matter of time before Stark responded.”

James Tong, president of Charter Properties and member of the Lin family is also listed as a contributor to the Swalwell campaign who has been involved in recent controversy involving the Promenade property in Dublin, according John Zukoski, editor of “Around Dublin” who has been rather critical of Swalwell and the Lin family.

According to Zukoski “bribing” is probably not the right word to use.

“The Lin Family is known to bundle — some might say launder — campaign contributions for political candidates that they support. So while they may only show as contributing a relatively small amount like $7,500, they likely contributed more through associates,” said Zukoski.

Stark had also accused Swalwell of a spotty voting record over the course of this past decade which Swalwell denied.

According to the Registrar of Voters, Swalwell has voted since 2006. Before then he was going to school in Maryland and was unable to vote in California, according to Swalwell. The voting record confirms this.

All candidates were suppose to show up to a candidate forum next week but according to the President of CSUEB’s Young Democrats Club, Ian Crueldad, Stark will be in Washington D.C. attending a Congressional session and will be unable to attend and therefore, Swalwell will probably not be attending as well. Pareja will be attending the event.