Tech flaws, weak rules mar Michigan system to shine light on lawmaker conflicts

• Michigan officials file new personal financial disclosure reports after complaining about the system and extending their own deadlines 
• Information is limited in some cases, because of what critics call ‘loopholes’ in the law and ongoing technological issues
• The state’s new transparency portal has been marred by issues since its rollout earlier this year

LANSING — Michigan’s beleaguered transparency portal stuttered again this month as Michigan lawmakers struggled to file their second-ever personal financial disclosure reports even after extending their own deadline to do so.

Many of the reports state officials did file were difficult to access and decipher, undermining the public's ability to understand potential conflicts of interest they sought to spotlight by approving a 2022 ballot measure. 

Other filings contained very little information, potentially because of what critics called "glaring loopholes" in the final set of rules that lawmakers devised for themselves in late 2023.

After hearing from colleagues that the Secretary of State's new online portal "wouldn't load properly," state Rep. Bryan Posthumus instead attempted to file a pdf of his disclosure report with the state. 

But the document he ultimately submitted to the state last week was effectively blank, outside of his wife's name and their address.  

“That was not intentional," Posthumus, R-Cannon Township, told Bridge Michigan. "It must not have saved — that's crazy. Hopefully I don't get in trouble for that.”

Related:

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• Michigan transparency plans die again, keeping public in the dark

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer was able to use the online portal to file her disclosure report, revealing she formed a new company that purchased a nearly three-acre parcel of lakefront property in Cascade Township for $399,000. 

But Whitmer did not disclose any income from book sales despite releasing two books since her last filing: "True Gretch" and a revised version for teens. 

Instead, the governor again reported an ownership interest in Super Deluxe, LLC, a company attorneys set up in late 2023 to manage her personal affairs, including book earnings. 

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, who oversees the state's transparency portal but had urged tougher financial disclosure rules, did report apparent earnings from her own book, "The Purposeful Warrior." 

The second-term Democrat, who is now running for governor, disclosed $65,000 from Penguin Random House, describing her contract position with the company as an "author." 

Disclosure rules

Under the 2022 ballot measure approved by more than two-thirds of voters, Michigan officials are constitutionally required to file periodic personal financial disclosures. 

But implementation of what exactly politicians have to disclose was left up to legislators to decide, and the requirements ultimately finalized in a late-night legislative session left substantial gaps relative to what members of Congress are required to disclose. 

Critics of the new rules note officials can transfer assets to their spouse to avoid disclosing them, and don’t have to report the free, lobbyist-paid travel that many elected officials have enjoyed. 

Michigan officials filed their first disclosure reports in April of 2024, but many complained the process was cumbersome under new software commissioned by Benson’s office. 

“The platform is failing,” state House Speaker Matt Hall, R-Richland Township, said in May as lawmakers quickly approved bills extending their own filing deadline by a month. 

The legislation, which Whitmer subsequently signed into law, also allowed officials to submit disclosure reports by email instead of the new online portal. A spokesperson for the Michigan Department of State confirmed this would be allowed into the future. 

The resulting filings, reviewed by Bridge Michigan, have become much more difficult to examine. 

The disclosures are split between two lists the state posted on two separate webpages: Officials that filed using the online system the state has paid contractor Tyler Technologies millions of dollars to design, and those that filed by email, which this month included more than two-thirds of all state lawmakers.

Some of the reports filed by lawmakers were scans of handwritten documents, while others were photos of pages inserted into a pdf file.

And some of the pdfs, which appeared to be filed out digitally, did not show all the information included in them. Bridge found at least four instances where lawmakers disclosed more information than the text box could display, cutting off the disclosure and hiding the remaining text.

A Benson spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on the status of issues with the personal financial disclosure system.

Promised improvements

Officials from Benson’s office have told state officials that they are working to improve the “Michigan Transparency Network,” which is supposed to allow the public to also view campaign finance reports and lobbyist disclosures but has been marred with errors and limited functionality.

Benson’s Chief of Staff Christina Anderson recently told frustrated lawmakers that the problems are “deeply serious.”

“The current performance and usability of all functions of the MiTN system is below (the department's) standard of excellence and we will be working nights and weekends until it is fixed,” Anderson said.

Sitting alongside a representative from Tyler Technologies in the committee hearing, Anderson said they would freeze payments to the contractor until the issues were resolved. A spokesperson for the department previously said they hope to have all major issues fixed by July.

The network had promised to modernize the aging databases used by journalists and the public to view Michigan’s ethics disclosures and centralize them into a single system. 

After rolling out the new system earlier this year, problems soon became apparent: users could no longer see a lobbyist’s disclosed clients, or how much money a candidate has raised in a campaign cycle, among other issues.

Gaps in the law

Under the state’s new disclosure rules, failing to file a report could land a candidate or elected official a fine of up to $1,000, while explicitly lying on a report could result in a fine of up to $2,000. By contrast, in Congress, those fees could be as high as $50,000.

Legislative attempts to toughen the rules have fallen flat, and transparency advocates have slammed the law for not living up to its promise to voters, which was to expose their elected officials’ potential conflicts of interest. 

The new filings point to gaps.

State Rep. Parker Fairbairn, a Harbor Springs Republican in his first term, disclosed that he was a member of a limited liability corporation, but he did not name the business in his report. 

He also did not disclose that he has served on the board of the Emmet County Farm Bureau, despite saying as much on his legislative website. 

Some lawmakers disclosed frequent interactions with registered lobbyists, including Reps. Bradley Slagh, R-Zeeland, and Nancy DeBoer, R-Holland. Slagh disclosed nearly 200 interactions with lobbyists, including meeting them at a “legislators bible study.” Other lawmakers reported very few, pointing to ongoing uncertainty about what information must be disclosed.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Sarah Anthony, D-Lansing, disclosed in a pdf that she was paid at least $1,000 for consulting by Progressive Turnout Project. The political action committee, which works to get Democrats to the polls on election day, revealed in a federal filing that it paid Anthony $16,000 in 2024. 

State Rep. Noah Arbit, D-West Bloomfield, told Bridge he did not understand his colleagues' difficulty with the disclosure system. Filing out his report through the online portal took him “10 minutes” because he had little to add, he said. 

Arbit said concerned Michiganders should “be finally attuned not to just what is in these reports, but how someone represents you in their totality.”

“If someone is voting a certain way because of financial interests, then they're probably doing other things that are unethical,” he added.

Arbit conceded, though, that it can be difficult to know an official’s financial interests without an effective disclosure system.