Editorial by Denver Post

It’s beyond discouraging to watch the White House flail about as it tries to squelch the developing story of how it tried to keep Andrew Romanoff out of Colorado’s Senate race.

The Obama administration repeatedly had said it never offered a job to Romanoff, but now officials are not only saying they dangled jobs in front of him but that they did so to avoid a “costly” primary.

Federal law says it is illegal to “directly or indirectly” offer a job or benefit, or even any “special consideration” in obtaining a job or benefit, to political candidates in any race for elected office.Editorial by Denver Post

While we’re not naïve enough to think this may be the first time that law has been violated — or that the Democrats running Congress will investigate the situation — we do think it’s unethical, at the very least, to try to keep Coloradans from having choices in their elections.

On Wednesday, we urged the White House and Romanoff to clear the confusion surrounding a possible job offer for abandoning his fledgling primary race against Sen. Michael Bennet, whom Obama is endorsing.

Obama promised to stop “politics as usual” in Washington. Yet the Romanoff case, like the White House’s handling of the Senate primary race in Pennsylvania, reeks of old-school, backroom wrangling and the kind of political favoritism that’s bad for a democracy.

Earlier this week, we expressed concern that Romanoff had told us in September that no job offer had been made. But Wednesday night he released an e-mail, dated Sept. 11, 2009, that details the jobs that could have been available to him. That was several days after we asked him whether an offer had been made. A previous editorial erroneously suggested that our conversation with Romanoff occurred later in the month.

Unless other evidence comes to light, it seems clear that Romanoff answered us honestly when he said he had not been offered a job.

Romanoff says when he did get the call from White House deputy Jim Messina, the well-known “fixer” said Obama would back Bennet, and suggested three positions within the administration might be available to him should he drop out of the race.

The White House denied that any jobs were offered when The Post’s Michael Riley broke the story Sept. 27, and claimed it would “be wrong” to suggest administration officials tried to buy him out of the contest. But Thursday, Obama spokesman Dan Gibbs conceded there were suggested offers because the administration wished “to avoid a costly battle between two supporters.”

Yes, Romanoff had applied for jobs with the administration earlier in the year. Yet, by the time Messina called in mid-September, he was approaching Romanoff in the context of his Senate run, which Romanoff had made official the day before. Any suggestion that Messina, who does not work at the agency in question, was simply following up on his application is laughable.

Based on the evidence available, we find Romanoff’s explanation of events the more credible. But it seems the Obama administration still has questions to answer, including whether someone from Colorado alerted the White House to the dangers Romanoff, a popular former state House speaker, might present to Bennet.

Republicans in Congress, conveniently playing politics as well, have asked for an independent investigation of the White House meddling in Colorado and Pennsylvania.

Unless enough fair-minded Democrats join them, that’s unlikely.

It’s too bad, because Colorado’s Democratic voters deserve more.

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This article was originally published at www.DenverPost.com