I find it unseemly. Obviously not on the level of, say, sexual harassment, but still philosophically in the same vein: using a position of power and its implications to subtly coerce. Not very impressive, IMO.

Richardson's ambition just leapt ahead of his good judgement.

Even if it's legal, it's wrong. And this comment explains why:

"You just hope that none of these employees are feeling compelled to do this out of fear of what might happen if the governor doesn't win the presidency and comes back to the state and then starts trying to count who helped him and who didn't help him," said Scott Darnell, a spokesman for the state Republican Party.

And yeah, spokespeople for the opposition party aren't exactly bias-free, but he has a good point. If they all want to volunteer, fine, but the effort should be something that comes from them, not their boss.

New Mexico's Civil Service law seems to permit Richardson's request that his employees donate their time to his campaign. There is one section of the statute which raises a serious question about whether they are being coerced into "donating" the money they would have to spend to travel to Iowa, however.

Nevertheless, it is undeniable that this constitutes a violation of the spirit of the Civil Service law, which exists to protect public employees from exactly this kind of political pressure.

Richardson should know better.

Jared Berry wrote:

This is what happens when an administrative person goes into another endeavor; they take their people with them. Bush took Texas State employees with him in 2000, and I'm sure that Romney had people working for him who once were employees of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

The difference, Jared, is that in Richardson's case, the workers in question are still employed by the State of New Mexico.

Even though the Civil Service statute protects them from retaliation from refusing to participate, each and every one of them knows how easy it would be for their supervisors to begin documenting infractions that could lead to their being reprimanded, denied promotions, or dismissed from their jobs. Their awareness of this reality cannot help but factor into their decisions about whether to participate in their boss's presidential campaign.

What Richardson is doing is inappropriate and indefensible.

He's desperate and disgusting. I am proud to have worked for a public official--New York Attorney General Robert Abrams--who between 1978 and 1992 absolutely forbade any of the Assistants he appointed staff from working on any of his campaigns.