NEW YORK, NY September 09, 2005 —Gifford Miller is going into the final campaign weekend without some much needed money, thanks to a ruling by the campaign finance board.

The board did NOT release Miller's final $140,000 in matching funds because, it said, the miller campaign had not demostrated it was in compliance with the law. At issue is some $1 million the miller campaign spent gathering signatures to get on the ballot. Miller said those expenses shouldn't count towards spending caps because costs of complying with election law are exempt. But rivals charged that the Miller campaign was trying to build a get out the vote operation and claim it as an exempt expense. Today the campaign finance board said Miller had yet to prove his rivals are wrong. The board scrutiny has caused miller to cut his crucial last minute television buy in half. Miller says he did nothing wrong and his campaign is still competitive. For WNYC, I'm Andrea Bernstein.