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(While as governor) Bush was a firm opponent of gambling, his position opened the door for GOP lobbyists to court gaming tribes worried about a tough administration policy. After Bush dropped his antigambling rhetoric, lobbyists touted their access, and fund-raising from Indian tribes grew exponentially.
Among the prominent figures who have come under the scrutiny of Senate and federal investigators are Norquist, whose organization received $1.5 million from tribes and fought a tax on Indian casinos; lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a top Bush fund-raiser who earned millions of dollars in fees as a consultant to gaming tribes; and Ralph Reed, the former director of the Christian Coalition who allegedly used some money from Indian gaming tribes to fund his efforts to close down rival casinos and lotteries. House majority leader Tom DeLay, who has said he is strongly antigambling, also has drawn media scrutiny because of his ties to Abramoff and opposition to an Indian gaming tax.
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Investigators have unearthed e-mails showing Rep. Tom DeLay's office tried to help lobbyist Jack Abramoff (search) get a high-level Bush administration meeting for Indian clients, an effort that succeeded after the tribes began making a quarter-million dollars in donations.
Tribal money went both to a group founded by Interior Secretary Gale Norton (search), the Cabinet secretary Abramoff was trying to meet, as well as to DeLay's personal charity.
"Do you think you could call that friend and set up a meeting," then-DeLay staffer Tony Rudy wrote to fellow House aide Thomas Pyle in a Dec. 29, 2000, e-mail titled "Gale Norton-Interior Secretary." President Bush had nominated Norton to the post the day before.
Rudy wrote Abramoff that same day promising he had "good news" about securing a meeting with Norton, forwarding information about the environmental group Norton had founded, according to e-mails obtained by investigators and reviewed by The Associated Press. Rudy's message to Abramoff was sent from Congress' official e-mail system.
Within months, Abramoff clients donated heavily to the Norton-founded group and to DeLay's personal charity. The Coushatta Indian tribe, for instance, wrote checks in March 2001 for $50,000 to the Norton group and $10,000 to the DeLay Foundation, tribal records show. source
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One way the money changed hands: Reed provided the name and address where Norquist was supposed to send the money: to Robin Vanderwall at a location in Virginia Beach.
Vanderwall was director of the Faith and Family Alliance, a political advocacy group that was founded by two of Reed's colleagues and then turned over to Vanderwall, Vanderwall said and records show. "I was operating as a shell," Vanderwall said.
In a telephone interview, Vanderwall said that in July 2000 he was called by Reed's firm, Century Strategies, alerting him that he would be receiving a package. When it came, it contained a check payable to Vanderwall's group for $150,000 from Americans for Tax Reform, signed by Norquist. Vanderwall said he followed the instructions from Reed's firm -- depositing the money and then writing a check to Reed's firm for an identical amount. Source: Washington Post
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Reed played a key role in Bush's reelection campaign by serving as the Southeast regional chairman. Reed, who is planning to run for lieutenant governor of Georgia, has cooperated with Senate investigators and is providing records of his transactions to the Indian Affairs Committee. His spokesman confirmed that federal officials have subpoenaed Reed's records.
Norquist was an influential adviser to Bush campaign strategists in 2004 and remains a key player on tax policy, holding weekly meetings with conservatives that often include White House officials. Norquist acknowledged earlier this month that he had arranged annual meetings with Bush over a four-year period at which Indian tribal chiefs discussed tax policy. He said the tribal leaders did not discuss casinos with the president. Norquist has spoken with Senate investigators but said he has not turned over a list of donors to his organizations, citing confidentiality. Boston Globe
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But the records show that the tiny U.S. Family Network, which never had more than one full-time staff member, spent comparatively little money on public advocacy or education projects. Although established as a nonprofit organization, it paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees to Buckham and his lobbying firm, Alexander Strategy Group.
There is no evidence DeLay received a direct financial benefit, but Buckham's firm employed DeLay's wife, Christine, and paid her a salary of at least $3,200 each month for three of the years the group existed. Richard Cullen, DeLay's attorney, has said that the pay was compensation for lists Christine DeLay supplied to Buckham of lawmakers' favorite charities, and that it was appropriate under House rules and election law. Washington Post 12/31/05
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Abramoff took on the Northern Marianas Island of Saipan as a client in 1994. He was paid nearly $100,000 a month by the island's government from 1995 to 2002.
The Northern Marianas is a US territory, and is allowed by law to apply the Made in the USA label to goods manufactured there. In testimony before the Senate, it was described that 91 percent of the Northern Marianas workforce were immigrants, and were being paid barely half the U.S. minimum hourly wage. Stories also emerged of workers forced to live behind barbed wire in squalid shacks without plumbing.
While on an Abramoff-arranged trip, at a benefit dinner, DeLay was quoted as saying: "When one of my closest and dearest friends, Jack Abramoff, your most able representative in Washington, D.C., invited me to the islands, I wanted to see firsthand the free-market success and the progress and reform you have made."
Abramoff arranged an all-expenses paid trip to Saipan for DeLay on New Year's Eve, 1997. Although House ethics rules at the time prohibited House members from accepting such gifts from lobbyists, the trip was funded directly by Saipan and thus was technically allowable.
After the trip, Abramoff helped DeLay craft policy that extended exemptions from federal immigration and labor laws to Saipan industries.
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The U.S. Family Network, a public advocacy group that operated in the 1990s with close ties to Rep. Tom DeLay and claimed to be a nationwide grass-roots organization, was funded almost entirely by corporations linked to lobbyist Jack Abramoff, according to tax records and former associates of the group.
The former president of the U.S. Family Network said Buckham told him that Russians contributed $1 million to the group in 1998 specifically to influence DeLay's vote on legislation the International Monetary Fund needed to finance a bailout of the collapsing Russian economy.
During its five-year existence, the U.S. Family Network raised $2.5 million but kept its donor list secret. The list, obtained by The Washington Post, shows that $1 million of its revenue came in a single 1998 check from a now-defunct London law firm whose former partners would not identify the money's origins.
Two former associates of Edwin A. Buckham, the congressman's former chief of staff and the organizer of the U.S. Family Network, said Buckham told them the funds came from Russian oil and gas executives. Abramoff had been working closely with two such Russian energy executives on their Washington agenda, and the lobbyist and Buckham had helped organize a 1997 Moscow visit by DeLay (R-Tex.).
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Over the years, Abramoff and Michael Scanlon, his partner, in Indian gaming consulting would receive more than $60 million in fees from six different tribes seeking to advance their gambling interests, the Senate investigation found. Abramoff also told the tribes to give money to political candidates and organizations. Eventually, the tribes gave $3 million, two-thirds of it to Republicans. Now, the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, the Interior Department, and the FBI are looking into whether the tribes were defrauded and how all the money was spent.
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Another Abramoff financial vehicle was the nonprofit American International Center, a Rehoboth Beach, Del., "think tank" set up by Scanlon, who staffed it with beach friends from his summer job as a lifeguard. The center became a means for Abramoff and Scanlon to take money from foreign clients that they did not want to officially represent. Some of the funds came from the government of Malaysia. Banks and oil companies there were making deals in Sudan, where U.S. companies were barred on human rights grounds. Sudan was among several oil-rich nations in Africa, Asia and the Middle East that Abramoff eyed as venues for lucrative energy deals. Abramoff told associates he wanted to become a go-to person for U.S. companies seeking to do business with oil-patch nations.
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Susan B. Ralston has been interviewed by investigators in the Abramoff case, which is examining Mr. Abramoff's work on behalf of Indian tribes and other lobbying interests, as well as his complicated financial arrangements. She worked for (Abramoff), first at the firm Preston Gates Ellis & Rouvelas Meeds and then at the firm Greenberg Traurig, before she moved to the White House early in President Bush's first term.
Susan B. Ralston, 38, has worked as an assistant and side-by-side adviser to Karl Rove since 2001, helping manage his e-mail, meetings and phone calls from her perch near his office in the West Wing. NYTimes 10/6/05
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Abramoff and the Malaysian government. Abramoff contacted presidential advisor Karl Rove on at least four occasions to help arrange a meeting (for Mahathir, the Malaysian leader), the witness said.
Finally, the former associate said, Rove's office called to tell Abramoff that the Malaysian leader soon would be getting an official White House invitation.
...
In May 2002, Mahathir met with Bush in the Oval Office; his photograph with the president was beamed around the world.
Abramoff received $1.2 million from the Malaysian government for his lobbying services in 2001 and 2002, the former associate said. Documents obtained by Senate investigators appear to confirm at least $900,000 of that amount.
...The White House says the meeting was arranged through normal channels. But Abramoff took credit for making it happen. source
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The arrest (9/23/05) of David Safavian, the former head of procurement at the Office of Management and Budget, in connection with a land deal involving Abramoff brings the probe to the White House for the first time.
Safavian once worked with Abramoff at one lobbying firm and was a partner of Grover Norquist, a national Republican strategist with close ties to the White House, at another. Safavian traveled to Scotland in 2002 with Abramoff, Representative Robert Ney of Ohio and another top Republican organizer, Ralph Reed, southeast regional head of President George W. Bush's 2004 re-election campaign.
Safavian was one of three former Abramoff associates who joined the Bush administration. Another was Patrick Pizzella, assistant secretary of labor for administration and management. The third was Susan Ralston, special assistant to White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove.
common dreams
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Rent an expert: Abramoff made multiple payments to Doug Bandow, former Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, and at least one other think tank expert, Peter Ferrara, to write opinion pieces favorable to his clients.
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The monetary influence of Jack Abramoff runs far and wide. Abramoff was deeply associated with Tom DeLay's K Street Project to bring Republican dominance to Washington lobbying. From 2000 to 2006, he personally donated money to campaign funds and Leadership PACs of numerous Republican candidates for Congress. He raised $100,000 for the reelection of George W. Bush, making him a Bush Pioneer. (Source : livecasinosites.com)
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http://zfacts.com/p/244.html | 01/18/12 07:19 GMT
Modified: Fri, 14 Apr 2006 04:48:55 GMT
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