How a Lobbyist Stacked the Deck
Abramoff Used DeLay Aide, Attacks On Allies to Defeat Anti-Gambling Bill

By Susan Schmidt and James V. Grimaldi
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, October 16, 2005; A01



Lobbyist Jack Abramoff and his team were beginning to panic.

An anti-gambling bill had cleared the Senate and appeared on its way to passage by an overwhelming margin in the House of Representatives. If that happened, Abramoff's client, a company that wanted to sell state lottery tickets online, would be out of business.

But on July 17, 2000, the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act went down to defeat, to the astonishment of supporters who included many anti-gambling groups and Christian conservatives.

A senior aide to then-Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) helped scuttle the bill in the House. The aide, Tony C. Rudy, 39, e-mailed Abramoff internal congressional communications and advice, according to documents and the lobbyist's former associates.

Rudy received favors from Abramoff. He went on two luxury trips with the lobbyist that summer, including one partly paid for by Abramoff's client, eLottery Inc. Abramoff also arranged for eLottery to pay $25,000 to a Jewish foundation that hired Rudy's wife as a consultant, according to documents and interviews. Months later, Rudy himself was hired as a lobbyist by Abramoff.

The vote that day in July was just one part of an extraordinary yearlong effort by Abramoff on behalf of eLottery, a small gambling services company based in Connecticut. Details of that campaign, reconstructed from dozens of interviews as well as from e-mails and financial records obtained by The Washington Post, provide the most complete account yet of how one of Washington's most powerful lobbyists leveraged his client's money to influence Congress.

The work Abramoff did for eLottery is one focus of a wide-ranging federal corruption investigation into his dealings with members of Congress and government agencies. Abramoff is under indictment in another case in connection with an allegedly fraudulent Florida business deal.

Abramoff had deep roots in the conservative movement and rose to prominence by helping Republicans tap traditionally Democratic K Street lobbyists for campaign dollars. But in the eLottery fight, he employed a win-at-any-cost strategy that went so far as to launch direct-mail attacks on vulnerable House conservatives.

Abramoff quietly arranged for eLottery to pay conservative, anti-gambling activists to help in the firm's $2 million pro-gambling campaign, including Ralph Reed, former head of the Christian Coalition, and the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition. Both kept close contact with Abramoff about the arrangement, e-mails show. Abramoff also turned to prominent anti-tax conservative Grover Norquist, arranging to route some of eLottery's money for Reed through Norquist's group, Americans for Tax Reform.

At one point, eLottery's backers even circulated a forged letter of support from Florida Gov. Jeb Bush ®.

Rudy declined to comment for this article. A spokesman for Reed -- now a candidate for lieutenant governor of Georgia -- said that he and his associates are unaware that any money they received came from gambling activities. Sheldon said that he did not remember receiving eLottery money and that he was unaware that Abramoff was involved in the campaign to defeat the bill. Norquist's group would say only that it had opposed the gambling ban on libertarian grounds.

Abramoff's lawyer declined requests for a comment.

DeLay, an outspoken opponent of gambling, was an instrument, witting or unwitting, in eLottery's campaign, documents and interviews show. Along with Rudy, he was a guest on a golfing trip to Scotland. As majority whip, he cast a rare vote against his party on the Internet gambling bill and for the rest of the year helped keep the measure off the floor. He told leadership colleagues that another vote could cost Republican seats in the hard-fought 2000 elections.

A statement from DeLay's lawyer said his votes "are based on sound public policy and principle."

The Scotland trip is one aspect of the gambling matter being investigated by the corruption task force. The trip took place more than five years ago, which ordinarily would be beyond the five-year statute of limitations on certain possible corruption charges. But legal sources say prosecutors have obtained a waiver of the time limit because of the need to gather information abroad.

Desperate Company

Like many Internet companies emerging from the overheated 1990s, eLottery's money was drying up in the spring of 2000.

The company was founded in 1993 on the gamble that even a small fraction of the market for helping states and others put lotteries online could be worth a billion dollars a year. But the company faced many obstacles.

In 1998, the Justice Department had used existing gambling laws to force eLottery to shut down its first online lottery venture, with an Idaho Indian tribe. ELottery had not earned a dime since.

The Senate had passed the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act in late 1999, aiming to make it easier for authorities to stop online gambling sites. With a companion bill by Rep. Robert W. Goodlatte (R-Va.) advancing in the House in the spring of 2000, eLottery was desperate to ramp up its Washington lobbying. It had to sell off assets to stay afloat and raise cash.

In May, eLottery hired Abramoff's firm, Preston Gates & Ellis LLP, for $100,000 a month, according to lobbying reports. In the following months, Abramoff directed the company to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to various organizations, faxes, e-mails and court records show. The groups included Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform; Sheldon's Traditional Values Coalition; companies affiliated with Reed; and a Seattle Orthodox Jewish foundation, Toward Tradition.

Robert Daum, a former eLottery official, said he could not recall the names of the groups that received the payments but noted that all the money spent by the company at Abramoff's direction was for the purpose of defeating the Internet bill.

"We were willing to pursue all legitimate means to ensure that outcome, as people do all the time in Washington," Daum said. "Nothing more, nothing less."

Arrayed against eLottery were many leading groups on the religious right who were pushing to ban Internet gambling, including the Moral Majority and the Christian Coalition. James Dobson, influential leader of Focus on the Family, praised the bill in an opinion piece for the New York Times.

Still, according to his strategy e-mails, Abramoff thought he could turn conservatives in the House against the bill. He seized on some compromise language in the bill making exceptions for jai alai and horse racing.

Abramoff's plan: argue that the legislation and its exemptions actually expand legalized gambling.

Check in the Mail

To reach the House conservatives, Abramoff turned to Sheldon, leader of the Orange County, Calif. - based Traditional Values Coalition, a politically potent group that publicly opposed gambling and said it represented 43,000 churches. Abramoff had teamed up with Sheldon before on issues affecting his clients. Because of their previous success, Abramoff called Sheldon "Lucky Louie," former associates said.

Checks and e-mails obtained by The Post show that Abramoff recruited Reed to join Sheldon in the effort to pressure members of Congress. Reed had left the Christian Coalition in 1997 and started a political consulting firm in Georgia.

Abramoff asked eLottery to write a check in June 2000 to Sheldon's Traditional Values Coalition (TVC). He also routed eLottery money to a Reed company, using two intermediaries, which had the effect of obscuring the source.

The eLottery money went first to Norquist's foundation, Americans for Tax Reform (ATR), and then through a second group in Virginia Beach called the Faith and Family Alliance, before it reached Reed's company, Century Strategies. Norquist's group retained a share of the money as it passed through.

"I have 3 checks from elot: (1) 2 checks for $80K payable to ATR and (2) 1 check to TVC for $25K," Abramoff's assistant Susan Ralston e-mailed him on June 22, 2000. "Let me know exactly what to do next. Send to Grover? Send to Rev. Lou?"

Minutes later Abramoff responded, saying that the check for Sheldon's group should be sent directly to Sheldon, but that the checks for Norquist required special instructions: "Call Grover, tell him I am in Michigan and that I have two checks for him totaling 160 and need a check back for Faith and Family for $150K."

According to the e-mails, 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.

Vanderwall, a former Regent University Law School student and Republican operative, was later convicted of soliciting sex with minors via the Internet and is serving a seven-year term in Virginia state prison.

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.

"I was operating as a shell," Vanderwall said, adding that he was never told how the money was spent. He said: "I regret having had anything to do with it."

Abramoff had previously paid Reed's consulting firms to whip up Christian opposition to Indian casinos and a proposed Alabama state lottery that would compete with the gambling business of Abramoff's tribal clients, sometimes using Norquist's foundation as a pass-through, a Senate investigation has found.

A spokeswoman for Reed said Century Strategies had no business relationship with eLottery. She said Reed was assured by Abramoff's firm "that our activities would not be funded by revenues derived from gambling activities."

Norquist declined to be interviewed. His spokesman did not answer questions about the movement of funds.

Another check issued in 2000 by eLottery at Abramoff's direction wound up helping to fund the Scotland golfing trip attended by Rudy and DeLay. On May 25, 2000, as the trip got underway, the company sent $25,000 to the National Center for Public Policy Research, where Abramoff was a board member at the time. Along with money from another Abramoff client, that payment covered most of the Scotland travel costs, according to records and interviews.

DeLay has said that he believed the National Center sponsored and paid for the trip.

A few weeks after the golfing trip, Abramoff took Rudy to the U.S. Open in Pebble Beach, Calif. They traveled aboard a corporate jet belonging to SunCruz Casinos, a Florida cruise line Abramoff was negotiating to buy, according to a participant who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation. Rudy did not report this trip in his House travel records.

Abramoff listed Rudy as a financial reference that summer in the SunCruz purchase. That transaction ultimately led to the indictment two months ago of Abramoff and a business partner on charges that they had forged a $23 million wire transfer.

Working the Bill

In early June 2000, DeLay had not yet taken a position on the Internet gambling ban. But his aide, Rudy, was already providing advice to Abramoff about how to kill it.

Five days after Rudy and DeLay got back from the Scotland trip, Rudy sent an emergency message to Abramoff from a wireless device.

"911 gaming," Rudy typed on June 8.

He followed up with a suggestion that Abramoff's team get a conservative House caucus to seek a meeting with the chamber's top leaders, Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) and Majority Leader Richard K. Armey (R-Tex.) -- a key supporter of the bill. Abramoff forwarded the idea to his team members. "Message from Tony Rudy. Don't share it please. However we should take his advice."

Sheldon was also hard at work, holding news conferences and buttonholing House conservatives to argue against the bill. On July 10, he called Abramoff's group saying he had run into resistance from the staff of an influential member who still favored the bill.

"Lou just called," team member Shawn Vasell told colleagues in an e-mail. "We need to get together and draft a response for Lou." Kevin Ring, Vasell's associate, responded: "This is a disaster."

Abramoff weighed in minutes later, saying he would get Reed to ramp up efforts. "I just chatted with Ralph. We are going to have to go on the air nationally on radio. We must get the conservatives back on this or we are doomed," he told the team.

Abramoff got another strategy e-mail the next morning from Rudy. Rudy was on DeLay's staff but wrote "we" as though he belonged to Abramoff's team. "I think we should get weyrich to get like 10 groups to sign a letter to denny and armey on gaming bill," Rudy wrote, referring to Free Congress Foundation Chairman Paul M. Weyrich and the House leaders.

Sheldon got a private meeting with DeLay on July 13. "I told him I strongly opposed the bill," Sheldon told Congressional Quarterly at the time.

A former DeLay staff member who spoke on the condition of anonymity said, "Lou was a credible face" because Sheldon's religious credentials carried some weight with conservative voters.

DeLay then told House Republican leaders that he was prepared to go against the anti-gambling bill.

The Bush Forgery

Still, the Abramoff team was worried about the vote. So the eLottery forces pressed the argument that the Internet bill was an unfair infringement of the right of individual states to sell lottery tickets online. Amid the frenzied lobbying, a potentially influential letter making that case began circulating on Capitol Hill. It was purportedly signed by Jeb Bush.

"While I am no fan of gambling, I see this bill as a violation of states' rights and I am looking to prevent this encroachment," the letter said.

A surprised Hill staffer called the Florida governor's office, and the letter was exposed as a forgery.

Months later, a little-noted investigation by Florida authorities resulted in a confession from a Tampa man hired by a division of Shandwick Worldwide, a public affairs company. Shandwick was working on the eLottery account with Abramoff's team. The Florida man, Matthew Blair, told authorities in a plea bargain agreement that he was hired to get letters opposing the bill from the governor and others. He said he created the forged letter on his own after he was unable to obtain one from Bush's office.

Brian Berger, then a Shandwick official, said his firm had been hired to produce the letters by Abramoff associate Michael Scanlon, a former DeLay press aide. Berger said in a recent interview that although he and Scanlon knew Blair, they did not sanction the forgery. "Essentially, we had a bad operative," Berger said.

But the letter still had an impact. It fed the confusion about the bill in the days before the floor vote. Goodlatte, the sponsor, had more than enough votes for his carefully crafted compromise. Yet he became worried that amendments might be introduced during the debate that could kill the bill.

One way to avoid a floor fight is to place a bill on the suspension calendar, which is supposed to be for non-controversial legislation; it suspends the usual rules, banning amendments and limiting debate. But doing so would require a two-thirds majority for passage.

Goodlatte agreed to the suspension calendar approach because he thought he could get the two-thirds. "We were told [by House leaders] to bring it up on the suspension calendar so you won't have to deal with all these amendments," said a member of Goodlatte's staff who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

That opening was exploited by the Abramoff team with Rudy's help -- fewer votes would be needed to stop the bill.

On July 17, the House debated for about 40 minutes. Rumors continued to fly about the Bush letter. Some members remained confused about the bill's contents. About 30 did not vote. "There was a lot of misinformation," said a congressional staff member who worked on the bill.

Still, Goodlatte had reason to be optimistic because nine out of 10 bills on the suspension calendar pass.

But Abramoff's efforts had eroded just enough votes. The roll call -- 245 in favor, 159 against -- left Goodlatte 25 members short. The bill failed.

'All Systems Go'

The eLottery team was euphoric. Abramoff lobbyist Patrick Pizzella, who was in the Capitol to watch the vote, wrote in an e-mail to colleagues the next day that he saw Sheldon celebrating the victory, too. "There was lucky Louie out front hi-fiving with some lobbyists," said Pizzella, who the following year was named an assistant secretary of labor. Others partied across from the Capitol at the restaurant Tortilla Coast.

Supporters of the Internet gambling ban, though, were outraged. They vowed to resurrect it, perhaps as part of an appropriations bill.

The Christian Coalition issued an "action alert." Dobson took to the airwaves, saying, "I'm just sick about what the Republican leadership is doing with regard to gambling." He urged listeners to contact DeLay and other House leaders to revive the measure.

Abramoff's team realized there was no way to win enough support for a simple majority because they were down more than two dozen votes. Instead, they had to persuade the leadership to keep the bill off the House floor, despite intense pressure from Goodlatte and another backer, Rep. W.J. "Billy" Tauzin (R-La.) .

On July 21, DeLay's legislative director, Kathryn Lehman, e-mailed Rudy. "Goodlatte and Tauzin asked Tom [DeLay] what they needed to do to get his vote, and Tom said to talk to you!"

Rudy immediately forwarded the e-mail to Abramoff asking for help.

Documents show that Abramoff's strategy was to dispatch Sheldon to pressure about 10 social conservatives in their home districts, accusing them of being soft on gambling for supporting Goodlatte's bill. Abramoff's group hoped those members would stir fears among House leaders that another vote on the gambling bill could threaten those members and thus the GOP's thin 13-seat majority.

On Aug. 18, Abramoff faxed a message to eLottery's Daum ordering more money for Reed's activities. "I have chatted with Ralph and we need to get the funding moving on the effort in the 10 congressional districts," Abramoff wrote. "Please get me a check as soon as possible for $150,000 made payable to American Marketing Inc. This is the company Ralph is using."

ELottery issued the requested check to American Marketing on Aug. 24 and delivered it to Abramoff at Preston Gates. Five days later, Abramoff e-mailed Reed. The subject, "Internet Gambling: And so it continues." The message asked, "Where are we? You got the check, no? Are things moving?"

Reed answered the next day. "1. Yes, they got it. 2. Yes, all systems go."

Targeting 'Our Guys'

Weeks later, a political mailer from Sheldon's group landed like a small bomb in the North Alabama district of Rep. Robert Aderholt.

The Republican was a member of the religious right's Values Action Team in Congress, a champion of public displays of the Ten Commandments and a vigorous gambling opponent. But now, in the midst of a tough reelection race, Aderholt was accused of being soft on gambling.

"Congressman Robert Aderholt voted with them in support of HR #3125 with the law the gamblers want on horse and dog racing," said Sheldon's mailer. Sheldon urged voters to call Aderholt's Washington office "and ask him to vote NO this time." Aderholt's opponent quickly incorporated Sheldon's attack in an ad of his own.

The bulk rate stamp on the mailing said it was paid for by American Marketing. Records show that the company is run by Robert Randolph, the president of Reed's direct marketing subsidiary. A spokeswoman for Reed said that American Marketing is "a different company" and that she could not respond to questions about it.

Sheldon's fliers also targeted Rep. J.C. Watts of Oklahoma, then the House GOP deputy whip, and vulnerable incumbents such as Aderholt, including Rep. James E. Rogan of California, one of the managers of the impeachment of President Bill Clinton, and Rep. Robin Hayes of North Carolina.

Angry House members targeted by Sheldon complained to the leadership. "Certainly our displeasure was relayed on up the chain, so to speak," said Andrew Duke, the chief of staff of Hayes.

Abramoff's willingness to jeopardize Republican House seats startled his lobbying team, some of whom had come from DeLay's office. "Once we started talking about taking out our guys, I got worried," said a former associate of Abramoff's who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The same former Preston Gates lobbyist said Rudy played a key role in getting House leaders to pay attention to the plight of members under attack.

"Tony would say to members, 'Oh, you're getting phone calls on this? I better go tell the whip.' Lou Sheldon sending a letter is not going to do anything unless you have somebody on the inside. Tony exaggerated to leadership how backing the bill could hurt those members," the former Abramoff associate said.

Sheldon backed off in some of the races. In Aderholt's district, he issued a letter praising the congressman and claiming that his previous mailer had been mistakenly distributed. In Rogan's district, he stopped pressuring the incumbent and attacked his challenger as "a champion of the homosexual agenda."

Sheldon said in an interview this week that he recalled little about his efforts against the bill in 2000. He said he did not remember receiving a $25,000 check from eLottery, but added that it is possible that his organization did receive it. He said he remembered some money coming in to pay for fliers he had printed and mailed to congressional districts to persuade members to oppose the bill.

"I wasn't aware the money was coming from them [eLottery]," Sheldon said. "I don't think I ever saw the check. It came in, and we paid the bill for some of the printing."

Sheldon also said he had no idea that Abramoff was lobbying against the bill or that he was working for eLottery.

"This is all tied to Jack?" Sheldon said. "I'm shocked out of my socks."

Chilling Effect

Rudy, who had known Abramoff for years, went to work for Abramoff when the lobbyist switched law firms, to Greenberg Traurig LLP, in January 2001.

Rudy's wife, Lisa, was also drawn into Abramoff's orbit. She was paid fees by Toward Tradition, the Seattle-based Orthodox Jewish foundation that often allies with the Christian right on social issues. The foundation is headed by longtime Abramoff friend Rabbi Daniel Lapin and the lobbyist served as chairman of the board.

Toward Tradition was issued a $25,000 check dated Aug. 24, 2000, by eLottery. A copy of the check was obtained by The Post. Daum, the former eLottery official, said he could not remember the check but said all funds Abramoff directed him to spend were intended to defeat the Internet gambling bill.

Lapin said in an interview that he could not remember a check from eLottery but that the company could have made donations to his foundation. He said that any such donation would have been separate from his foundation's hiring of Liberty Consulting, a political firm founded and operated by Lisa Rudy.

"Lisa Rudy worked for us for six months -- six to nine months -- to organize groundwork for a conference," Lapin said. He said she was paid more than $25,000 but was unsure exactly how and when Lisa Rudy was hired. Lapin said her work could have been for an interfaith conference held in Washington in mid-September 2000. That conference, which opened a few weeks after the eLottery check was sent to Toward Tradition, featured such speakers as DeLay, Sheldon and Norquist.

Rudy declined to comment on the Toward Tradition contract and said that his wife was not available for a comment.

A month after the interfaith conference, the gambling bill's sponsors agitated to get House leaders to let them attach the measure to an end-of-the-year spending bill.

But Sheldon's campaign in conservative districts had the desired chilling effect on GOP leaders. That became clear on Oct. 24, when House Republicans met to discuss their year-end strategy.

What happened at the meeting was relayed to Abramoff by a former associate, David H. Safavian, who was then a lobbyist for a coalition of online gambling companies and who this month was indicted for allegedly lying to federal investigators in the Abramoff probe.

DeLay, Safavian wrote in an e-mail, "spoke up and noted that the bill could cost as many as four House seats. At that point, there was silence. Not even Rep. Dick Armey (R-Texas) -- our previous opponent -- said a word."

When Congress prepared to adjourn in 2000 without revisiting the gambling bill, Safavian was ecstatic. He sent his clients an e-mail, which was posted on the Web site of the Fantasy Sports Trade Association.

"Relax a bit," Safavian wrote. "Policy beat politics once again. (Maybe the American system isn't really that bad.) The good guys won."

Researchers Alice Crites and Julie Tate contributed to this report.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1501539_pf.html

No comments on this story? Are you all just too bleary eyed from reading the 2 NYT Plame pieces to read this long article? Trust me, you will want to read this. They have put together one helluva piece detailing how these guys took down the gambling bill and how so many of the "holier than thou" wing of the Republican Party pimped for the gambling industry. Put some visine in your eyes and read this one.

All this switching of money around, as well as threats, by lobbyists should be called what it really is:

BRIBERY

I just now have had time to really read this piece. Another nail in Abramoff and DeLay's coffins, I hope.

How many are there really in the Bush Camp that is not Dirt and Blood-money?

They sound like the mafia.

I hope they all go down in flames.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/10/17/122311/72

Lawmaker's Abramoff Ties Investigated
Ohio's Ney Has Disavowed Lobbyist

By James V. Grimaldi and Susan Schmidt
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, October 18, 2005; A01



As federal officials pursue a wide-ranging investigation into the activities of Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff, his arrest on fraud charges in the purchase of a Florida casino boat company has increasingly focused attention on a little-known congressman from rural Ohio.

Rep. Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio) placed comments in the Congressional Record favorable to Abramoff's 2000 purchase of the casino boat company, SunCruz Casinos. Two years later, Ney sponsored legislation to reopen a casino for a Texas Indian tribe that Abramoff represented.

Ney approved a 2002 license for an Israeli telecommunications company to install antennas for the House. The company later paid Abramoff $280,000 for lobbying. It also donated $50,000 to a charity that Abramoff sometimes used to secretly pay for some of his lobbying activities.

Meanwhile, Ney accepted many favors from Abramoff, among them campaign contributions, dinners at the lobbyist's downtown restaurant, skybox fundraisers, including one at his MCI Center box, and a golfing trip to Scotland in August 2002. If statements made by Abramoff to tribal officials and in an e-mail are to be believed, Ney sought the Scotland trip after he agreed to help Abramoff's Texas Indian clients. Abramoff then arranged for his charity to pay for the trip, according to documents released by a Senate committee investigating the lobbyist.

Ney is under investigation by Florida federal prosecutors looking into Abramoff's acquisition of SunCruz, according to sources familiar with the investigation who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Abramoff and his business partner Adam Kidan were indicted in August on fraud charges related to the purchase.

Ney declined to be interviewed. He has said his actions benefiting Abramoff had nothing to do with the favors he received. He said he was misled by Abramoff and his associates.

"I am absolutely outraged by the dishonest and duplicitous words and actions of Jack Abramoff," Ney said last year when Abramoff's statements about Ney first came up in e-mails released by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. "As the testimony at both committee hearings has revealed, Jack Abramoff repeatedly lied to advance his own financial interests."

Abramoff, whose attorneys declined to comment for this article, has publicly denied that he misled Ney.

This spring, Ney hired a prominent Washington criminal defense lawyer, Mark Tuohey, to handle inquiries from the Justice Department and congressional investigators pursuing the widening scandal. Tuohey has not returned phone calls in recent weeks to discuss his client.

Comments for SunCruz

A six-term congressman from rural eastern Ohio, Ney, 51, does not have a national profile. A former teacher and public safety director for his home town of Bellaire, Ney was an Ohio legislator in 1994 when he defeated the Democratic incumbent in the congressional district once represented by Wayne Hays (D).

But to members of Congress, Ney is known as the mayor of Capitol Hill. Ney is Administration Committee chairman, a powerful position that doles out budgets, equipment, offices and parking spaces to House members. These perks are used by House Republican leaders to keep their rank and file in line.

Ney became chairman of the committee thanks to his political patron, Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), who recently stepped down as House majority leader after he was indicted on a charge of conspiracy to violate a Texas campaign law. Shortly after Ney arrived in the House in 1994, he became a part of DeLay's Retain Our Majority Program (ROMP), a fundraising effort in which GOP colleagues donated to Republicans such as Ney in districts without a safe majority. After lines were redrawn to make Ney's district more Republican, he returned the favor, donating to other vulnerable House Republicans. That helped him earn his chairmanship in 2001, leapfrogging over a colleague with more seniority.

Ney and Abramoff, whom DeLay once described as "one of my closest and dearest friends," crossed paths as early as 1996. That year Ney took a trip to Montenegro sponsored by a foundation that had links to Abramoff, who was a lobbyist for Montenegro.

A few years later, Ney paid unusual attention to another Abramoff client, the Florida gambling boat company SunCruz, which was headquartered more than 1,000 miles outside of Ney's congressional district. Abramoff and his business partner were trying to buy the cruise ship fleet from Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis, but Boulis was demanding unwelcome additional terms.

In March 2000, Ney used the Congressional Record to assail Boulis.

"On the Ohio River we have gaming interests that run clean operations and provide quality entertainment," Ney wrote. "I don't want to see the actions of one bad apple in Florida, or anywhere else to affect the business aspect of this industry or hurt any innocent casino patron in our country."

Ney's remarks were orchestrated by Michael Scanlon, a former DeLay spokesman who had just been hired to work for Abramoff at Preston Gates & Ellis LLP. Scanlon had approached Ney through his chief of staff, Neil Volz, according to sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Volz has repeatedly declined to be interviewed.

A few months later, Boulis agreed in principle to sell SunCruz to Abramoff and Kidan for $147.5 million. The deal closed in the fall. But Abramoff and Kidan failed to make good on a $23 million payment owed to Boulis, court records show.

When Boulis was being difficult in the negotiations, Ney again made an official statement, this time heaping praise on Kidan.

"Since my previous statement, I have come to learn that SunCruz Casino now finds itself under new ownership and, more importantly, that its new owner has a renowned reputation for honesty and integrity," Ney said in the Congressional Record on Oct. 26, 2000. "The new owner, Mr. Adam Kidan, is most well known for his successful enterprise, Dial-a-Mattress, but he is also well known as a solid individual and a respected member of his community.

"While Mr. Kidan certainly has his hands full in his efforts to clean up SunCruz's reputation, his track record as a businessman and as a citizen lead me to believe that he will easily transform SunCruz from a questionable enterprise to an upstanding establishment that the gaming community can be proud of."

But Kidan's "track record" included a string of lawsuits, judgments, liens, bankruptcies and failed businesses. His Dial-a-Mattress franchise in the District was in bankruptcy. He had filed personal bankruptcy, and he had surrendered his law license in New York after being accused of fraud. One of his mentors, Anthony Moscatiello, was alleged by law enforcement to be an accountant for New York's Gambino crime family.

Ney later said he did not know about Kidan's background.

Four months after Ney's remarks in the Congressional Record, Boulis was murdered in Fort Lauderdale. Police did not make any arrests in the case until September, when they charged four men in the slaying, including Moscatiello and a business associate of Moscatiello's whom Kidan had paid $250,000 as catering consultants.

Five weeks after the Boulis killing, SunCruz officials, including Kidan, threw a $1,000-a-head fundraiser for Ney at Abramoff's skybox at the MCI Center, according to Abramoff's fundraising log.

Language for Tiguas

In early 2002, Volz left his post as Ney's chief of staff to join Abramoff's lobbying team. Soon after, in March 2002, Ney agreed to sponsor legislation that would benefit the Tigua tribe of El Paso, an Abramoff and Scanlon client. They wanted Ney's help to reopen the Tiguas's casino, which the state of Texas had shut down.

"Just met with Ney!!! We're f'ing gold!!!! He's going to do Tigua," Abramoff told Scanlon in a March 20, 2002, e-mail.

Six days later, Abramoff directed tribal officials to make three contributions totaling $32,000 to Ney's campaign and political action committees. A Ney spokesman recently said that money has been donated to Ohio charities.

On June 7, 2002, Abramoff wrote in an e-mail to Tigua consultant Marc Schwartz that "our friend" had "asked if we could help (as in cover) a Scotland golf trip for him and some staff."

The e-mail does not name "our friend," but Schwartz testified in the Senate last fall that it was Ney.

Abramoff wrote that "the trip will be quite expensive (we did this for another member -- you know who) 2 years ago." He was referring to an earlier Scotland golf trip that Abramoff had arranged in 2000 for DeLay. Abramoff suggested to Schwartz that the tribe send $50,000 to a charity he directed, the Capital Athletic Foundation, which would pay for the trip "as an educational mission."

Ney later stated on disclosure forms filed with the House that the August 2002 trip cost $3,200 and was paid for by the National Center for Public Policy Research, a conservative advocacy group on whose board Abramoff served. The Washington Post reported last year that the trip was actually paid for by the Capital Athletic Foundation, which reported in tax records that it spent $150,225 on the trip.

Ney has said he was misled by Abramoff about who paid for the trip.

"In April, 2002, I was approached by Mr. Abramoff, who I believed to be a respected member of the community, and asked to go on a trip to Scotland which Mr. Abramoff said would help support a charitable organization, that he founded, through meetings he organized with Scottish Parliament officials," Ney said in a statement last November.

Ney's report to Congress listed as a purpose of the trip: "speech to Scottish Parliamentarians." However, there is no record of Ney's speech in the Scottish Parliament's register of official visits kept by the external liaison office, which is available on the Web. In addition, at the time of Ney's trip, the Scottish Parliament was out for its August recess, spokeswoman Sally Coyne said.

Ney is not the first public official who has come under scrutiny by investigators for the Scotland trip. David Safavian, then chief of staff at the General Services Administration, also went on the trip with Ney, Abramoff and former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed Jr. Safavian, who went on to become the chief White House procurement officer, was indicted this month on charges that he lied to investigators looking into the Scotland trip when he said that Abramoff had no business before the his agency.

The trip, Ney said in his statement last year, had nothing to do with legislation for the tribe.

"I want to be absolutely clear that at no point, ever, was I made even remotely aware that any Indian tribe played any role in this trip," Ney said in his statement.

Ney said he supported the Tigua legislation at Abramoff's request after the lobbyist told him the provision was supported by Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), who was sponsoring the election reform bill that would carry the Tigua provision.

"I then [in July 2002] personally asked Senator Dodd about this provision and he expressed no knowledge of it," Ney said. "In short, I had been misled by Jack Abramoff. I then asked Jack Abramoff why Senator Dodd was apparently not supporting it and Mr. Abramoff told me that someone had lied to him. The matter was then closed from my perspective."

However, the Tiguas say no one told them the matter was closed. Tigua consultant Schwartz later testified to the Senate Indian Affairs Committee that Ney remained a strong supporter of the Tigua legislation and Abramoff long after his conversation with Dodd.

Schwartz said that in August 2002 -- a month after Ney's reported conversation with Dodd and around the time of the Scotland trip -- Abramoff arranged for Ney to meet with Tigua representatives in his office. Before the meeting, "in an e-mail to me, Abramoff mentioned that Congressman Ney didn't want his trip to Scotland brought up, as he would show his appreciation to the Tribe later," Schwartz testified.

The meeting lasted more than 90 minutes, two tribal members testified at the Senate hearing. The tribal leaders who attended the meeting were pleased and impressed with the outcome, Schwartz said.

"During that meeting, Congressman Ney was very animated about Mr. Abramoff's skill and repute as a leader in the lobbying circles," Schwartz testified. "We were told about the impending success of Mr. Abramoff's legislative plan and how much Congressman Ney wanted to help to restore the Tribe's ability to conduct gaming on their reservation."

Two months later, on Oct. 8, after the election bill came out of a House-Senate conference committee without a Tigua provision, Ney held a conference call with tribal officials and told them of his "disbelief that Dodd had gone back on his word" to support the provision, Schwartz testified. Ney also expressed his continued support for the Tiguas, tribal officials said.

Ney responded to Schwartz's testimony by saying, "I, like these Indian tribes and other members of Congress, was duped by Jack Abramoff."

Ney later said he was very angry at Abramoff and Scanlon, who he said had misled him about Dodd. Ney has called Abramoff and Scanlon's activities in the Tigua episode "nefarious."

Abramoff shot back by referring to the conference call when he spoke to the New York Times Magazine this spring. "It's crazy" for Ney to say he was duped, Abramoff said. "He was on the phone for an hour and a half!"

Contract for Foxcom

In the late 1990s, members of Congress became increasingly frustrated at the lack of cell phone coverage inside the Capitol and its nearby office buildings.

The House decided to let the major wireless companies select -- and pay for -- a company to install antennas for cellular phones. In 1999, AT&T Wireless had asked LGC Wireless of San Jose to work with the House bureaucracy to put the antennas and repeaters into House buildings. The project was one of the largest of its kind, worth more than $3 million.

At the time, LGC was the world's leading provider of such equipment and had wired the headquarters of most cellular phone companies, including Nextel and AT&T. During the next year, LGC worked with the architect of the Capitol and the House Information Resources office to develop a plan.

Then Foxcom Wireless, an Israeli start-up telecommunications firm, entered the picture. Foxcom, which has since moved headquarters from Jerusalem to Vienna, Va., and been renamed MobileAccess Networks, lobbied for the job.

In early 2001, Ney took charge of the House Administration Committee, which was ultimately responsible for the antenna job. Sometime that year, exactly when is unclear, Foxcom donated $50,000 to the Capitol Athletic Foundation, Abramoff's charity. Foxcom officials have declined to be interviewed about the donation or the wireless project. A spokesman for Foxcom, now MobileAccess, referred all questions Monday to Ney's committee.

Also that same year, a decision was delayed on the antennas, which caught House staff by surprise.

"We were really surprised, given all the work we put in with LGC in designing the system," said Henry F. "Bud" Collins Jr., the senior network systems engineer for the House. "Then, all of a sudden this other company showed up. We had to go through this whole thing again."

LGC Chief Operating Officer Alex Gray wrote to Ney to complain about the "highly politicized selection process" that favored the Israeli company despite the House's "Buy American" posture. "Only Foxcom was permitted a full and fair hearing on the merits of its proposal -- essentially a 'back room' deal based on political expediency alone," Gray wrote.

Assistant House Counsel Carolyn Betz, replying on behalf of Ney, said in a letter to LGC that in the fall of 2001 the major wireless companies were receiving ballots to vote on who should get the contract.

In a letter to Betz, LGC president and chief executive Ian Sugarbroad called the election process "deeply flawed and unfair." He said each wireless company was sent a ballot and allowed to vote for LGC, Foxcom or "no preference." There were no details on the bid proposals, such as cost, security features, band capacity or critical performance metrics, Sugarbroad said.

Brian Walsh, Ney's spokesman, provided The Post redacted copies of the ballots. Three show checkmarks in a box next to Foxcom. The other three ballots are marked "no preference."

But representatives of all six companies said they voted no preference, according to interviews and documents. Five of them were interviewed by The Post, and the sixth made its preference known in a letter obtained by The Post.

Spokesmen for the companies -- Cingular, Nextel, Sprint, Verizon Wireless, AT&T Wireless and Voicestream -- said they remained neutral because both LGC and Foxcom were considered capable of doing the job.

Walsh said those statements are "an absolute contradiction to the documentation."

Ney awarded the license to Foxcom on Nov. 26, 2002, Walsh said. He declined to make public a copy of documents relating to the agreement, noting that the Freedom of Information Act does not apply to Congress. He noted that the work was paid for by the wireless companies and not by Congress, and he pointed out that the Senate also chose Foxcom.

LGC had no right to appeal. "This is not a traditional House procurement and, thus, House procurement policies do not apply," Betz stated in her letter to LGC.

Collins, the House engineer who has since retired, said, "It almost seemed like the cards were stacked for them."

After the contract was awarded, Foxcom listed Abramoff as its lobbyist. Over the next two years, Foxcom paid Abramoff's team $280,000.

Researcher Alice Crites and database editor Derek Willis contributed to this report.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1701918_pf.html

Hollywood on the Potomac

Tuesday, October 18, 2005; A24



THE MOST RECENT installment in the continuing saga of Jack Abramoff sounds more like a Hollywood thriller than a real-life account of the stealthy operations of one of the capital's most powerful lobbyists as he maneuvered to kill an Internet gambling bill for his $100,000-a-month lobbying client, eLottery Inc.

As reported in Sunday's Post by Susan Schmidt and James V. Grimaldi, the story has all the elements of Washington at its seamiest: lobbyists deploying corporate jets and luxury golf trips to curry favor with senior congressional aides; gambling money disguised by passing it through multiple accounts to hide its origins; conservative lawmakers, in the midst of tough reelection campaigns, being targeted -- by gambling forces -- for being soft on gambling.

We'd encourage you to read all 4,245 delicious words to get the full flavor, but in case you missed it, the juicier details include: a forged letter purportedly from Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; an official of a religious advocacy group who ends up in prison for soliciting sex with minors over the Internet; and "Lucky Louie," the nickname bestowed on the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, head of the Traditional Values Coalition, who was enlisted to fight the anti-gambling bill on the grounds that it would actually promote gambling -- and who, despite receiving a $25,000 check from eLottery, somehow didn't realize that Mr. Abramoff or the company was involved.

"There was lucky Louie out front hi-fiving with some lobbyists," Mr. Abramoff's lobbying colleague, Patrick Pizzella, now an assistant secretary of labor, recounted in one e-mail after a House victory. Even David H. Safavian, the indicted former White House procurement official and former Abramoff lobbyist, makes a guest appearance, proclaiming -- gotta love this one -- the triumph of policy over politics.

The story offers a particularly rich example of the back-scratching, revolving-door coziness among lobbyists, lawmakers and staff members. Mr. Abramoff wooed Tony C. Rudy, a top aide to then-Majority Whip Tom DeLay, taking Mr. Rudy on two luxury golfing trips -- one to St. Andrews in Scotland, the other to Pebble Beach in California. Mr. Abramoff had eLottery pay $25,000 to a Jewish foundation that also hired Mr. Rudy's wife as a consultant. When Mr. Abramoff was buying a Florida casino -- he's since been indicted for forging a $23 million wire transfer -- he listed Mr. Rudy as a financial reference. Mr. Rudy, for his part, worked closely with Mr. Abramoff, sharing internal e-mails and offering strategic advice -- all this before leaving Mr. DeLay's office to join Mr. Abramoff's lobbying empire.

The eLottery tale also illustrates how corporate money can be disguised -- laundered might be a more appropriate word -- to obscure its questionable origins. Enlisting former Christian Coalition head Ralph Reed to help defeat the Internet gambling ban, Mr. Abramoff used two passthroughs to get Mr. Reed the money. The first stop, Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, which got a $160,000 check from eLottery, took $10,000 off the top, and passed it on to the second passthrough, the Faith and Family Alliance, which then sent on $150,000 to Mr. Reed. "I was operating as a shell," the group's former director, now in prison on sex charges, told The Post.

The Justice Department continues to investigate the whole smelly Abramoff empire. We don't know what charges will ensue -- but it's sure making for great reading.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1701355_pf.html

As Washington Post blatantly puts it:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...5101701355.html

Hollywood on the Potomac


Tuesday, October 18, 2005; Page A24

THE MOST RECENT installment in the continuing saga of Jack Abramoff sounds more like a Hollywood thriller than a real-life account of the stealthy operations of one of the capital's most powerful lobbyists as he maneuvered to kill an Internet gambling bill for his $100,000-a-month lobbying client, eLottery Inc.

As reported in Sunday's Post by Susan Schmidt and James V. Grimaldi, the story has all the elements of Washington at its seamiest: lobbyists deploying corporate jets and luxury golf trips to curry favor with senior congressional aides; gambling money disguised by passing it through multiple accounts to hide its origins; conservative lawmakers, in the midst of tough reelection campaigns, being targeted -- by gambling forces -- for being soft on gambling.


We'd encourage you to read all 4,245 delicious words to get the full flavor, but in case you missed it, the juicier details include: a forged letter purportedly from Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; an official of a religious advocacy group who ends up in prison for soliciting sex with minors over the Internet; and "Lucky Louie," the nickname bestowed on the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, head of the Traditional Values Coalition, who was enlisted to fight the anti-gambling bill on the grounds that it would actually promote gambling -- and who, despite receiving a $25,000 check from eLottery, somehow didn't realize that Mr. Abramoff or the company was involved.

"There was lucky Louie out front hi-fiving with some lobbyists," Mr. Abramoff's lobbying colleague, Patrick Pizzella, now an assistant secretary of labor, recounted in one e-mail after a House victory. Even David H. Safavian, the indicted former White House procurement official and former Abramoff lobbyist, makes a guest appearance, proclaiming -- gotta love this one -- the triumph of policy over politics.
The story offers a particularly rich example of the back-scratching, revolving-door coziness among lobbyists, lawmakers and staff members. Mr. Abramoff wooed Tony C. Rudy, a top aide to then-Majority Whip Tom DeLay, taking Mr. Rudy on two luxury golfing trips -- one to St. Andrews in Scotland, the other to Pebble Beach in California. Mr. Abramoff had eLottery pay $25,000 to a Jewish foundation that also hired Mr. Rudy's wife as a consultant. When Mr. Abramoff was buying a Florida casino -- he's since been indicted for forging a $23 million wire transfer -- he listed Mr. Rudy as a financial reference. Mr. Rudy, for his part, worked closely with Mr. Abramoff, sharing internal e-mails and offering strategic advice -- all this before leaving Mr. DeLay's office to join Mr. Abramoff's lobbying empire.

The eLottery tale also illustrates how corporate money can be disguised -- laundered might be a more appropriate word -- to obscure its questionable origins. Enlisting former Christian Coalition head Ralph Reed to help defeat the Internet gambling ban, Mr. Abramoff used two passthroughs to get Mr. Reed the money. The first stop, Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, which got a $160,000 check from eLottery, took $10,000 off the top, and passed it on to the second passthrough, the Faith and Family Alliance, which then sent on $150,000 to Mr. Reed. "I was operating as a shell," the group's former director, now in prison on sex charges, told The Post.

The Justice Department continues to investigate the whole smelly Abramoff empire. We don't know what charges will ensue -- but it's sure making for great reading.

I don't know if anyone here is familiar with the GOP's New Hampshire phone-jamming scandal, from the 2002 mid-term elections. But it seems there is an Abramoff connection to that as well. And it's starting to get some notice. Here's Josh Marshall's column in The Hill about it.

http://thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/...all/102005.html

Thanks I remember that. The Abramoff investigation and the Plame investigation give me hope that even under total Republican control we "might" actually see justice done. It would certainly give one more hope about our political process. Hopefully there are enough good guys in both Parties that will eventually put the breaks on the scum that we see all too regularly.

A friend of mine supplied me with this website link. My computer will not allow me to click on the various politician links so if there is anything really good I hope someone will post it.


http://www.jackinthehouse.org/

Editorial from a Lincoln, Nebraska newspaper:

http://www.journalstar.com/articles/2005/1...ae944535075.txt

This is new from Time magazine:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout...1121973,00.html

Related to the article above about the Abramoff/Reed relationship is this item from Time, a compilation of emails exchanged between the two of them. Comments added by Time are in italics.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/printout/0...1121969,00.html

From the Christian Coalition
to goffer for Abramoff...and now
wants to be Georgia's Lt. Gov.

Oh yeah, God and government go together. Right!

Ralph was always a razor-cut (GOP) whimp...now everyone
gets to know it. I hope Georgia whips him like a step-child.

http://news.findlaw.com/ap/o/632/10-24-200...169dd3d302.html
Report: Abramoff Sought Help From Reed

(AP) - WASHINGTON-Jack Abramoff, the GOP lobbyist under investigation by federal authorities for possible fraud, repeatedly sought the help of Bush strategist Ralph Reed to open doors at the White House for his business clients, according to e-mails made public Sunday.

The e-mails show that Abramoff pushed for intervention from deputy White House chief of staff Karl Rove on at least three occasions since 2001 to promote business opportunities.



Reed, former head of the Christian Coalition and a candidate in the 2006 race for Georgia's lieutenant governor, wrote back obliging responses, according to the e-mails obtained by Time magazine. The e-mails are now being reviewed by federal investigators, Time reported.

The e-mails show that 10 days after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Abramoff promoted a business venture to rent cruise ships to the Federal Emergency Management Agency to house rescue workers off New York City.

Responding to Abramoff's request for help, Reed wrote on Sept. 21, 2001: "Put in a tag call to karl to find out the best contact at fema."

Four months later, Abramoff wrote Reed seeking "serious swat from Karl" in hopes of getting $16 million released by the Justice Department to fund a jail that his Choctaw Indian clients wished to build in Mississippi. Reed replied that he was at a lunch with Rove at a Republican National Committee meeting and would report the "substance shortly."

Reed agreed to give Rove materials on behalf of the Choctaws, Time reported.

The cruise-ship deal was never accepted, while the Choctaws got the jail.

A spokeswoman for Reed, Lisa Baron, told Time that her boss receives request for help all the time and that he "does not recall following up on these matters." On Sunday, Baron told The Associated Press that Reed has no recollection of talking to anyone regarding these issues.

In a third set of e-mails, Reed acknowledges having "weighed in heavily" with the White House on behalf of Abramoff to block Angela Williams from being appointed head of the Interior Department's Office Insular Affairs.

Williams is the wife of Orson Swindle, former member of the Federal Trade Commission and a Vietnam prisoner of war with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

Abramoff, not satisfied, responds in a Dec. 5, 2001 e-mail: "Any ideas on how we can make sure she does not get it? Can you ping Karl on this?"

Reed writes back: "i am seeing him tomorrow at the WH and plan to discuss it with him as well."

Williams didn't get the appointment.

Congressional Democrats have raised questions about Abramoff's ties to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas. Separately, Abramoff has pleaded innocent to a six-count federal fraud and conspiracy indictment stemming from his role in the 2000 purchase of a fleet of gambling boats in Florida.

2005-10-24T00:47:51Z

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/27/politics/27aide.html

Rove Aide's Name Appears in Two Washington Inquiries
By ANNE E. KORNBLUT
Published: October 27, 2005
WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 - At the nexus of two high-profile investigations roiling the nation's capital is an unlikely - and largely anonymous - figure known for fiercely safeguarding her bosses.

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. That has made her an important witness in the C.I.A. leak investigation, as the special prosecutor has sought to determine whether Mr. Rove misled investigators about his contacts with reporters about Valerie Wilson, the undercover operative whose identity was made public in 2003.

Ms. Ralston is also entangled in another political scandal: the case of Jack Abramoff, the Republican lobbyist, who employed her in the same frontline capacity during a stretch of time that is now under criminal investigation.

Ms. Ralston is not considered a suspect in either case, and several close colleagues say it is by sheer accident that she has been swept up in both investigations. Lawyers involved with the two cases say no other person besides Ms. Ralston has played a pivotal role in each one. She has appeared at critical junctures in both: it was Ms. Ralston who patched through a phone call from Matt Cooper, the reporter for Time magazine, to Mr. Rove on the day in July 2003 that they discussed Mrs. Wilson, then known by her maiden name, Valerie Plame. And Ms. Ralston, while in Mr. Abramoff's employ, drafted a memorandum about his suites at local arenas, which he used to entertain clients and public officials who have since gotten in trouble for accepting his favors.

Ms. 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 him, 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.

Ms. Ralston has also testified at least twice before the grand jury in the leak case.

She did not return a call to her White House office on Wednesday. Her lawyer, however, made available a friend who was able to verify details about her life and who, like her other colleagues, portrayed her as an up-close and innocent witness to both sets of events.

"Susan is sharp as a tack and straight as an arrow, and so that's all hopefully going to pay off now," said her friend, a Republican lobbyist who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case as well as Ms. Ralston's position.

Although published reports suggest that Mr. Abramoff sought to place Ms. Ralston with Mr. Rove after the 2000 election to gain easy access to him, her colleagues said that was not the case.

"Karl was looking for the most competent person around and stole her," said Grover Norquist, the Republican activist who heads the group Americans for Tax Reform and is an ally of both Mr. Abramoff and Mr. Rove.

Though colleagues described her as ambitious within the Republican Party, Ms. Ralston maintains a low external profile that has made her invaluable to Mr. Rove, who was quoted in The National Journal describing her as "a remarkably gifted leader" who was "playing a vital role."

"She's very careful about Karl and pretty guarded," said a Bush associate who is friends with Ms. Ralston, speaking on condition of anonymity because the White House is sensitive to even benign comments related to both the C.I.A. leak and Abramoff investigations.

In fact, she rebuffed Mr. Abramoff at least once in writing, after he sought her help in getting Mr. Rove to call the Interior Department on behalf of one of his clients.

"I don't want to bother you guys with a meeting request, so I was hoping you could pass on to Karl that Interior is about to approve a gaming compact and land in trust for a tribe which is an anathema to all our supporters down there," Mr. Abramoff wrote to Ms. Ralston in a February 2003 e-mail message first published by Time magazine.

Ms. Ralston replied, "Karl and others are aware, but the WH is not going to get involved."

Ms. Ralston's portfolio expanded at the White House this year, accompanied by an elevated job title and a significant raise. In 2003, she held the position of executive assistant to the senior adviser and earned $64,700, which was bumped to $67,600 in 2004. This year, as Mr. Rove took on new duties as the deputy chief of staff, Ms. Ralston was promoted to special assistant to the president and assistant to the senior adviser, earning $92,100.

Now, people familiar with Ms. Ralston's work said, she functions as Mr. Rove's own chief of staff, coordinating the five groups within the West Wing that he oversees.

Next Article in Washington (8 of 8) >

Lawmaker From Ohio Subpoenaed in Abramoff Case

By James V. Grimaldi and Susan Schmidt
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, November 5, 2005; A04



Rep. Robert W. Ney notified Congress yesterday that he had been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury examining the lobbying activities of Jack Abramoff, making the Ohio Republican the first lawmaker to receive such a demand in the expanding influence-peddling investigation.

The subpoena, delivered to Ney in recent days, seeks records and testimony from his office. His spokesman, Brian Walsh, said it is the first contact Ney has received from federal investigators looking at Abramoff, once one of Washington's most powerful lobbyists. Ney has denied any wrongdoing.

"I voluntarily provided information to the Senate Indian Affairs Committee last year and I have offered to make myself available to meet with the House Ethics Committee," Ney said in a statement yesterday. "I believe, however, that although the government's investigation of Mr. Abramoff has been well-publicized through other sources, it is inappropriate for my office to comment in any detail about an ongoing investigation."

Under House rules, members must announce subpoenas, and they are then reported in the Congressional Record. Ney received the subpoena earlier in the week, but it was not announced to the House until yesterday. Walsh said that "we do not believe that there would be any grounds" for Ney to be a target of the investigation.

Ney has received campaign contributions from Abramoff and has accepted favors, including dinners at the lobbyist's downtown restaurant, a fundraiser at the lobbyist's MCI Center box, and a golfing trip to Scotland in August 2002, according to public records, e-mails, interviews and documents obtained by The Washington Post.

As chairman of the powerful House Administration Committee, Ney promised to add legislation to a bill to reopen a casino for a Texas Indian tribe that Abramoff represented. After Ney agreed to prepare the legislation, Abramoff directed tribal officials to make three contributions totaling $32,000 to Ney's campaign and political action committees. A Ney spokesman recently said that money has been donated to Ohio charities.

In 2000, Ney placed comments in the Congressional Record favorable to Abramoff's purchase of a Florida gambling company, SunCruz Casinos. Ney has said he was not fully informed by the lobbyist. Abramoff and business partner Adam Kidan were indicted in August on fraud charges related to the purchase.

Federal prosecutors in Florida are investigating Ney's role in the SunCruz deal, according to people familiar with the probe who spoke on condition of anonymity. The grand jury that subpoenaed Ney is based in the District.

Ney also approved a 2002 license for an Israeli telecommunications company to install cell-phone antennas for the House. The company later paid Abramoff $280,000 for lobbying, according to lobbying disclosure forms. Records obtained by The Post show the firm also donated $50,000 to a charity that Abramoff sometimes used to secretly pay for lobbying activities. Walsh said that although Ney had the authority to make the antenna decision on his own he asked a group of wireless companies to select the contractor. Walsh said Ney's actions were not based on any connection to Abramoff.

Abramoff stated in an e-mail to tribal officials that "our friend" -- later identified in Senate testimony as Ney -- sought the Scotland trip after he agreed to help Abramoff's Texas Indian clients. Abramoff then arranged for the charity, the Capital Athletic Foundation, to pay for the trip. Ney said in a statement a year ago that Abramoff told him that going on the trip would help support a charitable organization through meetings the lobbyist organized through Scottish Parliament officials.

Another public official has come under scrutiny for the Scotland trip. David H. Safavian, then chief of staff at the General Services Administration, also went on the trip with Ney, Abramoff and former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed. Safavian, who went on to become the chief White House procurement officer, was indicted last month on charges that he lied to investigators looking into the Scotland trip when he said Abramoff had no business before his agency.

Ney's official report to Congress listed a purpose of the trip as "speech to Scottish Parliamentarians." However, there is no record of Ney's speech in the Scottish Parliament's register of official visits. In addition, at the time of Ney's trip, the Scottish Parliament was out for its August recess, spokeswoman Sally Coyne said.

Although no other lawmakers have been subpoenaed in the Abramoff investigation, Julie Doolittle, wife of Rep. John T. Doolittle (R-Calif.), and a company controlled by the husband of Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) have received subpoenas from the grand jury.

Staff writer R. Jeffrey Smith contributed to this report.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...0401197_pf.html

E-Mails Show Ex-Interior Official's Links to Lobbyist
Evidence Suggests Abramoff and Griles Had Close Ties

By Susan Schmidt
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 5, 2005; A04



The former deputy secretary of the Interior Department had numerous meetings, telephone calls and other contacts with Jack Abramoff concerning the lobbyist's tribal clients, e-mails released by congressional investigators show.

J. Steven Griles, who held the No. 2 job at Interior from 2001 to 2004, testified Wednesday before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee that he never tried to intercede on behalf of Abramoff's clients and that he had no special relationship with him. He said he had rejected a job offer from Abramoff in 2003.

The e-mails suggest a much closer relationship than Griles acknowledged in his testimony. They reflect more than a half-dozen contacts Griles had with Abramoff or with a woman working as the lobbyist's go-between. The contacts concerned gambling-related issues affecting four tribal clients who were paying Abramoff tens of millions of dollars to represent them.

According to the e-mails, Griles advised Abramoff how to get members of Congress to pressure the department and provided him information about Interior decision-making. In one instance, Abramoff wrote to his lobbying colleagues that Griles would be providing a draft of an Interior letter to Congress to give them "a head start."

The Justice Department is investigating Abramoff's practices, focusing on tribal clients that paid him and a public relations associate $82 million between 2001 and 2003. Investigators are examining whether executive branch officials or members of Congress and their staffs did favors for the lobbyist for campaign contributions, jobs or trips.

The e-mails made public this week show that Abramoff's dealings with Griles began at a March 1, 2001, social event. Before Griles took office, Abramoff offered him "strategic advice" on two Interior bureaus -- Insular Affairs and Indian Affairs -- whose decisions could affect his clients.

In an e-mail sent in September 2002, Abramoff reported to his lobbying team that he had a "great dinner with Griles," during which they discussed tribes seeking casinos that would compete with those of Abramoff's tribal clients. Abramoff told his team that Griles "is very excited" about a proposed "legislative fix" that would hamper efforts by the Jena Band of Choctaws to get land for a casino in Louisiana.

E-mails show Abramoff tried to influence Griles through Italia Federici, head of the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, a group co-founded by Interior Secretary Gale A. Norton. Griles had a personal relationship with Federici. Abramoff's tribal clients donated at least $250,000 to Federici's group. When Louisiana took action that moved the Jena plan along, Abramoff messaged Federici: "Can you make sure Steve knows about this and puts the kibosh on it? Thanks."

But Abramoff soon told colleagues that Griles was "upset" at him for mobilizing Ralph Reed and Christian groups to put grass-roots pressure on Norton to kill the Jena's plan. "I got a call from Griles basically accusing Ralph and me of having our finger prints on an anti-Norton effort. I denied it, of course, but it is clear that I have taken a hit here," he wrote to a colleague.

Abramoff's spokesman declined comment, citing the investigation.

E-mails from March 2003 show Griles's involvement in Abramoff's efforts to get Interior money for a school for the wealthy Saginaw Chippewa tribe, even though Congress had barred any such grants for new construction.

Griles "just called me," Abramoff wrote. "He said we have to get the Members of the House to respond to their letter that this should be funded and then it will be done. . . . Griles will get me the letter once it is drafted so we have a head start."

The Washington Post has reported that Abramoff's team got the $3 million grant for the tribe later that year after Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.) pressured the Bureau of Indian Affairs to release the funds. Burns received $137,000 in contributions from Abramoff lobbyists and their tribal clients.

Abramoff built his business with the tribes by touting ties to leaders such as former House majority leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.). Among e-mails released this week are several from 2002 in which Abramoff exhorted members of his lobbying team to raise money from their clients for Abramoff's personal charity, the Capital Athletic Foundation. Senate investigators have accused Abramoff of misusing the charity by funding activities such as an Israeli sniper school on the West Bank.

Abramoff wrote to lobbyist Tony C. Rudy, a former DeLay staffer, that DeLay "wants us to raise some bucks" for the foundation.

Richard Cullen, a lawyer for DeLay, said that he had not seen the e-mails, but that DeLay "has no recollection about this at all."

Rudy asked another lobbyist to get the Saginaw Chippewa tribe to donate $25,000, saying, "Jack wants this." Lobbyist Todd A. Boulanger queried: "What is it? I've never heard of it." Rudy replied: "It is something our friends are raising money for."

Boulanger appeared dubious about the solicitation. "I'm sensing shadiness. I'll stop asking." Said Rudy: "Your senses are good. If you have to say leadership is asking, please do. I already have."

Rudy and Abramoff parted ways within weeks of this exchange, with Rudy joining another firm.

In August 2002, Abramoff e-mailed the tribe again, seeking the $25,000 for "the DeLay thing." Foundation ledgers show it was not DeLay but another member of Congress who benefited from the charity's spending that summer. The foundation spent $166,634 on expenses related to a golf trip to Scotland that Abramoff organized for Rep. Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...0401938_pf.html

Posted on Sun, Nov. 06, 2005



Adventures of Jack Abramoff -- an ugly story

By CARL HIAASEN


The glistening slime trail left by lobbyist Jack Abramoff leads to an infamous homicide scene in South Florida.

And while the indicted bosom buddy of indicted Rep. Tom DeLay says he had nothing to do with the mob-style execution of casino fleet founder Gus Boulis, Abramoff probably wasn't turning cartwheels when three men were recently charged with murdering Boulis back in February 2001.

One of the defendants is Anthony ''Big Tony'' Moscatiello, identified by police as an associate of the Gambino crime family. Moscatiello is a longtime pal with lawyer Adam Kidan, who was Abramoff's partner in what prosecutors say was a fraudulent purchase of Fort Lauderdale-based SunCruz casinos from Boulis.

Kidan and Abramoff go way back. At the Georgetown Law Center they were both members of the College Republicans.

Abramoff grew up to be a big-time GOP operative whose friendship with House Speaker DeLay opened doors to all sorts of wondrous opportunities. For example, his lobby firm received $66 million in fees from Indian tribes that either wanted to set up casino operations, or block rival tribes from doing the same.

Sen. John McCain, the tenacious Arizona Republican, is currently holding hearings about Abramoff's unorthodox lobby tactics and the favors he seems have bought at the Interior Department, which oversees Indian matters.

It's an ugly story, but not the worst of Abramoff's legal problems. That would be his partnership with Kidan, whose keen business acumen and sterling ethics had already led to multiple bankruptcies and the loss of his New York law license.

In 2000, Abramoff shiningly recommended Kidan to Gus Boulis as a buyer for the SunCruz casino boat fleet, which Boulis was being forced to sell because he wasn't a U.S. citizen.

The buyout sounded like such a sweet deal that Abramoff decided to go 50-50 with Kidan, and the papers were finally signed in September 2000.

Boulis, who'd kept a stake in SunCruz, soon became enraged with Kidan's free-spending management. Among those hired for catering and security services were Kidan's old mob friend Moscatiello and another upstanding citizen named Anthony ''Little Tony'' Ferrari. When Boulis started to raise hell about the money, things grew so tense that Kidan got a restraining order and even hired three bodyguards.

Boulis filed suit, and the next month he was dead, shot to death in his BMW after leaving his office in Fort Lauderdale. Like Abramoff, Kidan says he knows nothing about Boulis' murder.

In September, Moscatiello, Ferrari and a third man, James ''Pudgy'' Fiorillo, were charged with the crime. But back to the deal:

Four months after Boulis died, SunCruz was in the toilet. Court records showed that Kidan and Abramoff had diverted $310,000 of company funds for a luxury skybox at FedEx Field in Washington, D.C., where Abramoff entertained politicians and GOP fat cats.

He and Kidan also had helped themselves to $500,000 salaries and lots of expensive perks. But here's the best part: According to prosecutors, the two men took control of the casino line without ever putting down a dime of their own dough.

Abramoff and Kidan were indicted in South Florida last summer for allegedly faking documents showing they'd invested $23 million in the deal. Those papers enabled them to obtain $60 million in real financing.

Both men say they're innocent. Predictably, Abramoff blames Kidan for the alleged fraud and insists he didn't know about his pal's past business flops, or the disbarment.

It's quite a tale, and quite a statement about the prevailing culture in Washington, D.C., where until his troubles began Abramoff owned a restaurant popular with the conservative crowd.

His role in the SunCruz takeover wasn't widely known four years ago when Gus Boulis was shot, but Abramoff obviously wasn't concerned. He and Kidan blithely siphoned the cash out the company and moved on.

Abramoff was coasting along nicely, ripping off the Indian tribes, until the SunCruz indictments last summer. Today his big-shot friends can't help him, and wouldn't if they could.

Once a star and darling of congressional Republicans, Abramoff is now political poison. No more skybox parties or free Scottish golf vacations for the Speaker of the House. No more schmoozing with Ralph Reed and Grover Norquist.

Indicted in Florida, under fire from McCain in Washington, Abramoff can now look forward to an upcoming mob-hit trial in which his once-golden name might be unflatteringly invoked.

He could even be asked to testify, an event that would reduce his once-bulging Rolodex to the thickness of a library card.

The players and politicians who are so desperately distancing themselves from Abramoff would prefer that we think of him as some small-time hustler, a fringe sleazeball who crawled out of the shadows.

He wasn't. He was a big-league hustler and a mainstream sleazeball.

And he was all theirs.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/.../printstory.jsp

House Speaker Rep. Dennis Hastert Caught In Lobbyist Abramoff's Scandal?...
| Posted November 5, 2005 05:28 PM

READ MORE: Tom DeLay, Washington Post, Jack Abramoff, Investigations

AP/Susan Walsh

In June 2003, House Speaker Dennis Hastert sent a letter to Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton urging her to act in favor of clients of the scandal-plagued lobbyist Jack Abramoff. The Cleveland Plain Dealer reported yesterday that investigators believe that Abramoff and his staff provided the congressmen with the letter's text.

Three other representatives, including former House Majority leader Tom DeLay and the current majority leader Roy Blunt, co-signed the letter. Both DeLay and Blunt have close ties to Abramoff and have received thousands of dollars from his clients.

The letter endorsed a view of gambling law that would block the Jena Band of Choctaw Indians from opening a casino nearby one owned by the Coushattas, an Abramoff client.

In September 2004, the Washington Post quoted V. Heather Sibbison, a lobbyist at the time for the Jena Band: "I have never seen a letter like that before. It was incredibly unusual for that group of people, who do not normally weigh in on Indian issues, to express such a strong opinion about a particular project not in any of their home states."

Accoring to FEC reports, since 1999 Hastert has taken $49,000 from American Indian tribes while they were Jack Abramoff's clients. On June 3, 2003, Hasteret held a fundraiser at Signatures, a Washington restaurant owned by Abramoff. He did not pay for the space until more than two years later, when Business Week began an in-depth investigation into use of Signatures.

Developing...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2005/11/05/h...is_n_10175.html

November 10, 2005
Lobbyist Sought $9 Million to Set Bush Meeting
By PHILIP SHENON
WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 - The lobbyist Jack Abramoff asked for $9 million in 2003 from the president of a West African nation to arrange a meeting with President Bush and directed his fees to a Maryland company now under federal scrutiny, according to newly disclosed documents.

The African leader, President Omar Bongo of Gabon, met with President Bush in the Oval Office on May 26, 2004, 10 months after Mr. Abramoff made the offer. There has been no evidence in the public record that Mr. Abramoff had any role in organizing the meeting or that he received any money or had a signed contract with Gabon.

White House and State Department officials described Mr. Bush's meeting with President Bongo, whose government is regularly accused by the United States of human rights abuses, as routine. The officials said they knew of no involvement by Mr. Abramoff in the arrangements. Officials at Gabon's embassy in Washington did not respond to written questions.

"This went through normal staffing channels," said Trent Duffy, a White House spokesman, who said the meeting was "part of the president's outreach to the continent of Africa."

A document from Mr. Abramoff's files that was released last week by a Senate committee shows that in the summer of 2003 he pushed to sign President Bongo as a client, even offering to travel to Gabon immediately after an August golfing vacation to Scotland "with the congressmen and senators I take there each year."

The documents also show that Mr. Abramoff and his colleagues drew up a draft contract that called for $9 million in fees to be paid to GrassRoots Interactive, the small Maryland lobbying company that his former colleagues say he controlled.

Documents, including copies of canceled checks, show that millions of dollars flowed through the company's accounts in 2003, the year it was created, including at least $2.3 million to a California consulting firm that used the same address as the law office of Mr. Abramoff's brother, Robert. A separate check for $400,000 was made out to Kay Gold, another Abramoff family company.

Mr. Abramoff, a Republican fund-raiser who once was one of the most powerful lobbyists in Washington, has been indicted in Florida on federal fraud charges. He is also under investigation by a federal grand jury in Washington and two Senate committees.

The grand jury inquiry initially centered on accusations that Mr. Abramoff had defrauded a group of Indian tribes out of tens of millions of dollars in lobbying fees connected to their gambling operations, including steep fees for work that was never performed.

But federal law enforcement officials say that inquiry has broadened, with prosecutors examining other issues, including Mr. Abramoff's relationship with GrassRoots and other small consulting firms and charities he controlled. Congressional investigators have questioned whether he used them to hide income to avoid paying taxes and to evade disclosure rules for lobbyists. Federal law requires lobbyists for foreign governments to register with the Justice Department.

A spokesman for Mr. Abramoff had no comment on GrassRoots or the lobbyist's contacts with President Bongo. Robert Abramoff did not return repeated phone calls. GrassRoots has no listed telephone number in Silver Spring, Md., where it had been based.

In a draft agreement with Gabon dated Aug. 7, 2003, Mr. Abramoff and his associates asked that $9 million in lobbying fees be paid through wire transfers - three of them, each for $3 million - to GrassRoots instead of the Washington offices of Greenberg Traurig, the large lobbying firm where he did most of his work. The agreement promised a "public relations effort related to promoting Gabon and securing a visit for President Bongo with the president of the United States."

In seeking meetings at the White House or on Capitol Hill, foreign leaders, especially those from small nations, regularly turn to Washington lobbyists, especially those who claim connections to the government because of political or family ties.

Billy Carter, President Jimmy Carter's brother, was a registered agent for Libya during his brother's presidency. During the Clinton administration, Anthony Rodham, whose sister, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, was the first lady, acknowledged that he had been offered a six-figure payment by supporters of the president of Paraguay to arrange a meeting with President Bill Clinton.

GrassRoots Interactive came under scrutiny on Capitol Hill in recent months when the Senate Judiciary Committee considered President Bush's nomination of a senior lawyer at Tyco International, a former lobbying client of Mr. Abramoff, as the No. 2 official at the Justice Department.

The lawyer, Timothy E. Flanigan, told the committee that at Mr. Abramoff's suggestion he had directed $2 million to GrassRoots from Tyco for lobbying on the company's behalf.

Instead, Mr. Flanigan said he learned last year that Mr. Abramoff had directed the money to "entities" that the lobbyist controlled and that Tyco was the victim of a "major fraud." After weeks of controversy over his ties to Mr. Abramoff, Mr. Flanigan withdrew his nomination as deputy attorney general last month.

Mr. Abramoff's ties to Gabon were first revealed in a letter that was among hundreds of pages of documents from Mr. Abramoff's files that were released last week by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, which has conducted a yearlong investigation of his lobbying for Indian tribes.

When he first approached Gabon, Mr. Abramoff was not new to issues involving West Africa.

He had been a Washington lobbyist for President Mobutu Sese Seko, the repressive leader of neighboring Congo, called Zaire at the time. He also had connections to Gabon through a former business partner, David Safavian, who was a registered agent in Washington for President Bongo. Mr. Safavian, a former White House budget official, was arrested in September on charges of lying about his ties to Mr. Abramoff.

The three-page letter released by the Senate panel was written to Mr. Bongo on Greenberg Traurig stationery and dated July 28, 2003; Mr. Abramoff suggested that he had unusual influence to arrange a meeting with President Bush.

"Without advance resources, I have been cautiously working to obtain a visit for the president to Washington to see President Bush," Mr. Abramoff wrote. "As you know, we were, in advance of the war in Iraq, able to secure a tentative date for this meeting; however, the war canceled all such scheduled visits."

Mr. Abramoff said he was willing to travel to Gabon to meet with Mr. Bongo to discuss the contract if the government would arrange for a private plane.

"It must be on the basis by which I travel anywhere, being in a private aircraft, which bears a substantial cost unfortunately," he said. "I am confident that we will have a long, productive and warm relationship, but good relationships are built on firm understandings at the outset."

Other documents obtained by The New York Times show that Mr. Abramoff and his colleagues prepared two draft agreements, both dated Aug. 7, 2003, that outlined the lobbying plan for Gabon.

One called for GrassRoots to receive $9 million in lobbying fees; the other called for Greenberg Traurig to receive $1 million, all of it in 2003.

A spokeswoman for Greenberg Traurig said the firm had no comment. "We don't comment on whom we do or don't represent," said Jill Perry, a spokeswoman for the firm, which forced Mr. Abramoff to resign last year.

Maryland state records show that GrassRoots were established in 2003 by Edward B. Miller, a Republican lawyer who is now deputy chief of staff to Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. of Maryland. Samuel Hook, a former partner of Mr. Abramoff from Greenberg Traurig, took over it in September 2003.

Mr. Ehrlich's office has said that Mr. Miller is cooperating in the Justice Department investigation. Aron Raskas, a lawyer speaking for Mr. Miller, said Mr. Miller had no knowledge of any project involving Gabon.

Mr. Hook's lawyer, Alyza D. Lewin, said that "Mr. Abramoff solely controlled G.R.I.," a reference to GrassRoots Interactive.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/10/politics...agewanted=print

Posted on Tue, Nov. 08, 2005



GOP's best friend could be its nightmare

BY JEFF SHIELDS
Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Lobbyist Jack Abramoff was not at the Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearing last week, but he was the central topic, as Congress continued to probe what some call one of this generation's most outrageous political scandals.

It was J. Steven Griles' turn to testify last Wednesday, but it could have been any number of people.

Griles, a former Interior Department deputy, was called to address suggestions that Abramoff had improperly influenced his federal work. Griles, who denies wrongdoing, is just the latest in a line of Republican officials and conservative leaders to be linked to Abramoff, who has been accused of mocking the laws that govern money and influence in American politics.

The hearing was a sharp reminder that while White House aides Karl Rove and I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby dominate the headlines, Abramoff remains - according to some observers - the Republican Party's most dangerous problem.

"I don't think we have had something of this scope, arrogance and sheer venality in our lifetimes," Norman J. Ornstein, resident scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, wrote recently. "It is building to an explosion, one that could create immense collateral damage within Congress and in coming elections."

Abramoff and his friends are some of the biggest players in the conservative revolution that took over Congress, the White House, and the lobbying industry.

Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who once called Abramoff one of his "closest and dearest friends," has requested a House ethics investigation to clear his name relating to trips he took at Abramoff's expense; DeLay has said he thought the trips were paid for by other sources.

Christian Coalition founder Ralph Reed, antitax guru Grover Norquist, members of Congress, administration officials, and a host of lobbyists have been drawn into Senate or Justice Department investigations of Abramoff's lobbying activities.

It goes on: Abramoff and a business partner were indicted in Florida in August on charges of fraud and conspiracy for their 2000 purchase of a gambling-boat fleet.

Former White House official David Safavian has been indicted on charges that he lied about his Abramoff ties and has pleaded not guilty. Rep. Bob W. Ney, R-Ohio, has been subpoenaed by a grand jury investigating Abramoff and is himself under federal criminal investigation on suspicion of taking bribes in the form of campaign contributions. Ney has denied wrongdoing.

Because Abramoff was so close to the power structure and fundraising mechanisms of the Republican Party, "he knows where a lot more of the bodies are buried," said Bill Allison, spokesman for the Center for Public Integrity, a nonpartisan ethics watchdog group.

"Abramoff goes to the much broader issue of how the Republicans have held their majority together," Allison said.

Abramoff, who was president of National College Republicans in the early 1980s, wrote and produced a B movie and once organized a meeting of anticommunist guerrillas and mujaheddin in Africa, became one of Washington's most powerful influence peddlers when Republicans took over Washington in 1994.

He opened a restaurant, Signatures, and leased skyboxes at sports arenas, where he held fundraisers. According to documents released by Senate investigators, he directed his clients - often unregulated entities that included U.S. territories, Indian tribes and Internet gaming clients - as to how much and where to direct their political contributions.

Abramoff invoked Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination when called before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee last year. Through a spokesman, he denies wrongdoing.

"Mr. Abramoff is put into the impossible position of not being able to defend himself in the public arena until the proper authorities have had a chance to review all accusations," spokesman Andrew Blum said in a statement. "Any fair reading of Mr. Abramoff's career would show that his clients benefited immensely from the hard work he and his team did on their behalf."

Thousands of e-mails subpoenaed by Senate investigators indicate a man who was publicly dedicated to conservative ideals while privately committed to enriching himself. His public descent began before the Indian Affairs Committee in September 2004, where he and partner Michael Scanlon, DeLay's former press secretary, were found to have charged Indian tribes more than $66 million while privately referring to their clients as "monkeys" and "troglodytes."

"What sets this tale apart, what makes it truly extraordinary, is the extent and degree of the apparent exploitation and deceit," Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., chairman of the Indian Affairs Committee, said at one of four hearings he has used to shame Abramoff over the past year.

Chairman Kevin Sickey of the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana, one of Abramoff's aggrieved clients, testified last week that the e-mails also offered a rare glimpse into the legal "underworld of government affairs."

"He is the golden-boy-gone-bad of the American political system," said Sickey, whose tribe paid Abramoff and partner Scanlon more than $32 million over three years.

Senate hearings and published reports have alleged that Abramoff and Scanlon often charged their tribal clients for work they never performed; paid to fly members of Congress and their staffs to places such as Saipan in the Northern Marianas Islands and Scotland, a violation of ethics rules; and secretly hired Reed with tribal gaming money to shutter a rival casino in the name of Christian family values. When Abramoff's gambling business venture in Florida went sour, a business rival was slain. Abramoff was not implicated, but two men hired by Abramoff's business partner are charged with the killing.

Abramoff, a major fundraiser for the Republican Party, was a "pioneer" for President Bush, meaning he raised at least $100,000 for the 2004 campaign, and his clients gave much more. He boasted of access to White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove, dined with Interior Secretary Gail A. Norton, and hired away key members of DeLay's staff as his lobbying partners.

"The Congress and the United States Government became Jack Abramoff's personal playground," said Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., who has long complained of Abramoff's influence in the Northern Marianas Islands, a U.S. territory that Abramoff helped keep free from U.S. minimum-wage and immigration laws. "But Abramoff was only able to succeed because he had willing partners within the Congress and this administration."

The Abramoff story "is breathtaking in its reach," McCain said at last week's Indian Affairs hearing, before leaning on witnesses, including former Interior Department deputy Griles, with gusto.

That same day, Griles was called to answer questions about why, according to Norton's former chief counsel, he suddenly became interested in a decision on whether the Jena Band of Choctaw Indians - a potential competitor of Abramoff's clients, the Louisiana Coushattas - would be permitted open a casino in 2002. E-mails showed that Abramoff, at the time, was channeling $250,000 from the Coushattas to an environmental nonprofit formed by Norton before she became Interior secretary, and now run by a friend of Griles'.

"I was alarmed that Mr. Griles had an inexplicable desire to become involved in this particular decision," said Michael Rossetti, Norton's former counsel. Rossetti said he challenged Griles, asking, "Whose water was he carrying?" - and Griles backed down.

Griles said he didn't recall being so interested and was "confused" by Rossetti's testimony.

In the end, the testimonies of Rossetti and Griles stood in direct conflict, but the 318 pages of e-mails had provided another revealing day, courtesy of Jack Abramoff.

"I've learned so much today," Griles said. "I'm really disappointed in what I've learned about today."

---

ABRAMOFF'S CIRCLE

Lobbyist Jack Abramoff is under investigation by at least three federal agencies and two Senate committees for his dealings with members of Congress, their staffs, and his clients. Much of the evidence has come from e-mails released to Senate investigators by Abramoff's former lobbying firm. Here are some of the main characters in the Abramoff inquiry:

REP. TOM DELAY: DeLay called Abramoff "one of my closest and dearest friends" and was allied with Abramoff in populating the lobbying industry with former Republican staff members, including his own. DeLay has requested that the House ethics committee look into three trips he made that were paid for by Abramoff or his clients.

DAVID SAFAVIAN: A former lobbying partner of Abramoff's, Safavian was chief of staff of the General Services Administration before he was arrested Sept. 19 and charged with lying to federal investigators about his dealings with Abramoff. He has pleaded not guilty.

REP. BOB W. NEY: The Ohio Republican, who chairs the House Administration Committee, which oversees campaign finance, has been subpoenaed by the federal grand jury investigating Abramoff in Washington. Abramoff organized a golfing trip to Scotland for Ney in 2002. Ney has denied any wrongdoing.

MICHAEL SCANLON: A former press secretary for DeLay, he partnered with Abramoff in a lobbying/public-relations business that took in more than $82 million from 12 American Indian tribes between 2001 and 2003. He has refused to testify before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, which is investigating whether he and Abramoff defrauded Indian clients and their gambling operations out of tens of millions of dollars.

RALPH REED: Former executive director of the Christian Coalition and now a candidate for lieutenant governor of Georgia, he was paid by a Louisiana tribe to rally Christian opposition against competing tribal casinos. Reed said he did not know his efforts were being funded by Abramoff's gaming clients, but Abramoff's e-mails indicate otherwise.

GROVER NORQUIST: President of the antitax group Americans for Tax Reform and a leading conservative activist, he received a subpoena from the Senate Indian Affairs Committee for records related to his dealings with Abramoff. The subpoena came after Abramoff's e-mails showed that he sometimes funneled money from his tribal gaming clients through Norquist's group to hide its source.

SEN. CONRAD BURNS: The Montana Republican helped Abramoff's client, the wealthy Saginaw Chippewas of Michigan, land $3 million in federal funding intended for impoverished tribes after the Department of the Interior determined that the tribe did not qualify. Two of Burns' staff members later joined Abramoff's lobbying team.

TIMOTHY FLANIGAN: President Bush's nominee for the Justice Department's No. 2 position, he withdrew his name from consideration after questions about his relationship with Abramoff when he was corporate counsel for Tyco International Ltd. Flanigan testified that Abramoff bragged of his access to Karl Rove, the White House deputy chief of staff, and DeLay when Abramoff was lobbying for Tyco.

ADAM KIDAN: A disbarred lawyer, he partnered with Abramoff to buy SunCruz Casinos, a Florida gambling-boat empire built by businessman Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis. Kidan and Abramoff were indicted in August for mail and wire fraud in the $147 million purchase in 2000. Boulis was killed six months after the sale.

ANTHONY MOSCATIELLO: He has been charged with conspiracy to murder Boulis. Moscatiello, who was friends with Kidan, and his daughter were paid at least $145,000 by SunCruz when it was controlled by Kidan and Abramoff.

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/n.../printstory.jsp

November 12, 2005
Democrats Seek Documents on Lobbyist and Bush Meeting
By PHILIP SHENON
WASHINGTON, Nov. 11 - House Democratic leaders called on the White House on Friday to release documents showing whether a powerful Republican lobbyist had a role in arranging an Oval Office meeting last year between President Bush and the president of the West African nation of Gabon, whose government had been asked by the lobbyist to pay $9 million to help arrange such a meeting.

In a letter to the White House counsel's office, the House Democratic leader, Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, and the senior Democrat on the Government Reform Committee, Representative Henry A. Waxman of California, said they wanted copies of "all records relating to any connections between White House staff" and the lobbyist, Jack Abramoff, "regarding a visit by representatives of Gabon."

The White House and the State Department have said that the meeting with President Omar Bongo of Gabon on May 26, 2004, was routine and that there was no evidence of any involvement by Mr. Abramoff.

"However," Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Waxman wrote, "it is impossible for Congress and the public to assess this assertion without further documentation from the White House."

The White House has said the meeting had special importance because Gabon held the presidency of the United Nations General Assembly last year and because of the Bush administration's interest in AIDS prevention in Africa. The Gabon Embassy in Washington has not responded to written questions from The New York Times about the meeting.

A spokeswoman for Mr. Abramoff, who is under indictment in Florida and under investigation by a federal grand jury in Washington, would not discuss the lobbyist's approach to President Bongo, whose government has often been criticized by the State Department as having a poor record on human rights.

The White House had no comment Friday on whether it would release documents to the House Democrats, who also requested material from the State Department about President Bongo's meeting.

A White House spokesman, Trent Duffy, said, "President Bush met with President Bongo because he believes in good U.S.-Africa relations, and if Democrats question that, that's their business."

Mr. Abramoff's contacts with Gabon were disclosed last week when the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, which is investigating his lobbying for Indian tribes and their gambling operations, released hundreds of pages of documents from his files, including a July 2003 letter in which Mr. Abramoff wrote to President Bongo to urge Gabon to hire him as a lobbyist.

Other documents obtained by The Times show that Mr. Abramoff and his colleagues drew up a draft contract in August 2003 that called for Gabon to pay $9 million for a "public relations effort related to promoting Gabon and securing a visit for President Bongo with the president of the United States."

There is no evidence in the public record to show that Mr. Abramoff completed a contract with Gabon or received any money from it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/12/politics...agewanted=print

A Houston Chronicle editorial that ties DeLay to Abramoff, Reed and the Indian Casino scandal. This is right in DeLay's back yard. His Congressional district is in the Houston suburbs.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/editorial/3455736

We can toss Cornyn into the Abramoff scandal pot, which is simmering along nicely.

This is from the Austin American-Statesman:

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/gen/...nyn_Glance.html

I believe this article goes with the emails in the last post:

http://www.statesman.com/metrostate/conten...9601410025.html

A Detour in The Corridor Of Power
Indictment Snaps Rapid Rise of Republican Star

By Thomas B. Edsall
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 16, 2005; A17



Before he was indicted on five felony counts of lying to investigators, David H. Safavian was positioned to break out of the pack of Republican operatives working in Washington.

Just 38, he was administrator of the Office of Federal Procurement Policy at the president's Office of Management and Budget, with the authority to make the rules governing $300 billion in annual expenditures, including those in response to Hurricane Katrina.

But that was before federal agents appeared at his home on Sept. 19 and arrested Safavian in connection with the investigation of Jack Abramoff, charging that Safavian lied about his dealings with the onetime powerhouse lobbyist and misled investigators from the General Services Administration and the Senate.

Knowing the indictment was imminent, Safavian had resigned his post three days earlier, derailing a government career he had carefully planned and skillfully executed.

Safavian's lawyer, Barbara Van Gelder, said the indictment is mainly a tactic by prosecutors to force Safavian to testify against Abramoff. At a hearing Monday, she demanded documents from the Abramoff criminal investigation that refer to Safavian.

Abramoff is under investigation by the Senate and several government agencies in connection with $82 million he and a partner charged Native American groups for lobbying and public relations services and other matters dealing with elected and appointed officials. He also has been charged with wire fraud and conspiracy in connection with the purchase of a casino cruise company in Florida.

Those close to Safavian say that whatever the outcome of the charges against him, he faces serious, if not insurmountable, obstacles to getting his career in Washington back on track.

Safavian set out a decade ago to win the backing of influential conservative Republicans such as Abramoff and anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist. In the intense competition for power in Washington, Safavian climbed the political ladder in the relatively short span of 10 years.

With a degree from the Detroit College of Law and a master's in tax law from Georgetown University, the Pontiac, Mich., native began as an associate lobbyist in 1995 at Preston, Gates and Ellis, where Abramoff was a lobbyist. Later he worked as a principal at Janus-Merritt Strategies, where Norquist was a consultant.

Safavian represented controversial but often lucrative clients, including the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, the Distilled Spirits Council, the Interactive Gaming Council and the National Indian Gaming Association.

An Iranian American, Safavian was a founding member of the board of Norquist's Islamic Free Market Institute, when the Bush campaign was targeting Arab American voters in key states such as Florida and Michigan.

Norquist, who welcomed Safavian to the board of the institute in 1999, declined to answer questions about Safavian.

In 2001, Safavian began a remarkable, four-year ascent in government. He first served in 2001-02 as chief of staff to Rep. Chris Cannon (R-Utah). Then, in June 2002, Safavian moved to the executive branch with a plum assignment: chief of staff at the General Services Administration. GSA is the government's bread and butter agency, letting contracts for construction as well as buying goods and services.

Safavian's big break came on Nov. 4, 2003, when President Bush nominated him to become the powerful administrator of the Office of Federal Procurement Policy. The post is crucial to the information technology, contracting and services industries, whose contractors can have millions of dollars riding on every OFPP decision.

The Safavian appointment brought immediate plaudits from the government contracting community. Larry Allen, executive vice president of the Coalition for Government Procurement, described Safavian as "a good man, and he's aware of the policies in play."

Safavian, however, needed Senate confirmation and ran into problems. One involved representation of a client at Janus-Merritt. The firm listed Abdurahman Alamoudi as a client starting on Sept. 18, 2000. Safavian was one of five lobbyists listed as working on the Alamoudi account.

Alamoudi, a prominent Muslim activist, was sentenced last year to 23 years in prison for conspiring to assassinate then-Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. In July, the Treasury Department charged that Alamoudi "raised money for al Qaeda in the United States."

Before those troubles, Alamoudi spoke at an October 2000 rally in front of the White House, where he declared his support for the Islamic Resistance Movement, or Hamas, which has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States.

Janus-Merritt Strategies continued to identify Alamoudi as a client in its next two reports to the Senate, listing receipt of two $20,0000 payments. But in December 2001, it declared that "an error" had been made and that Alamoudi was not a client. Instead, another man, Jamal Barzinji of Herndon, should have been listed as the firm's contact.

Safavian confirmed the change in written answers to the staff of the Senate Government Affairs Committee in April 2004.

On March 20, 2002, FBI, IRS and Custom Services agents raided the Herndon office building listed by Janus-Merritt as Barzinji's address, as well as Barzinji's nearby home. In an affidavit, the government said three agencies had been investigating whether groups at that address were providing material support to terrorists, laundering money and evading taxes. No charges have been filed against Barzinji, and he has denied wrongdoing.

White House spokeswoman Erin Healy would not say whether the administration had looked into Safavian's relationship with Alamoudi and Barzinji before nominating him. "We are cooperating fully with the Department of Justice investigation," she said.

On June 2, 2004, the Government Affairs Committee unanimously approved Safavian's nomination. The Senate confirmed him Nov. 21, 2004, but not before he ran into more trouble.

On Sept 28, 2004, The Washington Post disclosed that in August 2002, Safavian, who was then at the GSA, had gone on a golfing trip to Scotland arranged by Abramoff. House Administration Committee Chairman Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio) and lobbyist and former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed were also on the trip.

Safavian told GSA officials when he took the trip that he had no business dealings with Abramoff. The federal affidavit filed when Safavian was arrested says Abramoff had asked Safavian about acquiring property controlled by the GSA, butSafavian's lawyer contends the inquiries did not constitute "doing business," and said Safavian paid his share of the $120,000-plus trip by giving Abramoff a check for $3,100.

Safavian and Abramoff's spokesman, Andrew Blum, declined to comment. OMB spokesman Alex Conant said, "We don't comment on personnel and security issues. . . . Mr. Safavian resigned and is no longer an OMB employee. OMB is cooperating fully with the Department of Justice's investigation."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1501406_pf.html

November 17, 2005
Lawmakers Acted on Heels of Abramoff Gifts
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 5:00 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- While Congress investigated Jack Abramoff's efforts to win influence inside government, its members held a secret: Nearly three dozen lawmakers pressed to block a Louisiana Indian casino while collecting large donations from the lobbyist and his tribal clients.

Many lawmakers, including leaders in both parties, intervened with letters to Interior Secretary Gale Norton within days of receiving money from tribes represented by Abramoff or using the lobbyist's restaurant for fundraising, an Associated Press review of campaign reports, IRS records and congressional correspondence found.

Lawmakers said their intervention had nothing to do with Abramoff and that the timing of donations was a coincidence. They said they wrote letters because they opposed the expansion of tribal gambling, even though they continued to accept donations from casino-operating tribes.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., held a fundraiser at Abramoff's Signatures restaurant in Washington on June 3, 2003, that collected at least $21,500 for Hastert's Keep Our Majority political action committee from the lobbyist's firm and tribal clients.

Seven days later, Hastert wrote Norton urging her to reject the Jena tribe of Choctaw Indians' request for a new casino. Hastert's three top House deputies also signed the letter.

Approving the Jena application or others like it would ''run counter to congressional intent,'' according to Hastert's letter of June 10, 2003, to Norton.

It was what Abramoff's tribal clients wanted. The tribes, including the Louisiana Coushattas and Mississippi Choctaw, were trying to block the Jena's gambling hall for fear it would undercut business at their casinos.

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada sent a letter to Norton on March 5, 2002, that also was signed by Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev. The next day, the Coushattas issued a $5,000 check to Reid's tax-exempt political group, the Searchlight Leadership Fund. A second tribe represented by Abramoff sent an additional $5,000 to Reid's group. Reid ultimately received more than $66,000 in Abramoff-related donations between 2001 and 2004.

In the midst of the congressional letter-writing campaign, the Bush administration rejected the Jena's casino on technical grounds. The tribe persisted, eventually winning the department's approval. The casino now is tied up in a court dispute.

Congressional ethics rules require lawmakers to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest in performing their official duties and accepting political money.

That requirement was made famous a decade ago during the Keating Five scandal when five lawmakers were criticized for intervening with federal regulators on behalf of Charles Keating while receiving money from the failed savings and loan operator.

The Abramoff donations dwarf those made by Keating. At least 33 lawmakers wrote letters to Norton and got more than $830,000 in Abramoff-related donations as the lobbying unfolded between 2001 and 2004, AP found.

The campaign finance watchdog group Democracy 21 called for a congressional investigation.

''When you have members of Congress urging action to an executive branch official on a case-specific matter at around the same time they are receiving contributions or financial favors from someone in favor of that action, it raises fundamental ethics questions about whether there is a conflict or an inappropriate use of the office that must be investigated by the House and Senate ethics committees,'' said Fred Wertheimer, the group's president.

Lawmakers contacted by the AP said their intervention had nothing to do with Abramoff's fundraising, but reflected their long-held concerns about tribal gaming expansion.

''There is absolutely no connection between the letter and the fundraising,'' said Reid's spokesman, Jim Manley. ''The only connection was Senator Reid has consistently opposed any effort to undermine the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act.''

Hastert ultimately collected more than $100,000 in donations from Abramoff's firm and tribal clients between 2001 and 2004. His office said he never discussed the matter with Abramoff, but long opposed expanding Indian gambling off reservations and was asked to send the letter by Rep. Jim McCrery, R-La.

McCrery sent his own letter as well and collected more than $36,000 in Abramoff-connected donations.

''We've always opposed these things, in our backyard, in our state, someplace else,'' said Michael Stokke, Hastert's deputy chief of staff.

Melanie Sloan, a former federal prosecutor, said lawmakers' denials of a connection rang hollow.

''Special interests do get more and they do get what they pay for despite the constant denial that lawmakers can't be bought,'' said Sloan, who runs Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a group that monitors public officials' conduct.

Abramoff's spokesman, Andrew Blum, declined comment. The lobbyist has been indicted on fraud charges by a federal grand jury in Florida stemming from his role in the 2000 purchase of a fleet of gambling boats.

Federal prosecutors are investigating whether Abramoff's fundraising influenced members of Congress or the Bush administration, and whether anyone tried to conceal their dealings with Abramoff. For instance:

--Hastert failed for two years to disclose his use of Abramoff's restaurant the week before his letter or to reimburse for it as legally required. Hastert blames a paperwork oversight and recently corrected it.

--Sen. David Vitter, R-La., received $6,000 from tribes represented by Abramoff from 1999 to 2001 and refunded it the day before he sent one of his letters to Norton in February 2002. He also used Abramoff's restaurant for a September 2003 fundraiser but failed to reimburse for it until this year.

--The Coushattas wrote two checks to Rep. Tom DeLay's groups in 2001 and 2002, shortly before the GOP leader wrote Norton. But the tribe was asked by Abramoff to take back the checks and route the money to other GOP groups. In all, DeLay, R-Texas, received at least $57,000 in Abramoff and tribal donations between 2001 and 2004.

The intervention by congressional Republicans and Democrats was all but ignored in recent hearings on Capitol Hill led by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., that examined Abramoff's lobbying inside the Interior Department.

In one letter obtained by the AP, 27 lawmakers told Norton she should reject the Jena casino because gambling was a societal blight. But within weeks, several of the authors had accepted donations from Abramoff's casino-operating tribes. All but eight eventually got Abramoff-related donations or used his restaurant for political events.

Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, received four donations totaling $5,500 from casino-operating tribes represented by Abramoff a month and a day after he signed the Feb. 27, 2002, group letter.

''If they want to give a contribution to support Republican candidates, more power to them. That doesn't mean we have to support what they are doing,'' said Guy Harrison, a spokesman for Sessions.

Rep. John Doolittle, R-Calif., received $1,000 from Abramoff several weeks before he signed the group letter, then got $16,000 from two of Abramoff's casino-operating tribal clients about two months later. By year's end, Doolittle also had used Abramoff's restaurant to cater a campaign event and received an additional $15,000 from tribes.

Some lawmakers intervened more than once.

The current House majority leader, Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., signed three letters to Norton. He took $1,000 from Abramoff and $2,000 from the lobbyist's firm around the time he sent a May 2003 letter.

Blunt long has opposed the expansion of tribal gaming and his letters are ''consistent with his long-held position and are in no way related to political contributions,'' spokeswoman Burson Taylor said.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, whose committee is investigating Abramoff, sent a letter on March 1, 2002, opposing the Jena casino. The letter said a company that operates casinos in Grassley's home state was concerned. Grassley got $1,000 from Abramoff's firm the following month and a total of $62,200 in related donation by 2004.

Others who intervened:

--Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., the former Senate GOP leader, wrote Norton on March 1, 2002, to ''seriously urge'' she reject the Jena casino. Lott received $10,000 in donations from Abramoff's tribal clients just before the letter and $55,000 soon after. Lott's office said he sent the letter because his state's Choctaw tribe and a casino company were concerned about losing business.

--Then-Sen. John Breaux, D-La., wrote Norton on March 1, 2002. Five days later the Coushattas sent $1,000 to his campaign and $10,000 to his library fund, tribal records show.

--Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., wrote Norton on June 14, 2001, one of the first such letters. Cochran's political committee got $6,000 from Abramoff tribes in the weeks before the letter, and an additional $71,000 in the three years after.

--Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., who was engaged in a tight re-election race in 2002, sent her letter March 6, 2002. That same day, the Coushattas sent $2,000 to her campaign and she received $5,000 more by the end of that month. By year's end, the total had grown to at least $24,000.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/A...agewanted=print

Abramoff Witness Frustrates Panel
E-Mails Suggest She Was Lobbyist's Connection to Interior Official

By Susan Schmidt
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 18, 2005; A08



"Unfortunately, she is critical to me."

That's how former lobbyist Jack Abramoff once summed up his relationship with Italia Federici, the president of a Republican environmental group. He told colleagues that although Federici's help was expensive, it was important. Over three years, he directed Indian tribes he represented to contribute about $500,000 to her group.

Yesterday, Federici proved a combative witness before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. She tangled with senators demanding explanations for a stack of e-mails that suggest she exploited a personal relationship with former deputy interior secretary J. Steven Griles to secretly help Abramoff lobby the department and obtain inside information affecting Abramoff's tribal clients.

Federici said she had been manipulated by Abramoff. She acknowledged that the lobbyist had arranged for the tribes to donate to her group, the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy. Because he was a friend and donor, she said, she went along with his requests -- "once every other week, once a month" -- to contact Griles.

Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) and the ranking Democrat, Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (N.D.), cast Federici as a paid conduit for Abramoff's influence-peddling with the department.

"It looks to me like you got paid for things that had nothing to do whatever with your organization," Dorgan said. "It looks to me like you were working for Mr. Abramoff and you were getting paid by Indian tribes to do it."

Federici told the committee: "He did ask me for assistance, but it was not the body of work I did." She said she was "responding to Jack as a friend, as I would respond to any friend who had a need or question." Federici said she learned later about Abramoff's lobbying practices now under investigation. "I didn't know he was doing the things he was doing," she said.

"I come from a pretty small town, but I think I can spot a pretty big lie," Dorgan told Federici. She insisted, "I am not lying to this committee."

Typical of the many requests Abramoff made to Federici was an e-mail dated Dec. 2, 2002, in which he sought Griles's help in scuttling a casino plan by the Jena Band of Choctaw, a Louisiana tribe seen as competition by his clients: "It seems the Jena are on the march again. if you can, can you make sure Steve squelches this again? thanks!!"

Asked to explain Abramoff's request and what she did with it, Federici responded: "We work with people every day with varying levels of decorum." It was a response that drew a puzzled scowl from McCain, who said at one point: "Your answers are so bizarre."

Griles testified earlier this month that he never got involved in tribal issues at Interior and said his relationship with Abramoff was no different from that with any lobbyist.

McCain, exasperated yesterday with Federici's "non-responsive" answers and combative demeanor, threatened to cite her for contempt. Federici accused McCain of conducting a "witch hunt" directed at her because her group had opposed one of his bills on oil drilling in Alaska.

Federici said her group had no contact with the tribes that contributed, and did not get involved in any tribal issues. But she said she did not question Abramoff's solicitation of tribal contributions because he was known as a philanthropist.

Abramoff's requests were often paired with discussions of contributions for Federici's group. On April 3, 2003, Abramoff sent her an "urgent alert" about an Interior policy change. "Any way to see if this is something coming from the top?" he asked. Federici responded: "I will definitely see what i can find out. I hate to bug you, but is there any news about a possible contribution. . . ."

McCain questioned whether the exchange was a quid pro quo.

On a school funding issue affecting the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe, an Abramoff client, Abramoff asked Federici to call Griles. "We're really going to need someone from the top down to tell [acting Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs] Aurene Martin . . . that this money is going to the Saginaw, period."

"Got it," Federici replied.

Yesterday she told the Senate panel that she had merely meant to register receipt of the e-mail. While she always agreed to Abramoff's requests, she said, "I attempted to reach Steve many times more than I actually did."

Federici's group was co-founded by Gale A. Norton before she joined the Bush administration as interior secretary. In one e-mail, Abramoff told a colleague that Federici's group was "our access to Norton."

McCain said the committee has found no evidence that Norton knew Abramoff was trading on her name. Dan DuBray, Norton's press secretary, said she "was not aware of these activities." He added: "Mr. Abramoff's contact with the department -- both his direct contacts and those which may have been conducted by surrogates -- are being reviewed by the office of the inspector general and others."

Much of Abramoff's effort against the Jena tribe involved getting members of Congress to weigh in. At least 33 lawmakers who wrote letters to Norton opposing the Jena casino received more than $830,000 in Abramoff-related donations from 2001 to 2004, according to an Associated Press tally. Many of the lawmakers sent letters within days of receiving contributions from tribes represented by Abramoff or using the lobbyist's restaurant for fundraising, the AP found in its review of campaign records, IRS records and congressional correspondence.

Among those who wrote letters was House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), who held a fundraiser at Abramoff's Signatures restaurant on June 3, 2003, that collected at least $21,500 for his Keep Our Majority political action committee from the lobbyist's firm and tribal clients. A week later, Hastert wrote Norton to urge her to reject the Jena casino.

Senate Democratic Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) sent a letter to Norton on March 5, 2002, also signed by Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev). The next day, the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana issued a $5,000 check to Reid's tax-exempt political group, the Searchlight Leadership Fund. A second Abramoff tribe also sent $5,000 to Reid's group. Reid ultimately received more than $66,000 in Abramoff-related donations from 2001 to 2004.

The lawmakers contacted by the AP said their intervention had nothing to do with Abramoff's fundraising, but reflected their long-held concerns about expanding tribal gambling.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1701682_pf.html

http://apnews1.iwon.com//article/20051118/...G=home&SEC=news

November 18, 2005
Associate of Lobbyist Charged as Part of Corruption Scheme
By ANNE E. KORNBLUT and MARIA NEWMAN
WASHINGTON, Nov. 18 - Michael P.S. Scanlon, a business associate of the lobbyist Jack Abramoff, was charged today with conspiring to defraud Indian tribes of millions of dollars as part of a corruption scheme that included at least one member of Congress.

Mr. Scanlon, formerly the spokesman for Representative Tom DeLay, sought to "corruptly offer and provide things of value, including money, meals, trips and entertainment to federal public officials" in exchange for help with legislation and other favors, according to legal papers filed today.

The court document singled out one lawmaker, referring to him as "representative #1," as the chief recipient of lavish gifts from Mr. Scanlon and his partner. Representative Bob Ney, Republican of Ohio, has been subpoenaed in the case and the description in the indictment matches public accounts of his work with the lobbyists.

Mr. Ney has proclaimed his innocence, saying he was tricked into doing favors for Mr. Scanlon and Mr. Abramoff.

Brian J. Walsh, a spokesman for Mr. Ney, said the congressman would cooperate fully with investigators.

"He has not been told that he is the target of any investigation and there would be no grounds to do so," Mr. Walsh said in a statement. "Mr. Scanlon's being charged with lying to and cheating his clients does not change that."

Today's action came in what is called a criminal information filing, rather than an indictment, a legal distinction that often means prosecutors have reached a plea agreement with a defendant.

A Justice Department spokesman, Bryan Sierra, told The Associated Press that a hearing has been scheduled for Monday in Mr. Scanlon's case, but he provided no other details.

Investigators from several law enforcement agencies have been pursuing accusations that Mr. Abramoff and Mr. Scanlon defrauded several Indian tribes that paid them about $80 million for four years of work.

The inquiry has had repercussions across Washington because of Mr. Abramoff's and Mr. Scanlon's close ties to Mr. DeLay, who stepped down from his leadership post after being charged with violating campaign finance law in Texas.

One Bush administration official, David Safavian, the head of procurement at the Office of Management and Budget, was forced to resign in September after he was charged with lying to investigators about assistance he gave to Mr. Abramoff and obstructing a federal inquiry involving the lobbyist. The month before, a federal grand jury in Florida indicted Mr. Abramoff on charges of fraud and conspiracy stemming from his purchase of a fleet of gambling boats in 2000.

In the case of Mr. Scanlon, today's filing alleges that "Lobbyist A," who is not identified, solicited an Indian tribe in Mississippi in 1995 to provide lobbying services on taxes and other issues relating to tribal sovereignty.

The lobbyist then recommended that the tribe hire Mr. Scanlon's company, Capital Campaign Strategies, while concealing the fact the Lobbyist A would receive 50 percent of the profits from the tribe's payment to Mr. Scanlon, according to the document.

The Mississippi tribe paid Mr. Scanlon's firm $14.8 million from June 2001 through April 2004, while Mr. Scanlon concealed from the tribe that 50 percent of the profit "was kicked back to Lobbyist A pursuant to their secret arrangement," the court papers said.

Anne E. Kornblut reported from Washington for this article, and Maria Newman from New York.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/18/politics...agewanted=print

[qoute] Representative Bob Ney, Republican of Ohio, has been subpoenaed in the case and the description in the indictment matches public accounts of his work with the lobbyists.

Mr. Ney has proclaimed his innocence, saying he was tricked into doing favors for Mr. Scanlon and Mr. Abramoff.

Brian J. Walsh, a spokesman for Mr. Ney, said the congressman would cooperate fully with investigators.

"He has not been told that he is the target of any investigation and there would be no grounds to do so," Mr. Walsh said in a statement. "Mr. Scanlon's being charged with lying to and cheating his clients does not change that." [unqoute]

Mr. Ney is telling his constituents that he can't get a hearing in the House ethics committee to clear his name. It was the republicans who changed the ethics committee rules earlier this year for Tom Delay then had to retract them. The committe still has not reconvened due to staffing problems.

I hope that Ohioans vote him out next year.

UPDATE: As Pachacutec says, this is certainly worth a big mention. Guess whose partner got indicted? (Hint: His last name is Abramoff. Ahem.)

CORRECTION: Oh, and it just gets better. In re-reading the "indictment" article, at Pach's suggestion, it wasn't an indictment after all. It was an information.
In a one-count criminal information filed by the government, Scanlon was charged with conspiring with another lobbyist, who was not identified.

Although the document lists Scanlon's co-conspirator only as "Lobbyist A," it has been a matter of public record for more than a year that Scanlon and Abramoff had a fee-splitting arrangement and represented several Indian tribes.
For the non-legal folks among us, what this most likely means is that Jack Abramoff's partner cut a deal -- which likely means that he has flipped and turned State's evidence.

Oh man. What a glorious, schadenfreude-filled Friday this is turning out to be.

posted by ReddHedd @ 11:48 AM

http://firedoglake.blogspot.com/

C-span 2 is showing McCain's hearing on the Abramoff Indian scandal - on Thursday.

Italia Federici is testifying. She is the president of the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy (CoREA). CoREA is an anti-environment group.

McCain treated her as a hostile witness. She attacked McCain in her deposition. She denied getting bad money from Abramoff.

I watched it last night (actually early this morning).

November 18, 2005
Ex - Republican Aide Charged in Corruption Case
By REUTERS
Filed at 11:32 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A one-time aide to former House Republican Leader Tom DeLay of Texas has been charged with conspiring with his lobbyist partner Jack Abramoff to defraud Indian tribes of millions of dollars and to corruptly give gifts to a member of Congress, prosecutors said.

The filing of the one-count charge in federal court against Michael Scanlon, was contained in what is called a criminal information, usually used in cases involving a plea agreement, rather than in an indictment.

The New York Times reported on its Web site that Scanlon had agreed to plead guilty on Monday. ``Mr. Scanlon and the Department of Justice will present a proposed plea agreement to the court to resolve the charge,'' his lawyer, Stephen Braga, was quoted as saying.

The charge was filed in federal court on Thursday and made public on Friday.

According to the charge, Scanlon and Abramoff, once a powerful Washington lobbyist, provided a stream of things of value to a member of Congress, identified only as ''Representative No. 1,'' from January 2000 through April of last year.

The lawmaker and members of his staff received a lavish golf trip to Scotland, tickets to sporting events and other entertainment, regular meals and campaign contributions in return for supporting legislation, according to the court documents.

Rep. Bob Ney, a Republican from Ohio, said recently he had received a subpoena as part of the U.S. Justice Department's investigation of Abramoff.

A spokesman for Ney said the lawmaker will fully cooperate in the investigation. ``He has not been told that he is the target of any investigation and there would be no grounds to do so. Mr. Scanlon's being charged with lying to and cheating his clients does not change that,'' the spokesman said.

According to the seven-page court document, the conspiracy's purpose was for Scanlon and Abramoff ``to enrich themselves by obtaining substantial funds from their clients through fraud and concealment and through obtaining benefits for their clients through corrupt means.''

A Justice Department spokesman said a hearing had been scheduled for Monday in federal court in Washington in Scanlon's case, but refused to give any details.

The documents described Scanlon's dealings with ``Lobbyist A,'' with whom he worked. Although the lobbyist was not identified by name, a source close to the investigation said that it was Abramoff.

Scanlon's former boss, DeLay, faces conspiracy and money laundering charges in Texas as part of a campaign finance investigation. He resigned as majority leader in September when he was indicted.

Abramoff has pleaded not guilty to federal charges in Florida that he defrauded lenders in a casino cruise line deal.

The charges involving Scanlon said Abramoff solicited an Indian tribe in Mississippi in 1995 as a client for lobbying services on various issues.

Abramoff recommended that the tribe hire Scanlon's company, Capital Campaign Strategies, while concealing the fact that Abramoff would get half of the profits from the tribe's payments to Scanlon, according to the court papers.

The tribe paid Scanlon's firm $14.8 million from June 2001 through April 2004, while Scanlon concealed from the tribe that 50 percent of the profit, about $6.3 million, was kicked back to Abramoff under their secret arrangement, according to the papers.

The court documents detailed similar arrangements for tribes in Louisiana, Michigan and Texas.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/po...agewanted=print

If you haven't been keeping up with the Abramoff investigation you might want to check out this thread. There was major news on it today that should make Bob Ney, Tom Delay and possibly others very nervous.

http://www.commongroundcommonsense.org/for...pic=39944&st=30

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/20/politics...agewanted=print

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

November 20, 2005
Corruption Inquiry Threatens to Ensnare Lawmakers
By PHILIP SHENON
WASHINGTON, Nov. 19 - The Justice Department has signaled for the first time in recent weeks that prominent members of Congress could be swept up in the corruption investigation of Jack Abramoff, the former Republican superlobbyist who diverted some of his tens of millions of dollars in fees to provide lavish travel, meals and campaign contributions to the lawmakers whose help he needed most.

The investigation by a federal grand jury, which began more than a year ago, has created alarm on Capitol Hill, especially with the announcement Friday of criminal charges against Michael Scanlon, Mr. Abramoff's former lobbying partner and a former top House aide to Representative Tom DeLay.

The charges against Mr. Scanlon identified no lawmakers by name, but a summary of the case released by the Justice Department accused him of being part of a broad conspiracy to provide "things of value, including money, meals, trips and entertainment to federal public officials in return for agreements to perform official acts" - an attempt at bribery, in other words, or something close to it.

Mr. Abramoff, who is under indictment in a separate bank-fraud case in Florida, has not been charged by the federal grand jury here. But Mr. Scanlon's lawyer says he has agreed to plead guilty and cooperate in the investigation, suggesting that Mr. Abramoff's day in court in Washington is only a matter of time.

Scholars who specialize in the history and operations of Congress say that given the brazenness of Mr. Abramoff's lobbying efforts, as measured by the huge fees he charged clients and the extravagant gifts he showered on friends on Capitol Hill, almost all of them Republicans, the investigation could end up costing several lawmakers their careers, if not their freedom.

The investigation threatens to ensnarl many outside Congress as well, including Interior Department officials and others in the Bush administration who were courted by Mr. Abramoff on behalf of the Indian tribe casinos that were his most lucrative clients.

The inquiry has already reached into the White House; a White House budget official, David H. Safavian, resigned only days before his arrest in September on charges of lying to investigators about his business ties to Mr. Abramoff, a former lobbying partner.

"I think this has the potential to be the biggest scandal in Congress in over a century," said Thomas E. Mann, a Congressional specialist at the Brookings Institution. "I've been around Washington for 35 years, watching Congress, and I've never seen anything approaching Abramoff for cynicism and chutzpah in proposing quid pro quos to members of Congress."

Even by the gold-plated standards of Washington lobbying firms, the fees paid to Mr. Abramoff were extraordinary. A former president of the College Republicans who turned to lobbying after a short-lived career as a B-movie producer, Mr. Abramoff, with his lobbying team, collected more than $80 million from the Indian tribes and their gambling operations; he was known by lobbying rivals as "Casino Jack."

Mr. Abramoff's lobbying work was not limited to the casinos, though. Newly disclosed documents from his files show that he asked for $9 million in 2003 from the president of Gabon, in West Africa, to set up a White House meeting with President Bush; there was an Oval Office meeting last year, although there is no evidence in the public record to show that Mr. Abramoff had a role in the arrangements.

Fred Wertheimer of Democracy 21, an ethics watchdog group that has called for tighter lobbying rules, said it was too early to say whether the Abramoff investigation would produce anything like the convulsion in Congress during the Abscam investigations of the 1980's, when one senator and five House members were convicted on bribery and other charges after an F.B.I. sting involving a phony Arab sheik.

"But this clearly has the potential," Mr. Wertheimer said.

So far, one member of Congress, Representative Bob Ney, an Ohio Republican who is chairman of the House Administration Committee, has acknowledged receiving a subpoena from the grand jury investigating Mr. Abramoff. Another, Representative John T. Doolittle, Republican of California, has acknowledged that his wife, who helped Mr. Abramoff organize fund-raisers, was subpoenaed.

The Justice Department signaled last month that Mr. DeLay had come under scrutiny in the investigation, over a trip that Mr. Abramoff arranged for Mr. DeLay and his wife to Britain in 2000 that included rounds of golf at the fabled course at St. Andrews in Scotland.

The department revealed its interest in Mr. DeLay, who is under indictment in Texas in an unrelated investigation involving violations of state election laws, in an extraordinary request to the British government that police there interview former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher about the circumstances of a meeting in London with Mr. DeLay during the trip five years ago.

London newspapers quoted a document prepared by the British Home Office that outlined the Justice Department's investigation and said that "it is alleged that Abramoff arranged for his clients to pay for the trips to the U.K. on the basis that Congressman DeLay would support favorable legislation."

Richard Cullen, a lawyer for Mr. DeLay, said in an interview Friday that he was "glad that the Justice Department is looking into all aspects of the trip because I think that a thorough investigation will show that the trip was substantive and transparent."

Mr. Cullen said that shortly after he was hired several months ago, he contacted the Justice Department "to let them know that Mr. DeLay is available to cooperate in any way."

The lawyer said he was "convinced that when the Justice Department completes its investigation of Abramoff and Scanlon, that it will be clear Tom DeLay has acted ethically and has conducted himself consistent with all laws and House standards of conduct." He said he had not heard from federal prosecutors since the initial contacts.

The situation could be more serious for Mr. Ney, a five-term lawmaker whose position as chairman of the House Administration Committee gives him power over the operations of the Capitol building and allows him to divide up Congressional perks like office space and parking.

Mr. Ney's ties to Mr. Abramoff have been revealed slowly over the last year, largely through testimony before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, which has held a series of hearings into accusations that Mr. Abramoff and Mr. Scanlon defrauded their Indian tribe clients.

Mr. Ney was not identified by name in the documents filed against Mr. Scanlon on Friday. But the Ohio lawmaker's lawyers acknowledged that Mr. Ney was the lawmaker identified as "Representative #1" in the Justice Department papers, which charged Mr. Scanlon with conspiring to provide "Representative #1" with a golfing trip to Scotland, meals at Mr. Abramoff's Washington restaurant and campaign contributions.

Mr. Ney took part in a golf trip to Scotland in 2002 with Mr. Abramoff, where they played at St. Andrews, as Mr. DeLay had done two years earlier. Documents and testimony to Congress showed that Mr. Abramoff had asked an Indian tribe in Texas to sponsor the trip and that Mr. Ney was then asked for his help in trying to reopen a casino owned by the tribe that had been shuttered by state officials.

Mr. Ney was also a regular at Signatures, the expensive Washington restaurant that Mr. Abramoff owned and used to entertain clients, colleagues and lawmakers. Former Signatures employees have said that Mr. Ney frequently ate and drank at the restaurant without paying. Mr. Ney has acknowledged the gifts but said they were within limits set by Congressional ethics rules.



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Witness May Have Pivotal Role in Probe of Alleged Corruption

By Susan Schmidt and James V. Grimaldi
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, November 20, 2005; A08



Before he hit his mid-thirties, Michael Scanlon played enough roles to fill a lifetime: lifeguard, press aide to a powerful congressman, multimillionaire public relations entrepreneur.

Now the sandy-haired, buttoned-down Republican -- author of e-mails detailing wildly brash schemes to make money in politics -- is likely to take a turn as a star witness for the prosecution in the Justice Department's investigation of lawmakers, lobbyists, Capitol Hill staffers and executive branch officials.

Scanlon's help could be important to the probe, which focuses on the activities of former influential lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Scanlon was Abramoff's closest business partner at the height of the lobbyist's power, joining in an enterprise that collected $82 million in fees from Indian tribes between 2000 and 2004.

On Friday, Scanlon was charged with conspiracy, accused of plotting with Abramoff to defraud the tribes and bribe government officials, including a member of Congress. He is to appear in court tomorrow to enter a guilty plea worked out with prosecutors who have spent nearly two years sifting through the deals that made Scanlon a rich man almost overnight.

His cooperation also increases pressure on Abramoff to make his own deal with the prosecution. Abramoff has told his legal team that despite the millions of dollars he brought in, he is all but out of money, lawyers in the case said. Abramoff and another business partner are facing trial in Florida on separate fraud charges.

Scanlon has more to show from his alliance with Abramoff. He was a reporter-friendly spokesman for then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) in 2000 when he quit Capitol Hill to join forces with Abramoff. Soon he was raking in a seven-figure salary, astounding former colleagues as he shed his student loans and picked up a mansion on the Delaware shore, an estate in St. Barts and an in-town apartment at the Ritz-Carlton in the District.

E-mail released by Senate investigators shows that Scanlon and Abramoff referred to their secret partnership as "gimme five" -- code for their arrangement to split tens of millions of dollars in profits Scanlon's firm was taking in from the tribes. Abramoff, who cultivated a reputation as the best-connected Republican lobbyist in Washington, typically urged his tribal clients to hire Scanlon, never telling them he would be getting a chunk of the fees they paid Scanlon.

As a witness in the wide-ranging, influence-peddling probe of Abramoff and government officials, Scanlon may have knowledge of many areas of interest to investigators. In addition to Abramoff's dealings with the tribes, Scanlon was in a position to know whether lawmakers and their aides provided legislative favors for Abramoff's lobbying clients, including the tribes. E-mail shows Abramoff often talked of gaining sway over key officials at the Interior Department, which plays a regulatory role in tribal land issues and Indian gambling operations.

Scanlon's cooperation is crucial to helping prosecutors prove that any favor to a lawmaker was in explicit exchange for an official act, said Leonard Garment, an attorney for President Nixon during Watergate.

"It is important because you have direct evidence from someone who was involved who can testify with respect to the payment of money or some other thing of value to the legislator," Garment said.

"Scanlon presumably is in a position to say that it wasn't just ordinary assistance of a neutral or innocent character, that it was a quid pro quo, that if you vote a certain way or introduce a certain bill, I will pay you money or give you a brace of tickets to a Washington Redskins game. That is the way a case is proved."

Scanlon, a relatively junior member of DeLay's staff -- he refers to his former boss as "Mr. DeLay" -- may not have been privy to all of DeLay's dealings with Abramoff, a lobbyist the Texas lawmaker once called "one of my closest and dearest friends." But Scanlon could be a guide to the activities of top House GOP staffers, some of whom are now lobbyists and political consultants who work closely with DeLay, now the former majority leader.

The criminal charge against Scanlon shows that the lawmaker of most immediate interest to prosecutors is House Administration Committee Chairman Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio). Prosecutors charged that Scanlon and Abramoff conspired to bribe Ney -- referred to in the charging document as "Representative #1" -- by providing him and staff members with a golf trip to Scotland, sports tickets, meals, and campaign contributions.

From Ney, prosecutors allege, Scanlon and Abramoff "sought and received" a series of official acts, including meeting with clients, sponsoring legislation and approving a license to install wireless communications in the U.S. House for an Abramoff client.

Ney also placed comments in the Congressional Record favorable to Abramoff's 2000 purchase of the Florida casino boat company, SunCruz Casinos. Scanlon handled SunCruz's dealings with Ney and his chief of staff, Neil Volz, who later also went to work for Abramoff.

Ney has denied wrongdoing, and his lawyer said that any official acts Ney performed had no connection to favors from Abramoff's team.

Solomon L. Wisenberg, a former federal prosecutor, said a guilty plea and cooperation agreement often are announced to pressure other potential witnesses to cooperate. He said it also is a signal that investigators think Scanlon has told them what they need to make their bribery cases.

"The government would not enter into a plea agreement with somebody and offer to give them credit for cooperation unless they were getting something in return," Wisenberg said.

Scanlon's cooperation will be a key element incriminal trials that rely heavily on documents, such as e-mails and memos. "You have to have someone who can tell the story," Wisenberg said.

Scanlon was also a link between Abramoff's SunCruz dealings and DeLay's office.

On Inauguration Day 2001, Scanlon and Abramoff's SunCruz business partner Adam Kidan were guests at a reception in DeLay's Capitol Hill office celebrating the swearing in of George W. Bush, according to two people who were at the reception who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

A week later, Abramoff and his partners leased a corporate jet to ferry congressional staffers to the Super Bowl in Tampa and a night of gambling aboard a SunCruz ship. Among those aboard were DeLay aide Tim Berry, who left this year as DeLay's chief of staff, and DeLay's former deputy chief of staff, Tony Rudy, by then a newly minted lobbyist working for Abramoff. Two staff aides to Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.) also went on the trip.

Scanlon could help investigators learn more about the purpose of gifts and nearly $3 million in campaign contributions Abramoff and his tribal clients lavished on members of Congress and their staffers, who night after night filled the lobbyist's four sports skyboxes. Scanlon may also be able to elaborate on e-mails that have been made public by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, in which Abramoff discussed job offers to public officials and his efforts to get political appointees at the Interior Department to intercede on issues affecting clients.

Scanlon may also be knowledgeable about Abramoff's direction of tribal funds to several charitable foundations and advocacy groups and tax-exempt organizations, including one run by anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist. E-mail shows that Scanlon was intimately familiar with some of the financial dealings of anti-gambling activist Ralph Reed, former executive director of the Christian Coalition.

Reed, a Republican candidate for lieutenant governor in Georgia, has acknowledged receiving $4 million in dealings with Abramoff to whip up anti-casino campaigns in the South, but has maintained he did not know the funds came from the gaming proceeds of tribes that wanted to scuttle competition.

E-mails and other documents obtained by The Washington Post, and some released by the Indian Affairs Committee, show that Reed was routinely paid with tribal funds that were sent to Scanlon's firm, then routed to an Abramoff company called KayGold, and then sent to one of Reed's Atlanta-based political consulting firms.

Scanlon's e-mails and memos often reveal an aggressive, take-no-prisoners style. In a 2001 memo to a representative of the Louisiana Coushatta tribe, Scanlon said his political program was "designed to make the Coushatta Tribe a politician's best friend -- or worst political nightmare."

Abramoff, polished and soft-spoken in public, often showed contempt for his clients in private communications with his young partner. It was in an e-mail to Scanlon that Abramoff infamously referred to members of one tribe as "monkeys." In another exchange about a new client, the Tigua tribe of Texas, Abramoff said, "Fire up the jet baby, we're going to El Paso!!" Replied Scanlon: "I want all their MONEY!!!" Said Abramoff: "Yawzah!"

Abramoff turned to Scanlon when he wanted to disguise the origins of money from foreign entities, including the Malaysian government, e-mails and records show -- another area of likely interest for prosecutors and the Internal Revenue Service. Scanlon set up the American International Center, a Rehoboth Beach foundation that claimed on its Web site to be "a premiere international think tank."

Scanlon, who friends say never shook off the lure of summer days in the lifeguard stand even when he was making millions, staffed it with two longtime beach buddies -- one a former lifeguard and another a yoga instructor.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1900937_pf.html

November 20, 2005
Corruption Inquiry Threatens to Ensnare Lawmakers
By PHILIP SHENON
WASHINGTON, Nov. 19 - The Justice Department has signaled for the first time in recent weeks that prominent members of Congress could be swept up in the corruption investigation of Jack Abramoff, the former Republican superlobbyist who diverted some of his tens of millions of dollars in fees to provide lavish travel, meals and campaign contributions to the lawmakers whose help he needed most.

The investigation by a federal grand jury, which began more than a year ago, has created alarm on Capitol Hill, especially with the announcement Friday of criminal charges against Michael Scanlon, Mr. Abramoff's former lobbying partner and a former top House aide to Representative Tom DeLay.

The charges against Mr. Scanlon identified no lawmakers by name, but a summary of the case released by the Justice Department accused him of being part of a broad conspiracy to provide "things of value, including money, meals, trips and entertainment to federal public officials in return for agreements to perform official acts" - an attempt at bribery, in other words, or something close to it.

Mr. Abramoff, who is under indictment in a separate bank-fraud case in Florida, has not been charged by the federal grand jury here. But Mr. Scanlon's lawyer says he has agreed to plead guilty and cooperate in the investigation, suggesting that Mr. Abramoff's day in court in Washington is only a matter of time.

Scholars who specialize in the history and operations of Congress say that given the brazenness of Mr. Abramoff's lobbying efforts, as measured by the huge fees he charged clients and the extravagant gifts he showered on friends on Capitol Hill, almost all of them Republicans, the investigation could end up costing several lawmakers their careers, if not their freedom.

The investigation threatens to ensnarl many outside Congress as well, including Interior Department officials and others in the Bush administration who were courted by Mr. Abramoff on behalf of the Indian tribe casinos that were his most lucrative clients.

The inquiry has already reached into the White House; a White House budget official, David H. Safavian, resigned only days before his arrest in September on charges of lying to investigators about his business ties to Mr. Abramoff, a former lobbying partner.

"I think this has the potential to be the biggest scandal in Congress in over a century," said Thomas E. Mann, a Congressional specialist at the Brookings Institution. "I've been around Washington for 35 years, watching Congress, and I've never seen anything approaching Abramoff for cynicism and chutzpah in proposing quid pro quos to members of Congress."

Even by the gold-plated standards of Washington lobbying firms, the fees paid to Mr. Abramoff were extraordinary. A former president of the College Republicans who turned to lobbying after a short-lived career as a B-movie producer, Mr. Abramoff, with his lobbying team, collected more than $80 million from the Indian tribes and their gambling operations; he was known by lobbying rivals as "Casino Jack."

Mr. Abramoff's lobbying work was not limited to the casinos, though. Newly disclosed documents from his files show that he asked for $9 million in 2003 from the president of Gabon, in West Africa, to set up a White House meeting with President Bush; there was an Oval Office meeting last year, although there is no evidence in the public record to show that Mr. Abramoff had a role in the arrangements.

Fred Wertheimer of Democracy 21, an ethics watchdog group that has called for tighter lobbying rules, said it was too early to say whether the Abramoff investigation would produce anything like the convulsion in Congress during the Abscam investigations of the 1980's, when one senator and five House members were convicted on bribery and other charges after an F.B.I. sting involving a phony Arab sheik.

"But this clearly has the potential," Mr. Wertheimer said.

So far, one member of Congress, Representative Bob Ney, an Ohio Republican who is chairman of the House Administration Committee, has acknowledged receiving a subpoena from the grand jury investigating Mr. Abramoff. Another, Representative John T. Doolittle, Republican of California, has acknowledged that his wife, who helped Mr. Abramoff organize fund-raisers, was subpoenaed.

The Justice Department signaled last month that Mr. DeLay had come under scrutiny in the investigation, over a trip that Mr. Abramoff arranged for Mr. DeLay and his wife to Britain in 2000 that included rounds of golf at the fabled course at St. Andrews in Scotland.

The department revealed its interest in Mr. DeLay, who is under indictment in Texas in an unrelated investigation involving violations of state election laws, in an extraordinary request to the British government that police there interview former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher about the circumstances of a meeting in London with Mr. DeLay during the trip five years ago.

London newspapers quoted a document prepared by the British Home Office that outlined the Justice Department's investigation and said that "it is alleged that Abramoff arranged for his clients to pay for the trips to the U.K. on the basis that Congressman DeLay would support favorable legislation."

Richard Cullen, a lawyer for Mr. DeLay, said in an interview Friday that he was "glad that the Justice Department is looking into all aspects of the trip because I think that a thorough investigation will show that the trip was substantive and transparent."

Mr. Cullen said that shortly after he was hired several months ago, he contacted the Justice Department "to let them know that Mr. DeLay is available to cooperate in any way."

The lawyer said he was "convinced that when the Justice Department completes its investigation of Abramoff and Scanlon, that it will be clear Tom DeLay has acted ethically and has conducted himself consistent with all laws and House standards of conduct." He said he had not heard from federal prosecutors since the initial contacts.

The situation could be more serious for Mr. Ney, a five-term lawmaker whose position as chairman of the House Administration Committee gives him power over the operations of the Capitol building and allows him to divide up Congressional perks like office space and parking.

Mr. Ney's ties to Mr. Abramoff have been revealed slowly over the last year, largely through testimony before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, which has held a series of hearings into accusations that Mr. Abramoff and Mr. Scanlon defrauded their Indian tribe clients.

Mr. Ney was not identified by name in the documents filed against Mr. Scanlon on Friday. But the Ohio lawmaker's lawyers acknowledged that Mr. Ney was the lawmaker identified as "Representative #1" in the Justice Department papers, which charged Mr. Scanlon with conspiring to provide "Representative #1" with a golfing trip to Scotland, meals at Mr. Abramoff's Washington restaurant and campaign contributions.

Mr. Ney took part in a golf trip to Scotland in 2002 with Mr. Abramoff, where they played at St. Andrews, as Mr. DeLay had done two years earlier. Documents and testimony to Congress showed that Mr. Abramoff had asked an Indian tribe in Texas to sponsor the trip and that Mr. Ney was then asked for his help in trying to reopen a casino owned by the tribe that had been shuttered by state officials.

Mr. Ney was also a regular at Signatures, the expensive Washington restaurant that Mr. Abramoff owned and used to entertain clients, colleagues and lawmakers. Former Signatures employees have said that Mr. Ney frequently ate and drank at the restaurant without paying. Mr. Ney has acknowledged the gifts but said they were within limits set by Congressional ethics rules.


http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/20/politics...agewanted=print

According to this article from Bloomberg News, Scanlon "knows where all the bodies are buried."

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=n...id=aLHX6Q_LZC4A

rox63, where do you think dem minority leader, Reed, fits into this story?

I have no idea. I don't know enough about his role in all of this.

http://liberalgirlnextdoor.blogspot.com/20...down-house.html

Ney is also neck-deep in the Ohio Coingate scandal. I hope the Dems have a good candidate running for this seat, because with Ney in so much trouble, it may be an easy Dem win.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...5112300154.html

Bob Ney benefits from redistricting in Ohio. He now covers areas where is is not known as well. Hopefully, the voters will wake up and read the newspapers. Ney claims he is a victim when anyone attacks him.