http://www.insightmag.com/archive/200005096.shtml "All hell will break loose" New DNC Phones at White House By Paul M. Rodriguez [EMAIL PROTECTED] Insight uncovers FBI Director Freeh's alarm that private detectives hired by Clinton intimates tracked at least one big-time scandal donor. More backup tapes have been found. In the furor about campaign fund-raising tactics used by the Clinton-Gore reelection committee there have been denials, corrections, waffling and tortured legalisms to explain sometimes-bizarre efforts by Bill Clinton and Al Gore to raise money for themselves and the Democratic National Committee, or DNC. The Justice Department's Campaign Task Force has been investigating possible crimes and both FBI Director Louis Freeh and his former deputy, Campaign Task Force head Charles LaBella, repeatedly urged Attorney General Janet Reno to seek an independent counsel because of a pattern of suspected wrongdoing by Gore and other high White House officials. Now Insight has discovered previously unknown DNC telephones inside the White House complex, billing records for which may shed additional light on fund-raising issues still under investigation. Installation of these phone lines could be a violation of federal laws that prohibit the mixing of political and government services on government property, say legal experts. Insight also has learned of the existence of more unknown backup "tapes" of virtually every White House employee's computer. In fact, there are nearly 900 archived external-storage devices containing these materials. And most never have been revealed to federal investigators and/or were not searched or inventoried by the White House as required under subpoena throughout the Clinton-Gore scandals. These backup "tapes" include, for example, information copied by external drives and technicians from computers once used by Billy Dale (the former White House Travel Office director), Leon Panetta (the former White House chief of staff), Craig Livingstone (the former White House security director) and Harold Ickes (the former White House deputy chief of staff). Some of the "tapes" are secreted within the White House complex, while others are stored at an off-site facility in Greenbelt, Md. The House Government Reform Committee, chaired by Rep. Dan Burton of Indiana, has conducted numerous hearings and obtained thousands of records from federal law-enforcement investigators detailing potential crimes committed at the White House by a variety of government and political figures, including the president and vice president. Burton is furious at what he regards as out-and-out obstruction of justice. As Insight reported April 12 on its Webwire (www.insightmag.com), a House Judiciary subcommittee chaired by Rep. Charles Canady, a Florida Republican, now also is looking to obtain previously unknown memos from Freeh and LaBella related to their ignored calls for an independent counsel. After an April 13 meeting of his subcommittee, Canady struck a bargain with the Justice Department to delay issuing subpoenas pending further talks with Reno's senior aides, including Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder. But the pot is boiling. As Congress continues to search for secreted documents, the Insight investigation of mysteriously "lost" White House e-mails and "missing" White House long-distance telephone records is turning up still more surprises. Investigators say the recovered documents will be extremely helpful in determining who has not told the truth about key conversations and transactions. Issues include perjury, conspiracy and obstruction of justice. As Insight has been reporting since December 1998, White House principals were aware two years ago that the allegedly "missing" evidence had not been turned over as required under the subpoenas (see "Looking for Information in All the Wrong Places" and "Computer Glitch Leads to Trove of `Lost' E-Mails at White House," Dec. 28, 1998.). And in late 1998 Panetta's office confirmed to Insight not only the existence of the now-controversial e-mails but the long-distance telephone records as well. Now Insight has confirmed from one of its many interviews with federal investigators that Panetta also knew about one or two telephone lines installed at the White House for direct communications with the DNC. During questioning, the former California congressman also revealed knowledge about telephone solicitations made by Clinton and Gore during 1996 fund-raising efforts. He said he knew little about the actual calls but was aware of a special phone in the West Wing and another elsewhere. He couldn't remember where. Clinton has said that he did make calls on behalf of the DNC and, presumably, for his own reelection committee, but he claimed he didn't do it often and couldn't remember when or where. Gore has said that he, too, made such calls from the White House complex but that he used a telephone calling card provided by the DNC and therefore no laws were broken as there was "no controlling legal authority." Alas, no one could check these stories because the White House long maintained that there were no detailed telephone records. Then, two years ago, White House officials discovered that some calls placed by either Clinton or Gore improperly were billed to "White House" lines and reimbursement was sought for $24.20 from the DNC to offset taxpayer expense. Federal law-enforcement investigators began wondering how the White House could search telephone records it consistently has said it doesn't have, and about which it says there never were call-billing details. As Insight followed up on all of this, it was told of at least two telephones installed at the White House in 1996 for use by the DNC and White House personnel, possibly the ones referred to by Panetta. Now Insight has found at least two previously unknown phone lines installed in 1997 at the Old Executive Office Building, or OEOB, for use by the DNC and White House staff. The DNC phones installed in 1997 were put in by an official at the White House Office of Political Affairs. Charges for these telephones, located in offices on the first and second floors of the OEOB, were to be billed to the DNC according to memos and other sources secured by Insight. The phones not only were ordered by a White House official, they were installed by White House personnel on a rush basis. This had been done before, according to Insight sources, and that was confirmed by review of White House records. When Insight called Cynthia Jasso-Rodman in the White House political office on April 12 and asked about those special DNC phone lines, she said "yes" she could help to clarify the matter, then paused for a long while, placed us on hold for two minutes and came back on the line to transfer the call to the press office. A press aide said she didn't know anything about the matter we raised and promptly forwarded the call to a press-office voice mailbox where a recording suggested we call back later. When Insight asked federal law-enforcement and congressional offices about the newly discovered DNC-related phone lines, everyone expressed surprise. A Burton aide said the congressman wasn't aware of them and promised to look into it. Ditto federal law enforcement. Now Insight has obtained still more new documents and interviews confirming that there is a substantial number of other internal memos not previously searched or turned over concerning general telephone records, the DNC-related telephone lines and data associated with a computer system called the White House Office Data Base, or WHODB (see Insight's Webwire for earlier investigative reports about this computer and dodgy fund raising). Insight just has discovered, for instance, that despite claims of the White House, and weeks of hearings concerning the WHODB by Indiana Rep. David McIntosh's House Government Reform subcommittee two years ago, there was a WHODB link set up for other outside offices not previously known, including the Treasury Department. Does that mean the IRS, or were these politicos watching ... who and what? This is interesting in a broader context because it was always McIntosh's opinion that WHODB was improperly used for political purposes, a charge the White House denied. Although a criminal referral was sent to the Justice Department, it still sits there without action more than a year after receipt from the subcommittee. But it wasn't just Congress that felt strongly about this, according to yet more breaking news obtained by Insight: Freeh also believed the WHODB may have been used illegally to further alleged wrongdoing in the Clinton/Gore/DNC fund-raising mess. In fact, in a still-secret memo to the Justice Department, Freeh cited the WHODB as one of the many reasons to argue for the appointment of an independent counsel, as did others at Justice whom Reno ultimately rebuffed. And, in a shocking revelation, Freeh also felt the need to seek an independent counsel because of information the Campaign Task Force obtained suggesting the clandestine use of private investigators by Clinton intimates to probe one or more persons who made illegal donations to several coffers, including the Presidential Legal Expense Trust. Monies allegedly paid to hire these P.I.s were drawn from a special fund used to help Clinton on a variety of matters. The manner in which payments were made for these alleged investigations lay at the center of a line of reasoning Freeh used in his pleas to Reno, and which LaBella always had used, that the problem involved a pattern of abuses, not just a specific instance of wrongdoing, a federal law-enforcement source confirms. "All hell will break loose when these memos are made public," says a second federal source, who is aware of the allegations that private investigators were used to probe at least one, and possibly three, high-profile campaign contributors to several of Clinton's fund-raising organizations. And this source confirmed separate details that have been mentioned in the press that a former senior Justice Department official who reported directly to Reno strongly supported the call for her to appoint an independent counsel to probe Gore because of direct testimony that contradicted the vice president concerning what he said he did or knew about the allegedly illegal fund-raising schemes. Copyright � 2000 News World Communications, Inc. . <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! 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