{Well, I don't know about you, but I am shocked, shocked that
Reno will probably not order a special prosecutor to investigate
the Soliciter in Chief. Hmmm, maybe there really is something to
Traficant's charges.]
---------------------
Reno Unlikely to Investigate Gore
UPI Wednesday, Aug. 9, 2000
WASHINGTON - Attorney General Janet Reno is close to a decision
on whether to appoint a special counsel to investigate Vice
President Al Gore, but officials around her still say she is
unlikely to launch such an independent probe.
Some of the officials close to Reno argue that in any case no
announcement should be made until the Democratic National
Convention ends next week in Los Angeles.
The head of the Justice Department's Campaign Financing Task
Force recommended earlier this year that Reno name a special
counsel to conduct an independent investigation of whether Gore
told the truth about 1996 fund raising during an April interview
with task force investigators.
The task force chief, Robert Conrad Jr., so far has been the only
official to recommend an independent probe in writing, though FBI
Director Louis Freeh is believed to have seconded Conrad's advice
during a private meeting with Reno last month.
Other department offices, asked to weigh in before Reno makes her
decision, have recommended against a special counsel, arguing
that it would be almost impossible to convict Gore of a crime
given the lack of evidence.
Conrad has questioned Gore's truthfulness in at least two areas:
The vice president has said he was not aware that an event at a
Buddhist Temple near Los Angeles was a fund-raiser.
He said he was unaware some of the money he raised through
telephone calls from his office would be routed into "hard" money
accounts, even though that strategy had been discussed in at
least one White House meeting attended by Gore.
"Hard" money can be used directly in an election, but is strictly
regulated and limited by federal law. "Soft" money can only be
used for "party-building" activities, such as registration drives
or advertising on issues, and is largely unregulated.
A new independent investigation would be a political disaster for
Gore, to be formally nominated as the Democrat presidential
candidate next week.
Meanwhile, department investigators have brushed aside reports
that GOP vice presidential candidate Dick Cheney hosted large
Republican contributors at the Pentagon as defense secretary in
1991 and 1992. Officials say even if any violation occurred, the
statute of limitations on any conceivably applicable federal law
would have long since expired, and no money appeared to have
changed hands on federal property.
A federal investigation into some Republican campaign financing,
however, is still up in the air.
The department's campaign finance task force is still weighing
its options after a three-judge appeals court panel essentially
gutted the investigation of Haley Barbour and other former
officials of the Republican National Committee.
The panel ruled last month that a $2.1 million, Chinese-backed
loan to an organization formed by Barbour when he was RNC
chairman in 1994 was not a "political contribution" covered by
federal law, even though part of the loan was defaulted.
The task force is considering whether to appeal the ruling to the
full U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, take the case
to the Supreme Court or terminate the investigation.
On July 14, the panel said that Barbour and other former RNC
officials could not be guilty of a campaign-finance conspiracy.
The meat of the ruling came in an order reversing a federal judge
who had ordered a former RNC general counsel to turn over
documents relating to the loan under a secret grand jury
subpoena.
Barbour and two other RNC officials set up the National Policy
Forum in May 1993 as a think tank separate from the RNC. By
September 1994, the NPF had received more than $2.3 million in
loans from the Republican National State Elections Committee.
The state elections organization was technically not a "federal
committee" regulated by U.S. law, though it was under the
control of the RNC.
"Barbour and other NPF and RNC officials arrived at an agreement
with Ambrous Young, a foreign national," to have Young Brothers
Development of Hong Kong to provide $2.1 million in collateral
through its U.S. subsidiary to secure a loan of that amount from
Signet Bank to NPF, according to court records.
Signet disbursed the money to NPF in October 1994, and the
organization used $1.6 million of the proceeds to repay part of
the loan from the GOP state elections committee. Barbour later
told a Senate committee that he had asked Young's representative
to forgive the loan entirely, but ended up repaying about half of
it.
After the initial loan activity came to light, the Federal
Election Commission's general counsel recommended that the FEC
find the RNC and its officials in violation of the federal ban on
receiving money from foreign nationals. The commission vote on
the general counsel's recommendation split 3-3 along political
lines, effectively ending the FEC action.
However, the loan repayment "also drew the attention of the
Department of Justice," the appeals court panel said. The
department began a grand jury investigation into whether "the
repayment transaction amounted to solicitation and receipt of
foreign contributions by the RNC" in violation of federal law,
"and conspiracy by various RNC officials to defraud the United
States for failing to disclose the transaction."
The grand jury subpoenaed the RNC records in September 1997, but
a former RNC general counsel refused to produce them, contending
they were "work product" protected by attorney client privilege.
After looking at the documents out of the grand jury's presence,
a federal judge ruled that the lawyer's claim of lawyer-client
privilege was overridden by the documents' relevance to a
criminal investigation.
The appeals court panel reversed the judge, saying no crime had
been committed and the documents did not have to be produced.
The panel said "the government has failed to allege any conduct
that is criminal" under the federal election law. The
department's argument "strikes out on the failure of its basic
claim that a loan repayment is a contribution," the panel ruled.
"On its face this is improbable."
The Justice Department had argued behind closed doors that all
the political organizations involved were controlled by the RNC,
and that the Young-backed loan freed up other GOP funds for the
1994 congressional elections.
(C) 2000 UPI All Rights Reserved.
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Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT
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Shalom, A Salaam Aleikum, and to all, A Good Day.
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