December 2, 2005
Lobbyist's Role in Hiring Aides Is Investigated
By ANNE E. KORNBLUT, NY TIMES

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WASHINGTON, Dec. 1 - With a federal corruption case intensifying, prosecutors investigating Jack Abramoff, the Republican lobbyist, are examining whether he brokered lucrative jobs for Congressional aides at powerful lobbying firms in exchange for legislative favors, people involved in the case have said.

The attention paid to how the aides obtained jobs occurs as Mr. Abramoff is under mounting pressure to cooperate with prosecutors as they consider a case against lawmakers. Participants in the case, who insisted on anonymity because the investigation is secret, said he could try to reach a deal in the next six weeks.

Many forces are bearing down on Mr. Abramoff. Last week, his closest business partner, Michael Scanlon, pleaded guilty to conspiracy in exchange for cooperating in the inquiry, being run by an interagency group, into whether money and gifts were used in an influence-peddling scandal that involved lawmakers.

Despite charging Indian tribes that were clients tens of millions of dollars in lobbying fees, Mr. Abramoff has told friends that he is running out of money. In a new approach that could contribute to the pressures, prosecutors are sifting through evidence related to the hiring of several former Congressional aides by a lobbying firm, Greenberg Traurig, where Mr. Abramoff worked from 2000 to last year, according to people who know about the inquiry. That course could impel a new set of Mr. Abramoff's former associates to cooperate to avoid prosecution.

Investigators are said to be especially interested in how Tony C. Rudy, a former deputy chief of staff to Representative Tom DeLay of Texas, and Neil G. Volz, a former chief of staff to Representative BobNey of Ohio, obtained lobbying positions with big firms on K Street.

The hiring pattern is "very much a part of" what prosecutors are focusing on, a person involved in the case said. Another participant confirmed that investigators were trying to determine whether aides conducted "job negotiations with Jack Abramoff" while they were in a position to help him on Capitol Hill.

Prosecutors are trying to establish that "it's not just a ticket to a ballgame, it's major jobs" that exchanged hands, the participant in the case said. Also under examination are payments to lobbyists and lawmakers' wives, including Mr. Rudy's wife, Lisa Rudy, whose firm, Liberty Consulting, worked in consultation with Mr. Abramoff, people involved in case said.

What began as an inquiry into Mr. Scanlon and Mr. Abramoff's lobbying has widened to a corruption investigation centering mainly on Republican lawmakers who came to power as part of the conservative revolution of the 1990's. At least six members of Congress are in the scope of the inquiry, with an additional 12 or so former aides being examined to determine whether they gave Mr. Abramoff legislative help in exchange for campaign donations, lavish trips and gifts.

It may be difficult for prosecutors to translate certain elements of the case into indictments. Bribery, corruption and conspiracy cases are notoriously difficult to prove. But the potential dimensions are enormous, and the investigation, at a time of turmoil for the Bush administration, threatens to add a new knot of problems for the party heading into the elections next year.

Several people involved in the case, insisting on anonymity because of the plea negotiations, said they anticipated that Mr. Abramoff would try to reach an agreement with the prosecutors in a rapidly closing window of time before he is scheduled to stand trial in a separate federal case in Florida.

Mr. Abramoff and another business partner, Adam Kidan, were indicted in August on charges of wire fraud and conspiracy for reportedly defrauding their lenders as they sought to buy a company in Miami, SunCruz Casinos, that operated a fleet of gambling boats.

That trial is to begin on Jan. 9.

A lawyer for Mr. Abramoff in the case, Neal R. Sonnett, declined to comment on whether his client is conferring with prosecutors, indicating that he is moving ahead as though there will be no plea agreement.

"I'm preparing for trial," Mr. Sonnett said.

After more than a year of slow progress in what initially appeared to be a case of lobbying excess, the larger scope of the inquiry started to come into view toward the end of September with the arrest of David H. Safavian, chief procurement official in the administration.

Mr. Safavian is accused of lying to investigators and of obstruction of justice. He is pleading not guilty, his lawyer has said. Prosecutors contend that Mr. Safavian did not disclose to investigators business that Mr. Abramoff had before his agency at the time of a golfing trip to Scotland arranged by the lobbyist.

The focus also expanded from Mr. Abramoff's work for Indian tribes with the end of hearings by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. The hearings set out to examine whether the tribes, which paid $82 million to Mr. Abramoff and Mr. Scanlon, had been defrauded. The panel, headed by Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, avoided looking at the ties between the lobbyists and specific lawmakers, leaving that to the inquiry's interagency group.

The Senate hearings uncovered many patterns of Mr. Abramoff's activities, including his offering favors to officials while making deals on government work. In one case, a former senior Interior Department official, J. Steven Griles, testified that Mr. Abramoff had offered him a position at Greenberg Traurig while Mr. Griles was in a position to affect decisions involving Mr. Abramoff's Indian clients. Mr. Griles said he reported the offer to his department's ethics division and rejected it.

Prosecutors are trying to determine whether Mr. Abramoff made similar overtures to other well positioned government workers, especially former aides to Republican leaders in of the House and Senate. Such gestures could be considered as bribery or a conflict of interest, especially if the interests of the two parties were entangled.

Of particular interest, according to several people involved in the case, are how Mr. Rudy, who left Mr. DeLay's office in 2001 to join Greenberg Traurig, and Mr. Volz, who left Mr. Ney's office in 2002 for that firm, obtained their positions. Investigators believe Mr. Abramoff may have solicited help from both men and their supervisors on Capitol Hill while helping arrange for high-paying positions, people familiar with case said.

Mr. Rudy now works for the Alexander Strategy Group, a lobbying firm run by Ed Buckham, another former senior aide to Mr. DeLay. Alexander Strategy is also under scrutiny for its ties to Mr. Abramoff and for putting Mr. DeLay's wife, Christine, on its payroll for several years.

As investigators try to unravel the web of relationships between the lawmakers and the lobbyists, they are considering spouses' roles, people involved in the case said.

Neither Mr. Rudy nor Mr. Volz returned calls and e-mail messages seeking comment on Thursday.

Hiring patterns offer a rich and complicated field for investigators. Congressional staff members routinely leave for the private work, with the sole prohibition a one-year ban on lobbying their former supervisors. Mr. DeLay is so renowned for funneling his skilled staff members into lobbying firms across Washington that his political network is known as "DeLay Inc."

Although Mr. DeLay was reprimanded by the House Ethics Committee in the late 90's for pressuring a lobbying firm to hire a Republican, the practice has become so standard in an era of Republican dominance that partisans have given it a name, the K Street Project.

What investigators seek is evidence of a quid pro quo between Mr. Abramoff and the lobbyists he helped hire, lawyers and others involved in the case said. They are especially interested in evidence that Mr. Abramoff discussed hiring Mr. Rudy, Mr. Volz or other staff members before they left the government or around the time they or their bosses were doing favors for Mr. Abramoff's clients.

November 25, 2005
Congressional Memo
Questions on the Legality of Campaign Fund-Raising
By CARL HULSE, NY TIMES

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WASHINGTON, Nov. 24 - The American system of underwriting political campaigns is often derided as legalized bribery. Now the Justice Department is contending that it can amount to illegal bribery as well.

In pursuing a case that threatens to envelop Congress in an election-year lobbying scandal, federal prosecutors are arguing that campaign dollars and other perks routinely showered on lawmakers by those with legislative and political interests on Capitol Hill can reach the level of criminal misconduct.

The prosecutors say that among the criminal activities of Michael Scanlon, a former House leadership aide who pleaded guilty on Monday to bribery conspiracy, were efforts to influence a lawmaker identified in court papers only as Representative No. 1 with gifts that included $4,000 to his campaign account and $10,000 to a Republican Party fund on his behalf.

Lawyers and others who follow such issues say the case against Mr. Scanlon amounted to a shift by the Justice Department, which, they say, has generally steered clear of trying to build corruption cases around political donations because the charges can be hard to prove.

"The department has rarely charged campaign contribution cases," said Joseph E. diGenova, a defense lawyer and former federal prosecutor. "It would be a surprise that a contribution that has been lawfully reported" would lead to a criminal charge.

The case against Mr. Scanlon, who became wealthy in a partnership with the lobbyist Jack Abramoff, reaches far beyond the contributions to Representative No. 1. Court documents filed by prosecutors lay out an extensive conspiracy in which Mr. Scanlon and Mr. Abramoff, identified in the documents only as Lobbyist A, sought to defraud clients - mainly Indian tribes with gambling interests - and win legislative help from lawmakers in exchange for campaign donations, trips, dinners, greens fees and jobs.

Watchdog groups and some lawmakers say the emerging details of how at least one set of well-connected lobbyists operated should help build momentum for changes in lobbying rules. And, they say, the case demonstrates that the Justice Department shares their longstanding contention that campaign contributions can be used to game the system.

"I think the Justice Department wants to show that there is a line that can be crossed," said Larry Noble, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics.

Others say a vast majority of lawmakers are committed to operating within the rules that already exist and in any event would not be easily swayed by the attentions of special interests, no matter how generous.

"Contributions can only take you so far," said former Senator John B. Breaux, a Louisiana Democrat who has relocated to a K Street law firm and is now advising clients on lobbying strategy. "I tell them, 'Look, you can give to an elected official and take them to lunch, dinner and breakfast. But if you are asking them to vote yes on an issue and they have 2,000 letters from home telling them to vote no, then you have a problem.' "

Representative Bob Ney, an Ohio Republican who has acknowledged being Representative No. 1, dismisses any suggestion that he was persuaded to do Mr. Scanlon's bidding because of campaign aid or perks like meals, entertainment or overseas travel.

"Whenever Representative Ney took official action," a statement from his office said, "actions similar to those taken by elected representatives every day as part of the normal, appropriate government process, he did so based on his best understanding of what was right and not based on any improper influence."

But the scrutiny of Mr. Ney has caught the attention of anxious lawmakers who have lobbying relationships of their own. It has also spurred advocacy groups. The campaign finance watchdog Democracy 21, for instance, is calling for inquiries by the House and Senate ethics committees into whether three dozen other members of Congress received contributions in exchange for intervening on behalf of a client of Mr. Abramoff.

The Associated Press reported this month that various lawmakers of both parties had asked the Interior Department to reject a casino application from a tribe that was a rival to one of Mr. Abramoff's clients. The lawmakers later received campaign aid from the tribe and Mr. Abramoff. Among the beneficiaries was the Senate Democratic leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, who received a $5,000 contribution to his political action committee shortly after sending a letter to the department in 2002.

Jim Manley, a spokesman for Mr. Reid, said Mr. Abramoff and the donation had had nothing to do with the position of the senator, who Mr. Manley noted was an author of Indian gaming laws and an opponent of new Indian casinos. "There was absolutely no connection between the letter and the contributions," he said.

Federal law requires that to prove bribery, the government must establish that a "thing of value" was provided in a direct effort to obtain a specific official act - the essential quid pro quo. A more vague expectation that something like a contribution might influence a public official has been deemed insufficient.

Mr. diGenova and others said that as a result, the Justice Department had been reluctant to try to link official actions to political donations, leaning instead toward cases in which public officials had been personally enriched.

Those watching the current case see Mr. Scanlon's decision to cooperate in the continuing investigation of Mr. Abramoff and others as a crucial link to the possibility of further charges: as an insider, he could conceivably provide evidence of a strong tie between efforts to influence lawmakers and their official actions.

Criminal charges aside, some watchdogs and members of Congress say they hope that public exposure of lobbying abuse stirs the Congressional ethics committees to police lawmakers more aggressively and that it simultaneously builds support for tighter lobbying restrictions.

"I think most Americans play by the rules and expect their leaders in government to do the same," said an author of one such proposal, Representative Martin T. Meehan, Democrat of Massachusetts. "It is time for Congress to clean up its act."

The Abramoff Effect
by JOHN NICHOLS, The Nation, December 19, 2005

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Last year Ohio Republican Representative Bob Ney, one of Tom DeLay's lieutenants, coasted to re-election by a 2-to-1 margin over an obscure foe. Next year Ney will face an aggressive, well-financed challenge from a former state legislator who is currently the Democratic mayor of one of his district's largest cities. Why the sharp rise in Democratic prospects? Was it mounting frustration with the Iraq War? Concern about the damage done to Ohio's industries by Bush Administration free-trade policies? DeLay's indictment? All were factors in Chillicothe Mayor Joe Sulzer's decision to take on Ney. But the real appeal of the race--as it is with contests involving a growing number of GOP Congressmen--is Ney's link to an old-fashioned bribery and influence-peddling scandal that has already sullied the reputations of some of Washington's most powerful Republicans and that could muddy the 2006 re-election prospects of dozens more.

The burgeoning controversy surrounding Jack Abramoff, a conservative lobbyist whose Washington ties stretched deep into the Bush White House and the Republican Capitol, has yet to gain anywhere near the media attention accorded the CIA Plamegate leak investigation or DeLay's indictment. Yet with the bank fraud indictment of Abramoff now part of a Florida grand jury inquiry and the guilty plea by Michael Scanlon, a former DeLay aide who became Abramoff's partner, on charges of conspiring to bribe a Congressman, the scandal is creating headaches for Republicans--and opportunities for Democrats to turn a national scandal into political pay dirt. Even the Wall Street Journal admits that the Abramoff imbroglio "raises the risk of serious embarrassment to the [GOP] before next year's congressional elections." Ohio's Sulzer is making the risk a reality with an in-your-face challenge to Ney, who accepted overseas trips, gifts and hefty campaign donations from Abramoff, allegedly in exchange for using his office to advance the interests of the Indian tribes and casinos that were Abramoff's big-ticket clients. Sulzer says Ohioans "need a Congressman who will...be getting headlines for providing better healthcare or better jobs for our district, not for ethics scandals and investigations."

There is every reason to believe that candidates in other states can pick up on that theme. Ney is, after all, only "Representative No. 1" in the Justice Department investigation of how Abramoff used ties to top Republicans--going back to college alliances with Grover Norquist, one of Washington's best-connected conservative activists, and Ralph Reed, former executive director of the Christian Coalition--to build a powerful DC lobbying operation. The investigation is already examining his relationships with DeLay, Representative John Doolittle and Senator Conrad Burns, as well as seventeen current and former Congressional aides and two former Bush Administration officials. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Abramoff had working relationships with dozens of Congressmen, including House Speaker Dennis Hastert, who collected more than $100,000 in campaign contributions from Abramoff's firm and clients between 2001 and '04 and in 2003 urged Interior Secretary Gail Norton to favor the lobbyist's clients in an Indian-gaming dispute; House majority leader Roy Blunt, who accepted at least $8,500 for his PAC and campaign from Abramoff's firm and clients between 1999 and 2003 and who intervened at least three times in matters involving those clients; and California Representative Dana Rohrabacher, who accepted thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from Abramoff and turned up as a financial reference for the lobbyist's purchase of a casino cruise line. Dozens of GOP House members have banked direct contributions from Abramoff.

The lobbyist's ties to Senator Burns, who accepted $150,000 in campaign contributions from Abramoff and his cronies and helped an Abramoff client score a $3 million federal grant, could be an especially big deal in 2006, as Burns's Montana Senate seat is a top Democratic target. Another vulnerable Republican senator, Missouri's Jim Talent, has also been a recipient of Abramoff's largesse. At a point when Democrats are excited by the prospect of picking off GOP Senate seats in blue states Pennsylvania and Rhode Island, as well as the classic swing state of Ohio, blows to Republican incumbents in red states Montana and Missouri make talk of a Democratic turnaround in the Senate credible. Another GOP senator up for re-election next year, John Ensign of Nevada, signed a letter on behalf of Abramoff's tribal clients and accepted $16,293 from the lobbyist, his associates and clients--creating an opening that might not otherwise have been found in a red state that has been trending blue.

To be sure, Democrats have a sorry history of running as reformers. The party's inability to exploit the Enron debacle--at least partly because some Democrats accepted Enron-linked donations--shows there's more to hanging a scandal around your opponents' necks than merely watching it unfold. But because of Abramoff's long and close ties to the GOP establishment, the scandal of this particular lobbyist presents a unique opening. Indeed, while the primary focus should be on House and Senate races, one of the most interesting playouts of Abramoff's troubles may come in Georgia, where his pal from college Republican days, Reed, is running for lieutenant governor. Reed's most aggressive Democratic foe, former State Senator Greg Hecht, has created a model for Democrats seeking to make hay from the scandal by banging away at what he refers to as the Abramoff-Reed scandal. It appears to be working. According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Georgia Republicans are worried about polls that show Reed's negatives beginning to move ahead of his positives. If Democrats are smart, they'll recognize that these trends can apply well beyond the borders of Georgia.

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Indicted Republican Lobbyist Jack Abramoff Attests to "Good Relationships With Members of Congress"