Pennies For Tom

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Contributions Down for DeLay Legal Fund

The Associated Press
Thursday, July 21, 2005; 4:31 PM

WASHINGTON -- Majority Leader Tom DeLay raised $42,900 for his legal expense fund in the quarter ending June 30 _ short of the fund's expenses during the period, a House report showed Thursday.

Expenses for the Tom DeLay Legal Expense Trust totaled $56,211 in the second quarter. Most of the disbursements, more than $45,600, went to the Washington firm of DeLay lawyer Bobby Burchfield.


DeLay faces a possible investigation this year by the House ethics committee, which admonished him on three separate issues in 2004. News articles have questioned whether a Washington lobbyist or his clients paid for some of DeLay's nongovernment travel, despite House rules prohibiting lobbyist travel payments.

The Texas Republican has denied wrongdoing and said he assumed the nonprofit groups that invited him to travel had paid for the trips. In an effort to clear his name, DeLay has asked the ethics committee to look into the matter.

The officially named Committee on Standards of Official Conduct has not yet determined whether to conduct a comprehensive investigation.

Federal authorities and congressional committees are investigating whether the lobbyist, Jack Abramoff, bilked some of his Indian tribe clients.

The legal fund contributions are running far below 2004, when DeLay raised $439,300. In the quarter ending March 31 this year, DeLay raised $47,750 _ enough to cover his first quarter expenses of more than $34,000.

The fund has raised $1,089,871 since its formation in July 2000, according to Public Citizen, a congressional watchdog group that keeps track of the donations.



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U.S. House Republicans, Beset by Scandal, Want Higher Donations


July 21 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. House Republicans are considering removing Watergate-era limits on campaign donations even as Majority Leader Tom DeLay and other lawmakers face scrutiny over ethics issues and growing voter disapproval.

DeLay may bring to a floor vote as early as September legislation approved last month by the House Administration Committee. The measure, which the Texan supports, would end limits on political donations that date back to the 1974 campaign-finance law passed after the scandal that led to President Richard Nixon's resignation.

Ohio Representative Robert Ney, the chairman of the House Administration Committee, received $56,500 in contributions from lobbyist Jack Abramoff, Abramoff's partner and their Indian tribe clients, Federal Election Commission records show. Abramoff is under investigation by Congress and the Justice Department. DeLay was rebuked three times last year by the ethics committee.

``It's the wrong medicine at the wrong time,'' said Kenneth Gross, a partner with the New York-based law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP and a former FEC associate general counsel.

The measure would remove the $101,400 cap on the total amount an individual can give to political campaigns every two years and would increase political action committee donations to candidates. It would allow lawmakers' own PACs to transfer unlimited amounts to the political parties, which in turn could spend as much as they want on campaigns coordinated with their nominees.

$2 Million

The legislation wouldn't change the limits on contributions to individual candidates and political parties. Because there would be no limit on the total amount of giving, a single donor could give $2 million if he or she contributed to a political party and its candidates in all 435 House races and the 33 Senate races on the ballot every two years. That's almost 20 times higher than the current cap.

Ney said the legislation ``has nothing to do'' with the ethics issues. Instead, he said, it's a response to the growth of independent political groups incorporated under Section 527 of the Internal Revenue Code, such as America Coming Together and Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. The 527 groups, which can take unlimited donations, raised $429 million for the 2004 elections, up from $184 million two years earlier.

Competing Measure

The measure has 38 Republican sponsors and one Democrat, Albert Wynn of Maryland. ``The parties ought to have the ability to raise large donations, rather than just the 527s,'' Wynn said.

The legislation also would allow political-action committees to donate $15,000 to a House candidate every two years, up from $10,000, and would allow PACs to contribute $25,000 to a political party every two years, up from $15,000. Those limits would rise with inflation.

A competing measure being considered by Congress takes a different tack, seeking to limit donations to 527s to the same $5,000 that PACs can receive. That legislation is sponsored by Representatives Christopher Shays, Republican of Connecticut, and Martin Meehan, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Senator John McCain, an Arizona Republican, and Russell Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat. They are the authors of a 2002 campaign-finance law that banned political parties from raising unlimited donations from individuals, corporations and unions.

Indiana Representative Mike Pence, the chief Republican sponsor of the measure that would raise contribution limits, defended his legislation, saying it will encourage political expression.

``The other side wants to bring more regulation; we want to bring more freedom,'' said Pence.

Record Fund-Raising

Even without accepting unlimited donations, the Republican and Democratic parties raised record amounts in 2004, FEC reports show. The Republicans collected $657 million, up from $620 million for the 2000 elections, while the Democrats increased their fund- raising to $576 million from $470 million four years earlier.

The Pence measure is ``disastrous,'' said McCain. ``I see no way it would get a majority'' in the Senate.

``It is a mistake for my party to want to push this legislation, and I hope they don't,'' said Shays, who has called for DeLay to step aside as majority leader.

Polls show Congress faces voter dissatisfaction similar to that of 1994, before Republicans ended 40 years of Democratic control of the House. A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll taken July 8-11 found only 28 percent of voters approving Congress' performance. Six months before the 1994 elections, the approval rating was 32 percent.

``It's obviously the anti-response,'' Celia Viggo Wexler, vice president for advocacy at Common Cause, a Washington-based group that supports tougher campaign-finance laws, said of the Pence legislation. ``You'd think that with all these ethics problems, they would think twice and maybe three times about the implications of putting forth such a brazen bill.''

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Originally posted by LoungeMachine


DeLay may bring to a floor vote as early as September legislation approved last month by the House Administration Committee. The measure, which the Texan supports, would end limits on political donations that date back to the 1974 campaign-finance law passed after the scandal that led to President Richard Nixon's resignation.



unFUCKINGbelievable:rolleyes: :rolleyes: :mad: