The Friends of Jack Abramoff
CONTINETTI, MATTHEW
The Friends ofJack Abramoff They're not all Republicans. BY MATTHEW CONTINETTI "THIS IS A REPUBLICAN scandal," Harry Reid, the Democrats' leader in the Senate, told Fox News Sunday host chris...
...Abramoff approached the Tigua and told them that he could use his connections in the federal government to the tribe's advantage...
...But Abramoff and Scanlon were also greedy...
...Later she became executive vice president of another lobbying firm, Global USA, Inc...
...Wallace had asked Reid about his relationship with Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist who last week pleaded guilty, in two separate investigations, to five counts of mail fraud, tax evasion, wire fraud, and conspiracy...
...So don't lump me in with Jack Abramoff...
...Shackelford "did approach my oiEce," he wrote, "during the waning hours of negotiations over the HAVA legislation...
...No one seems to have told Bob Ney that...
...Among Shackelford's clients in 2005: FM Policy Focus, which paid Global USA Inc...
...The plan, in short, had failed...
...Senator Christopher Dodd (D-CT)," he wrote, "managed the Senate...
...I checked around, and it was the formal position of the DNC to have that reopened...
...senator—had declared illegal...
...What the Tigua did not know was that Scanlon planned all along to send half that amount back to Abramoff in the form of a $2.1 million check to Kay Gold LLC., an Abramoff front...
...Enter Lottie Shackelford...
...She is also a lobbyist...
...The answer to all three questions was yes...
...Abramoff, Scanlon, and Ralph Reed, the former executive director of the Christian Coalition, had worked behind the scenes on behalf of another tribe, the Louisiana Coushattas, to make sure that the Tigua casino stayed closed...
...Strategies Inc., a lobbying firm...
...How Money, Power, and Influence Have Corrupted the GOP (Doubleday...
...That she did so tells us that Jack Abramoff's story is not simply about how some Republicans work Washington for private gain...
...In 2002, when she contacted Dodd about the Tigua provision, Shackelford was also a registered lobbyist on behalf of Quest Software, as well as United to Secure America, which paid Global USA Inc...
...Schwartz told Sen...
...Shackelford, he continued, was "critical...
...But at that time Democrats controlled the Senate, which meant that Scanlon's work had to be bipartisan...
...They were successful...
...Tigua tribe had operated the Speaking Rock casino in El Paso, which a Texas District court, adjudicating a suit brought against the tribe by Texas Attorney General John Cornyn—^now a U.S...
...the "Metro-Miami Action Plan Trust," which hired her to "assist with procurement of appropriated funds...
...However, according to Dodd, "the suggestion was summarily rejected...
...Schwartz's testimony jibes with the contents of an April 12, 2002, memo Scanlon sent to his tribal contacts, in which he wrote that "we have Senate support," but that "they are looking for political cover...
...Scanlon was the 'preeminent expert in grassroots politics,'" recalled Marc Schwartz, a Tigua representative, in a 2004 hearing before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee...
...And Representative Ney came on the scene somewhat later...
...He had someone in mind—his silent partner Scanlon...
...Abramoff "explained to us that Mr...
...In 1993 Clinton appointed Shack-elford, who had served on his presidential transition team, to the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, an obscure government agency that oversees subsidies for U.S...
...The route by which Scanlon had supposedly secured Dodd's cooperation was circuitous...
...In 2004 Dodd delivered a statement to the Senate Indian Affairs Committee...
...BY MATTHEW CONTINETTI "THIS IS A REPUBLICAN scandal," Harry Reid, the Democrats' leader in the Senate, told Fox News Sunday host chris Wallace in December...
...The two friends called this arrangement "Gimme Five...
...She was the first woman to be elected mayor of Little Rock, Arkansas, and her career has followed the arc of that state's former governor, Bill Clinton...
...She has been a vice chairman of the Democratic National Committee since 1989...
...businesses investing abroad...
...What's more, Schwartz testified, thanks to Scanlon's "experience with Representative Tom DeLay," for whom he had served as spokesman, Scanlon "had developed a reputation as the, quote, 'go-to guy' for the most difficult campaigns...
...And Reid's willingness to do so, and his reluctance to return the Abramoff-related funds, as many of his Republican colleagues have done, suggests that Washington's latest lobbying scandal may be more complex than partisans have let on, and more difficult for Democrats to make partisan hay out of than pundits now think...
...Now that the Tigua were out of luck, they reasoned, wouldn't the tribe want to see their casino reopened...
...Scan-lon replied...
...His firm, Scanlon & Gould, aka Capital Campaign Strategies, paid another firm, Lunde & Burger, $50,000 to lobby the Connecticut Democrat...
...Shackelford kept the $10,000...
...and Hyundai Motor Company, which paid her to work on "issues related to hydrogen fleet and infrastructure demonstration and validation project," specifically "HR 2419, Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act, 2006, provisions relating to Department of Energy hydrogen program...
...45,000 for six months' work to lobby the House and Senate on "regulatory reform issues" and the "Federal Housing Finance Reform Act of 2005...
...She was not a registered lobbyist on behalf of the Tigua...
...Like many Washing-tonians Lottie Shackelford came to this city to do good and stayed to do well...
...Dodd looked at him like a 'deer in headlights,'" Abramoff later wrote to Scanlon, and "said he had never made such a commitment and that, with the problems of new casinos in Connecticut, it is a problem...
...I'm on the phone with Tigua...
...As you know," Scanlon wrote in a January 9, 2003, after-action report to Schwartz, his tribal contact, "the election reform bill was targeted as the vehicle for the necessary legislative language needed to reopen the Speaking Rock Casino...
...only if he were successful would he ask the tribe to consider putting him on retainer...
...Reid might not have taken money directly from Abramoff, a lifelong Republican and conservative activist, but he did accept donations—some $66,000 worth—from Abramoff's clients, indian tribes operating casinos throughout the united States...
...Reid said there was no relationship...
...I want all their MONEY...
...until the previous month, the Matthew Continetti is a staff writer at THE WEEKLY STANDARD and author of the forthcoming book, Can This Party Be Saved...
...10,000 to influence immigration reform legislation...
...We directed her to make personal contact with the Senator throughout the campaign starting in April and lasting through the passage of the legislation in October," Scanlon wrote in his 2003 memo...
...But Abram-off's representation would not be enough...
...Most important, wouldn't they pay those influence peddlers a whole lot of money to do so...
...Much of her bio can be read on the website of the pharmaceutical company Medicis, on whose board Shackelford sits...
...It's also about how Washington really works...
...Ney told him that he had met with Dodd to discuss HAVA, and brought up the Tigua...
...Abramoff and Senator Dodd early in the process...
...Scanlon's program, "Operation Open Doors," came at a price: $4.2 million...
...Lunde and Burger entered into a $10,000 subcontract with yet another "public relations strategist" to lobby Dodd directly...
...Lobbyists, of course, get to cash their checks whether they are successful or not...
...He called me about the Tiguas' wanting to reopen their casino," Brian Lunde, a former Democratic National Committee executive director who in 2004 was the national chair of Democrats for Bush, later told the New York Times...
...She was, however, a member of Dodd's fundraising committee...
...Fire up the jet, baby, we're going to El paso...
...On February 2, 2002, Abramoff wrote an email to his lobbying partner Michael Scanlon...
...Fortunately," Scanlon continued, "Congressman Bob Ney (R-OH), with whom we have good relations and a solid working arrangement, was managing the House process...
...Also that year she was named executive vice president of U.S...
...Abramoff gave me no money," he said...
...He also said that his representation would cost nothing...
...On July 25, 2002, Abramoff received some disturbing news...
...The Tigua would also need to hire an expert in "grassroots" politics...
...This was because the Help America Vote Act of 2002, a grab-bag election reform bill also known as HAVA, was a sure legislative bet: It was due to pass Congress quickly, and the president would almost certainly sign it...
...John McCain in November 2004 that he recalled "an agreement between Mr...
...When the Help America Vote Act became law in October 2002, there was no provision reopening the Speaking Rock casino...
...consider another example...
...And wouldn't they want, further, to hire influence peddlers to petition the government on their behalf...
...While Scanlon was working with the Democratic lobbyists, Abramoff had been working with the Ohio Republican congressman...
...And Shackelford did "inquire whether recognition provisions for the Tigua tribe could be included in the bill...
Vol. 11 • January 2006 • No. 17
