[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 67 (Wednesday, May 25, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[Congressional Record: May 25, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
WHITEWATER
Mr. FAIRCLOTH. Mr. President, the Clinton administration is currently
embroiled in a scandal, a scandal that is causing enormous turmoil and
problems. Washington today is divided between two opposing groups. One
is made up of those who expect Congress to do its job and exercise
oversight into the matter. The second is those who do whatever it takes
to block congressional investigation, an investigation that will, at
the very least, cause embarrassment to their political allies and to
President and Mrs. Clinton.
There are many reasons to have the investigation, and I will not
attempt to go through a litany of them this afternoon, but they run
into the twenties. But only one I am going to touch on, and that is one
involving a man named Dan Lasater. Lasater is a convicted cocaine
dealer who ran a bond trading firm.
In the early 1980's--and this is verified testimony by the FBI--in
the 1980's, he met President Clinton's mother at the horse racetrack in
Hot Springs, AR. According to Newsweek magazine, and a confidential FBI
document, Dan Lasater told Federal agents that shortly thereafter, Bill
Clinton had asked Lasater to give his brother-in-law, Roger Clinton, a
job. Lasater gave Roger Clinton a job on his horse farm, but he also
paid off Roger Clinton's drug debts.
Lasater sponsored fundraising events all around Arkansas for Bill
Clinton. He did these in his brokerage offices. He made his airplane
available to Bill and Hillary Clinton to use for campaign and
noncampaign events alike. He also encouraged his workers to contribute
to Bill Clinton's gubernatorial campaign, promising higher commissions
to compensate for the money they contributed.
But for all this, Dan Lasater expected something in return and, Mr.
President, he got it. Shortly after Bill Clinton was back in the
Governor's mansion, despite having been censured by the Arkansas State
Securities Commissioner and National Association of Security Dealers,
Lasater's bond firm was again added to the select list of brokerage
firms eligible to underwrite State issues.
That classification in return generated millions of dollars of
business for Dan Lasater's firm. In the summer of 1985, Bill Clinton
personally lobbied the Arkansas State Legislature to approve a contract
for Dan Lasater to sell $30.2 million in bonds for an Arkansas police
radio system. That contract alone netted Dan Lasater $750,000.
Before he was jailed for trafficking in cocaine, Dan Lasater got a
contract to trade Treasury bond futures for the American Savings and
Loan in Oak Brook, IL. First American eventually sued Lasater's bond
firm for mail fraud, wire fraud, and security fraud. They could not
think of another.
In 1986, First American was seized by Federal regulators. Those
regulators pursued the lawsuit against Dan Lasater. Now, who did the
Government hire to handle the case against Lasater? The Rose law firm.
And who did the Rose law firm assign to handle the case? Not their
normal savings and loan lawyer, Webster Hubbell. Webster Hubbell was
the normal savings and loan lawyer, but they did not use him in this
case. Instead, they assigned it to Vince Foster and Hillary Rodham
Clinton. Those were the two assigned to handle Dan Lasater's case.
Hillary Clinton, whose husband had been bankrolled by Lasater, whose
brother-in-law had had his drug debts paid by Lasater, who had been
flown around Arkansas by Lasater, had now been hired by the FDIC to
represent the taxpayers against Lasater. The FDIC was suing for $3.3
million. Hillary Clinton and Vince Foster settled the case with her old
friend, lobbying client and political crony for $200,000--6 cents on
the dollar.
In 1987, Dan Lasater, serving a prison sentence, gave power of
attorney to Patsy Thomasson, who is today a top White House official.
Keep her name in mind, Mr. President. She will surface often.
Later, in 1987, Vince Foster and Hillary Clinton settled the
taxpayers' case with Dan Lasater for 6 cents on the dollar. But in
order to keep you and me from knowing about it, they settled the case
confidentially. The only way anyone ever found out about it was through
a letter that Vince Foster wrote the FDIC, the agency that Bill Clinton
now wants to install his friend Ricki Tigert to head--a favorite
hanging out friend of Mrs. Clinton.
Mr. President, the U.S. Senate should be holding hearings right now.
Members of Congress who are aware of many, many more facts in this
whole web of intrigue that has collectively come to be known as
Whitewater know that the whole matter will not just go away, and it is
time for the administration to realize it is not going away and they
will be better served by opening it to the public and full
investigation.
I am proud to join my colleagues in supporting this call for
immediate hearings on the matter. The American people deserve the
honesty of knowing what went on.
I thank the Chair.
Mr. NICKLES addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
Mr. NICKLES. Mr. President, I wish to compliment my colleague,
Senator Faircloth, from North Carolina for his statement and also my
friend and colleague from New York, Senator D'Amato, for his
persistence in calling for hearings. I wish to congratulate Senator
Dole as well.
I would urge that the majority leader, Senator Mitchell, work with
Senator Dole to set these hearings up and set a date and time certain
and commit to a format, so these hearings can be conducted and can be
concluded.
Frankly, I think it is in the President and Mrs. Clinton's best
interest to have these hearings occur and have them concluded as soon
as possible. There are a lot of questions that need to be asked, a lot
of questions that frankly have not been answered. Hearings will ask the
appropriate questions and seek the truth.
Now, I know Mrs. Clinton had one press conference and President
Clinton had another press conference on various Whitewater matters, but
there are a lot of unanswered questions that need to be resolved,
because some of these allegations do involve, if they are correct,
violations of Federal law.
Now, I have heard some people say, well, no credible allegations have
been made. Frankly, that is not the case. I have a list of 12 cases as
reported by the press, that, if true, were a violation of Federal law.
And I think we need some type of political justice and equity. I am
bothered by the fact that one of our colleagues, Senator Durenberger,
is going to be on trial in the Federal district court in Washington,
DC, over a case that involves maybe $4,000, a little less than $4,000.
The case was dismissed and then the Justice Department reindicted him,
and that case should go to trial in the near future.
I am looking at possible potential allegations dealing with
Whitewater many times greater than that. If the Justice Department is
going to be going after Senator Durenberger, who has already been
punished by this body, and go after him in prosecution for $4,000, I am
looking at some of these allegations dealing with Whitewater, and you
are talking about dollars in the hundreds of thousands in some cases.
So we need answers. We need answers.
The Senator from New York is correct: We need to find out things
dealing with Whitewater, with Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan. We
need to answer some questions dealing with cattle commodity futures.
Most people are kind of shocked that you can take a $1,000 investment
and make a 1,000-percent rate of return and have that be done legally
and ethically. Many have said it cannot be done.
We need to find out some answers. When it comes to commodities, for
example, we need to find out whether winning trades were allocated to
Mrs. Clinton's account and losers allocated to somebody else's account?
If that was done, that is illegal. We need to know.
We need to know answers to questions of whether federally insured
Madison deposits were diverted to pay the Clintons' share of their
Whitewater investment debts. We need to know answers to these
questions.
We need to know answers to what happened to the Whitewater records.
What happened to the documents that were taken from Vince Foster's
office the day that he died? That information has not been made public.
What about the information dealing with commodity trading that we now
understand the Chicago Mercantile Exchange has available but has not
yet been made public? Why has it not been made public?
So again I think that committee hearings are vitally important to
find answers to a lot of these unanswered questions, questions that
have been asked but questions that have not been answered. And fair,
objective, careful, bipartisan hearings are one way to find answers.
I see the majority leader is in the Chamber, so I would urge him to
move forward. I think it is in his interest, the President's interest,
and, frankly, in this country's interest to get this issue behind us.
A lot of us would like answers to some of these questions. We had
something like 20-some hearings during the Reagan and Bush
administrations, some of which many people considered political. I hope
that we could have these hearings, get these issues raised, questions
asked, and answers found as soon as possible.
I yield the floor.
Mr. MITCHELL addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
Mr. FORD. Mr. President, will the majority leader yield me a couple
minutes.
Mr. MITCHELL. Certainly, I yield.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kentucky.
Mr. FORD. Mr. President, my colleagues said that they analyzed TV ads
in Kentucky and say whether they are good, bad, or indifferent, distort
the facts. And he referred to the Courier Journal in their analysis of
these TV ads.
I thought I had seen this, and I wanted to be sure so that I will not
make another mistake on the floor. I really do not think I made a real
mistake. But I do not like to make mistakes.
Here is an editorial from the Courier Journal as it relates to the TV
ads. I would like to read that, Mr. President, if I may.
``Low Blows and Late Hits'' is the title of the editorial from the
Courier Journal that was referred to, analyzed in the TV ads.
It says:
Pity the voters of Kentucky's 2nd Congressional District.
For four happy decades, they abided in the shade of Bill
Natcher's political rectitude. Now, courtesy of the
Republican National Committee, they suddenly find themselves
wandering in the hellish, mirage-filled desert of modern
media campaigning.
It's a pitiless, truth-scorching place that takes some
getting used to--a place where character is only something to
be destroyed, where a record of honorable public service is
automatically mangled into a badge of shame, and where
responsible leadership is considered prima facie evidence of
betraying the public.
It's a place, in other words, where a solid, honest and
conservative Kentucky Democrat like Joe Prather can be
portrayed by attack ads as everything he isn't--a social
radical, a prodigal spender, a dirty politician--and have
large portions of the public accept the video lie over the
flesh-and-blood truth.
That's exactly what's happening in the special election
between Mr. Prather and Republican Ron Lewis to succeed Mr.
Natcher. Why? While Mr. Prather intended a modest, low-budget
campaign befitting his own style and Mr. Natcher's legacy,
the Republican National Committee decided otherwise.
It sent in big bucks and big guns, and the attack ads
began, delivering a series of late hits and low blows to Mr.
Prather's admirable record and reasoned views.
The race ceased being a campaign between two Kentuckians
over who can best represent and reflect the district.
Instead, it became a televised horror show featuring the
monstrous double of Mr. Prather created by the GOP's Dr.
Videosteins.
But to see Bill Natcher's Kentucky so quickly overtaken by
the worst kind of media politics is especially disheartening.
Voters should send Mr. Lewis' cynical handlers back to their
muck and turn out in droves for the real Mr. Prather.
I ask unanimous consent that the editorial be printed in the Record
at this point.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
[From the Louisville Courier Journal, May 21, 1994]
Low Blows and Late Hits
Pity the voters of Kentucky's 2nd Congressional District.
For four happy decades, they abided in the shade of Bill
Natcher's political rectitude. Now, courtesy of the
Republican National Committee, they suddenly find themselves
wandering in the hellish, mirage-filled desert of modern
media campaigning.
It's a pitiless, truth-scorching place that takes some
getting used to--a place where character is only something to
be destroyed, where a record of honorable public service is
automatically mangled into a badge of shame, and where
responsible leadership is considered prima facie evidence of
betraying the public.
It's a place, in other words, were a solid, honest and
conservative Kentucky Democrat like Joe Prather can be
portrayed by attack ads as everything he isn't--a social
radical, a prodigal spender, a dirty politician--and have
large portions of the public accept the video lie over the
flesh-and-blood truth.
That's exactly what's happening in the special election
between Mr. Prather and Republican Ron Lewis to succeed Mr.
Natcher. Why? While Mr. Prather intended a modest, low-budget
campaign befitting his own style and Mr. Natcher's legacy,
the Republican National Committee decided otherwise.
It sent in big bucks and big guns, and the attack ads
began, delivering a series of late hits and low blows to Mr.
Prather's admirable record and reasoned views.
The race ceased being a campaign between two Kentuckians
over who can best represent and reflect the district.
Instead, it became a televised horror show featuring the
monstrous double of Mr. Prather created by the GOP's Dr.
Videosteins.
Jefferson County Democrats are enduring similar tactics, as
cable-TV millionaire Charlie Owen tries to buy a
congressional nomination with a late deluge of attack ads.
But to see Bill Natcher's Kentucky so quickly overtaken by
the worst kind of media politics is especially disheartening.
Voters should send Mr. Lewis' cynical handlers back to their
muck and turn out in droves for the real Mr. Prather.
Mr. MITCHELL addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, will the majority leader give me an
opportunity to make a very brief observation about the Kentucky race
sort of inspired by Senator Ford? I probably will take only a couple of
minutes.
Mr. MITCHELL. We have had about 7 or 8 Republican speeches, and only
one Democrat has had a chance to speak. I will not want to suggest the
standard of equal time. But we ought to be able to get some time.
I am pleased to yield to my colleague.
Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I thank my friend, the majority leader.
My colleague from Kentucky has correctly alluded to an editorial in
the liberal Democratic, major newspaper in our State. I will stipulate
that on the editorial page they very much supported the democratic
candidate in the Second District.
What I was referring to earlier in the critique of the commercials is
the political reporter for the Courier Journal picking up on a trend
that David Broder actually launched a couple of years ago as a critique
of not only the editorial page but in the news section, a critique of
candidate's ads.
And the point I was making earlier was that his critique of the
advertising of the Republican candidate, the ultimate winner, in the
Second District, was really very, very mild.
Senator Ford and my colleague correctly points out that on the
editorial page the newspaper was very, very much in favor of the
Democratic nominee and quite depressed over the ultimate outcome.
Finally, let me say that I do stand corrected on something earlier
either I or the majority leader said with regard to the Whitewater
issue not being raised in the campaign. I am told that Whitewater was
mentioned in the commercials of the Republican candidate. So at least
to that extent it was mentioned. It was a factor in the Second
District.
I thank the majority leader for giving me an opportunity to continue
this little discussion 1 minute longer. I thank him very much.
Mr. MITCHELL. I thank my colleague.
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