[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 132 (Monday, September 29, 1997)]
[House]
[Pages H8130-H8137]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
A RIDICULOUS THREAT FROM THE PRESIDENT TO CONGRESS REGARDING CAMPAIGN
FINANCE REFORM
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 7, 1997, the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Souder] is recognized
for 60 minutes.
Mr. SOUDER. Madam Speaker, I have found few things as ridiculous
since I have been elected to Congress in 1994 as the headline that I
saw last week in the Washington Times, repeated in various publications
around the country in different ways. That headline says ``Clinton
Threatens to Recall Lawmakers to Hill. Campaign Finance Vote Demanded
During Session.''
Madam Speaker, I was trying to sort this through. My basic
understanding of this was that the President of the United States, Mr.
Campaign Finance himself, is threatening to call us into session for
campaign finance reform; this, the President who has made more from Air
Force One, the plane, than Harrison Ford made from the movie? He wants
us to have a session on campaign finance reform?
Tonight, Madam Speaker, we are going to talk a little bit about this
President and some of his friends. Additional Members will be joining
me as we go through this. But I have been soliciting some information
about different people's opinion on this, and what their reaction was
to this headline.
Madam Speaker, I have a couple of comments that I want to share with
the Members. We will be going through a number of these tonight.
I think that principle No. 1, and if I can, I am going to move down
to the other microphone here so I can use these posters, rule No. 1,
before we pass a bunch of new laws, is, how about we start in this
campaign finance reform with follow the current law. Because it does
not do a lot of good if in this country we pass a bunch of laws but
then we ignore those laws.
As I suggested the other day, if the President wants to have a
special session, maybe we could have the first day with his friends who
are in jail; the second day with his friends who have already been
released from jail; maybe the third day would be his friends who have
been indicted and are headed to jail. Then we could have a couple of
days for his friends who have pleaded immunity, 1 day for those who
pleaded partial immunity, 1 day for those who pleaded full immunity.
Then we could have a couple days for his friends who pleaded the fifth
amendment. There are I think 56 of those right now. Then we could have
3 days for his friends who have fled the country, possibly 1 day for
each continent.
Madam Speaker, it is ridiculous. They are not following the current
law. Why does he want us to come in and pass a bunch of new laws if we
cannot get people to follow the current law?
We have the Vice President of the United States, and we will get into
this more later, but who said that he was not following the existing
law because he was not clear on the controlling legal authority. Madam
Speaker, that is quite the explanation, that he was not sure of the
controlling legal authority.
The sale of access by this administration is unprecedented. To be
fair, the President does not discriminate where they are going to take
the money from. If the money is green, they will take it. They have
taken it from drug dealers, international fugitives, from arms dealers.
Hey, it is an equal opportunity administration.
There are some things that you can buy, for example, if you tune into
the Clinton Shopping Network. For $100,000 you can become a managing
trustee of the Democratic Party, which entitles you to two meals with
the President, two with the Vice President, issue retreats, private
impromptu meetings with administration officials, and your very own DNC
staffer to assist with your personal requests.
For $300,000, you can bypass the national security aides and get
directly to the President, even if you are an international fugitive
like Roger Tamraz. In his case, it was $250,000 or $300,000 to be able
to talk to the President about a pipeline, and he did not even get it.
I do not know what it would have cost if he was going to get the
pipeline.
We cannot even make up a cast of characters like the contributors who
wound up at the White House coffees, overnight in the Lincoln bedroom,
or posing for photographs with the President. It is something like out
of the bar scene from ``Star Wars.'' It is such an odd conglomeration
of different types of people.
The key, driving thing was, how can we raise more money so we can put
more ads up. Do not worry about the details. Drop the background
checks, in spite of the advice they were getting from different people
regarding individuals that were coming. The key thing was, can they
bring in money, will they give the party money.
[[Page H8131]]
One other thing in looking at this cast of characters, it is not
clear because we have not at least found a memo regarding this yet,
whether or not all these people who have been bringing the funds in,
whether we have seen the exhaustive list.
For example, what exactly does it cost if you want to see the
President and somebody from the Department of the Interior? Does that
cost more money? What if you want to see the President and somebody
from the Department of Treasury? What if you want to see two cabinet
officials? What if you have a case pending in front? What if you are
from a foreign country that maybe has minerals that you want an
international exclusive on, and maybe you would like a wilderness area?
It is not clear how these things interrelate, and a lot of documents
are missing or have yet to come clear.
Hopefully we will have some people with the courage that we had under
the Nixon administration, when clearly they were attempting to cover
up. Democrats and Republicans joined together to try to find the truth.
It was not a partisan event. Sure, the Democrats were very partisan
against Nixon. We would expect them to be partisan against Nixon.
Members might expect me and other Republicans to be partisan against
the President.
But where are the Democrats speaking out against President Clinton,
like the Republicans did against Nixon? Where are the staffers whose
conscience goes to the country as opposed to their boss? Are they so
intimidated? Are they so dulled to the sense of decency that they are
not coming forth? Or have people learned so much from Watergate that
maybe they did not leave as many messages as they did in the old days?
Quite probably they did not tape the conversations at the White House
like they did under Nixon.
But we need to have ways to find out, because it certainly is clear
that the administration did everything they could to get as much money
as they could. They backed off of the clearances of the people that
were coming in. They clearly had coffees, for which they had a going
price.
They took the Lincoln bedroom from the days of just a few people
going there, friends, other dignitaries. I think, if I recall right off
the top of my head, President Bush had maybe 8 to 10 major contributors
there. And they took it to a system, a production line of people who
could give the money to the President of the United States, and get to
stay in the Lincoln bedroom. They took all these things to a new high
effort.
In the foreign contributors, there is a lot of debate about what the
lines are in foreign contributions. Can you do this? Can you do that?
But there are some lines that are crystal clear. Foreign governments
cannot put money into campaigns. Furthermore, you definitely cannot
have somebody who is not wealthy give money on behalf of somebody else.
That is law violation No. 1.
Law violation No. 2 is if that person then gets refunded their money
from somebody who is not an American citizen, from an overseas thing.
And it is clear that that is what happened to this administration,
because it had to give the money back.
For example, we have seen the concerted efforts by foreign
contributors and governments to generously support Clinton-Gore. We
have watched them use executive branch officials and fact-finding to
raise money overseas. It is against the law, and it was supported with
taxpayer dollars. President Clinton and the Democratic Party received
more than $75 million in Federal funds during the 1996 campaign, and
the infusion of Federal matching funds provided additional fuel for
their fundraising obsession. We have never seen this level of use and
abuse of the system.
A friend of mine who is a historian, a former history professor, made
a list for me of 10 reasons for a special congressional session on
campaign finance reform to determine whether the Clinton administration
has set a record for the largest number of officials under
investigation in American history.
Runners-up, Grant, Harding, and Nixon. Harding just appeared not to
know what was going on. He never claimed to be a detail-type person.
General Grant had good days and bad days, depending on other things in
his personal lifestyle. So while they were accountable for what went on
under them, they did not claim to be micromanaging, like our current
President and Vice President, who said they were going to reinvent
government and were going to be hands-on President and Vice President.
Of course, Nixon we all know about. And maybe Nixon was as bad as
Clinton, but he does not have or did not have quite that number of
people under investigation.
No. 2, of the 10 reasons for a special congressional session on
campaign finance reform, to find out if the American timber industry is
large enough to handle the paper needs of the special prosecutors,
grand juries, and congressional committees looking into the deeds and
misdeeds of the Clinton officials. After all, as an environmentalist,
he needs to be concerned about all the paper we are using and all the
trees that are being chopped down for all these investigators.
{time} 2100
Maybe he could call a special session to enable Paula Jones to
address us on sexual harassment at the workplace. That would make about
as much sense as the President calling us into session on campaign
finance reform.
No. 4, to commission Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. to conduct a government
funded survey in which noted historians assess ``distinguishing
characteristics'' of the 42 men who have been President.
No. 5, to ascertain why the administration has had such difficulties
in persuading witnesses to return from safe havens in Beijing and other
places committed to MFN, religious freedom, and human rights.
No. 6, to learn at long last who hired Craig Livingstone and who is
paying the fees of his attorneys. I sit on the Government Reform and
Oversight Committee. I got to actually ask questions of Craig
Livingstone and ask him who hired him. It was quite the experience. He
did not come in for a tour at the White House. He did not even come in
to work at the receptioninst desk. He came in to be charge of security
at the White House. Yet he doesn't know who hired him.
He said under oath that it was the goal of his life to some day work
at the White House, that he worked in many low level campaigns, got
what a lot of people would consider to be dirty jobs in those campaigns
in order to some day have a chance at working his way up and maybe
working at the White House. So he finally gets to the White House and
he does not know who hired him.
I asked him, because he had been saying all day he did not know what
all of us know, who our early supporters were, especially if it was
your dream to get to the White House, I said, who did you say thank you
to. Are you so ungrateful that you never told thank you to anybody who
hired you? And he hung his head down. And I want to say that I believe
he felt badly. I do not know what intimidation was on him. I do not
know why he would not give up the information. He just said, I do not
know who hired me.
My next question was relatively simple as well. The American people
are watching and they know, as visitors in the gallery know, that if
you go to the White House and want to take a tour, they do checks on
you. If we, as Members of Congress, want to go over, they do checks on
us, if we take somebody through, they run background checks on us. He
was coming in to be head of White House security and he did not know
who hired him. I said, who let you in the door. He gave me the name of
the receptionist.
I mean this is a joke. This is absolutely ridiculous. We kept the
questioning up. And later one of the former counsels at the White House
ventured that maybe Vince Foster hired him. Do you know what? Every
time we came to a tough point in the travelgate hearing, every time we
came to a tough point in whatever investigation we were going through,
the FBI files, who hired Craig Livingstone, whenever the pressure got
toughest, they blamed it on the dead guy. Either Vince Foster was
carrying tremendous baggage or some people are really abusing Vince
Foster, who is no longer with us to defend himself. So maybe we could
learn in a special session who hired Craig Livingstone.
No. 7, to charge the civil Rights Commission with investigating
whether Gennifer Flowers was actually retained
[[Page H8132]]
as an Arkansas State employee at the expense of a more qualified
minority applicant.
No. 8, to permit Roger Tamraz to fuel all the automobiles retained by
Members of Congress and their staffs in return for attending all the
receptions held in the Rayburn building for a year with an overnight
stay in Statuary Hall.
No. 9, to commission the printing of the motto ``no controlling legal
authority'' on all letterhead charged to the House Ethics Committee,
the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the Department of Justice.
No. 10, present the Congressional Medal of Honor to Mary Heslin,
lately of the National Security Council, for daring to attempt to
preserve the honor and integrity of the presidency from the corrosive
clutches of its present occupant and to ban all Georgetown bar bouncers
from obtaining access to her FBI file.
It is really scary, when we go through. In the Nixon administration,
Chuck Colson went to prison because he had one FBI file. When we went
through the FBI files in our committee and we started asking, I
remember one of the early questioners asking one of the former
attorneys at the White House if he knew Craig Livingstone and he looked
around and said, I met him once. He reported to me but I did not really
know him. Then they asked him if he knew Anthony Marceca. He looked
down the thing, no, never met him, never saw him. He later, to another
question, said, yes, the FBI files were under my office. The FBI files
were never looked at by anybody. Nobody looks at these, these were
under Livingstone and Marceca's control. So former Congressman Bill
Martini asked the question, Mr. Nussbaum, under oath, you earlier said
that you had met Craig Livingstone one time. You never met Anthony
Marceca; you did not know him. Yet you also said under oath that all
these files were never violated, nobody looked at them and does not
that seem to be a contradiction? And Mr. Nussbaum said, the reason I
can say that is I know nobody in our administration would stoop so slow
as to look at any of those files.
It is like, come on, guys. If you have hundreds and hundreds of files
scattered through various staffers, they had interns having these files
with background information that they had checked on Republicans,
people they had no business even investigating in the first place yet
alone looking at their file. They do not know who hired the national
security advisor who most of his qualifications were that he had been a
dirty tricks person in large part in different campaigns. They have in
Travelgate, when we got into that, you look at that and see that what
the whole deal there was is first you have a girlfriend of a staffer
getting a deal. Then you realize that a friend from Arkansas is trying
to get, without White House security clearance, is wondering around
trying to get the contract for the travel office. What he really wants
is the contract for travel for his agency for all the different
branches of the Federal Government which, rather than just the small
travel office budget, is now millions and millions of dollars. And we
see this unfold first in the Travelgate. Because we are looking at the
Travelgate, we find out about the files. And we are looking at the
files and we find out about Craig Livingstone.
It is just like what is now starting to happen, when we start to
unravel the money, part of the reason this is so confusing to the
American people is you start, you go, wow, there is money from China
here and some arms dealer and such-and-such, and the next thing you are
over in Indonesia and next thing it is happening from Thailand. Oh,
Taiwan, too. And pretty soon you have people confused because it is
coming from about every major country in the world that has any
business. You have all these different people pouring money in left and
right. It is no wonder the American people are confused as to the
particulars.
I have a couple of other charts here. This is a list of witnesses who
have fled the country. Charlie Trie was last seen in Beijing, China. He
is a former restaurateur and old friend of President Clinton who tried
to give $640,000 in suspicious contributions to the President's legal
expense trust. Part of the reason it is hard for our committees to lay
this out is it is not like China is cooperating and it is not like the
banks in China are cooperating, and it is not like Charlie Trie is
cooperating. So it is a little hard to get all this information.
I think you will see, as the House investigations start this fall and
go through next year, that we will hopefully get more of this. Pauline
Kanchanalak, in Thailand, had $235,000 in DNC contributions returned
because she could not verify that she was the source. In other words,
we are already seeing this money being sent back. It is not like it is
a dispute whether the funds were legal. He is telling us he wants
campaign finance reform when rule No. 1 is this, follow the current
law.
The current law seems to be, in the eyes of this administration, if
the Senate investigators or the House investigators turn up the funds,
send it back fast. That seems to be what is happening. We are seeing
very little money sent back until we uncover it in one of the
committees. Then they send it back. That is not the law. The law says,
do not take the illegal money and send the illegal money back, not
until Congress discovers it.
Third, Ming Chen, a businessman in Beijing, China, runs Ng Lap Seng's
restaurant business in that city and is the husband of Yue Chu.
Agus Setiawan, Indonesian employee of Lippo who signed many of the
checks to the DNC drawn on Lippo affiliates.
Subandi Tanuwidjaja, in Indonesia, gave $80,000 to the DNC for a
dinner with Clinton, which may have come from wire transfers from his
father-in-law, Ted Sioeng, who lives in China. Arief and Soraya
Wiriadinata, Indonesian couple who gave the DNC $450,000 after the
receipt of a $500,000 wire from Soraya's father, a co-founder of the
Lippo Group.
It knows no country. John H. K. Lee, South Korean businessman,
president of Cheong Am America, Inc., DNC returned $250,000 to Cheong
Am.
Antonio Pan, ex-Lippo executive and friend of Charlie Trie and John
Huang who delivered cash to individuals for conduit payments.
And then there is Ted Sieong, father of Jessica Elnitiarta, who
donated $100,000 to the DNC. He is reportedly connected to the Chinese
intelligence community.
Then there are the witnesses who have pled the fifth amendment to the
House or Senate committees. John Huang, former DNC fundraiser, Commerce
Department official and Lippo Group employee who solicited more than $1
million in questionable contributions.
Jane Huang, wife of John Huang, her name appears on DNC documents as
a solicitor of some DNC donations while Huang was at Commerce.
Mark Middleton, former White House Deputy Chief of Staff, who became
an international businessman, worked with the Riadys and Trie. Maria
Hsia, Taiwan-born consultant who helped Huang organize the temple
fundraiser.
Manlin Foung, sister of Charlie Trie, was given thousands of dollars
to donate to the DNC in her name by Trie.
Joseph Landon, Manlin Foung's friend, was given thousands of dollars
to donate to the DNC in his name by Trie.
David Wang, made $5,000 contribution to the DNC at Trie's request.
Nora and Gene Lum, fundraising couple who pled guilty to violations
of Federal election laws.
These are people to pled the fifth, remembering that rule No. 1,
before we do campaign finance reform, is follow the current law. Do you
know what? Generally speaking, I am not an attorney. I know some of my
friends here tonight are attorneys. It does not mean you are guilty
because you plead the fifth. But it means you are not being very
cooperative in trying to find out the truth, and it does not look
particularly good.
The next name on here, Webster Hubbell, already is coming out of
jail, former Associate Attorney General, not the kind of person you
want to see go to jail or that kind of ups your confidence in the
President that he would put in an Associate Attorney General who goes
to jail, received hundreds of thousands of dollars from Lippo after
leaving the Justice Department. Hsiu Luan Tseng, a Buddhist nun at a
Hawaiian temple who contributed to the DNC at the Hsi Lai temple event.
[[Page H8133]]
Judy Hsu, Buddhist nun who contributed at the temple event.
Yumei Yang, Buddhist nun who contributed at the temple event.
Seow Fong Ooi, Buddhist nun who contributed at the temple event.
By the way, either nuns make a lot more money than I thought they
did, or we have a serious problem here. Jen Chin Hsueh, gave $2,000 to
DNC, listed address as home owned by the temple but does not live
there. Jie Su Hsiao, Buddhist nun who contributed at the temple event.
Gin F. J. Chen, DNC donor at a fund-raiser at Washington's Hay Adams
hotel who may have been reimbursed by Hsi Lai.
Hsin Chen Shih, DNC donor at a fund-raiser at Washington's Hay Adams
hotel who may have been reimbursed by Hsi Lai.
Bin Yueh Jeng, Taiwanese national who, at John Huang's urging, gave
$5,000 to the DNC.
Hsiu Chu Lin, employee of Hsi Lai, who gave the DNC $1,500.
Chi Rung Wang, a California man who gave DNC $5,000 at the temple
fundraiser.
Noland Hill, business partner of the late Secretary Ron Brown.
Yogesh Ghandi, while receiving $500,000 in wire transfers from a
Japanese bank, contributed $325,000 to the DNC.
These are people who pled the fifth amendment. They do not want to
talk to us about it. Jane Dewi Tahir, college student related by
marriage to the Riadys who received $200,000 in wires from the Lippo
bank and gave $30,000 to the DNC.
Duangnet Kronenberg, sister-in-law of Pauline Kanchanalak, attended a
coffee at Vice President Gore's residence.
Maria Mapili, employed by Trie, familiar with wires he received from
Ng Lap Seng.
Jou Sheng, gave DNC $8,000 listing a Maywood, CA, Buddhist temple as
his address but does not live there.
I want to make it clear that these people at the Buddhist temple,
they may or may not have known what the American laws are. That is the
responsibility of the people soliciting the money. It is the
responsibility of the Democratic National Committee, the Vice President
of the United States, the President of the United States to know the
law.
And I personally want to make it clear that it would be very easy to
make this seem like somebody is anti-Asian or anti these countries.
That is not the case here. The question is what were the leaders of
this country doing when they know the law, as every one of us know the
law, soliciting money and taking advantage of people who think that
that is how the U.S. Government works?
It is an insult to our Nation and a shame on our Government that they
would use these other countries, use how they may have to deal in other
parts of the world to let them think they have to give money to the
President's campaign committee and the President's party in order to do
business with the United States. They should be up front and say, we do
business fairly here. We do not have things for sale in this country.
We have a different standard than the rest of the world. And instead,
we abuse people who may not have known, who had always looked to
America as a country different in the world, a country that was not
corruptible. And they went and used these people, even in their own
Buddhist temple. They used these people to get their money and to then
use it for campaign purposes to stay in power. It is very difficult, I
feel bad if I mispronounce these names but there is a whole bunch more
from there.
{time} 2115
I could go on, but I see I have been joined by a few of my friends
here. I will yield to the distinguished gentleman from Arizona [Mr.
Shadegg].
Mr. SHADEGG. I would be happy to join in this discussion if the
gentleman would yield.
One of the posters the gentleman put up is one that strikes me a
great deal in this debate, and if he will put it back up, it says,
first rule, follow the current law.
I notice we are now debating on the set-aside the whole issue of
campaign finance reform, and there is this hue and cry that we really
ought to be revising our campaign laws because, clearly, this episode
demonstrates that we need to rewrite the law. And yet, as the gentleman
shows there, rule No. 1, follow the current law, it kind of makes me
wonder what is the point of rewriting the law so that we have a new law
if they did not follow the old law. Why do we think they will follow
the new law? It is kind of amazing.
I know the gentleman talked about legal authorities. I am an
attorney, and I was proud to make my living in that field before coming
here, but in that regard, and just to touch on follow the law, let us
talk about Al Gore's favorite phrase: The controlling legal authority.
And guess what? There is some in this area. As a matter of fact, there
are a number of statutes that touch on these practices quite directly.
For example, 18 United States Code section 201 outlaws bribery in
this country. Now, whether or not we quite have the facts to establish
bribery, whether they will come out before the Thompson hearings end,
whether they will come out in the course of the Burton hearings may not
be clear, but there is a law here that says bribery is wrong.
But let us talk about some others where we do have some pretty clear
evidence.
How about 18 United States Code section 600, which prohibits the use
of government offices for political purposes. How about that same
section of law that says it is a crime to promise access to a
government building or to government services in return for campaign
contributions.
There were, I think, 103 White House coffees held with the President,
telling them they could come to the White House and have coffee with
the President for $500,000. It seems to me we turned this place into
Starbucks on Pennsylvania Avenue.
Let us talk about another one. 18 United States Code section 607
specifically says it is a Federal crime to solicit campaign
contributions in a Federal building. On that one we have Al Gore on at
least 86 different solicitation calls from the White House.
We also have a fascinating note, that maybe the gentleman has put it
up or maybe he has not put it up, where a White House staffer makes a
note that BC made 15 to 20 calls and raised $500,000. Now, BC, I
suppose we could be talking about the cartoon character BC who I used
to read about. We could be talking about Bill Cosby.
Mr. SOUDER. Or Boston College. We should not be so judgmental.
Mr. SHADEGG. Boston College. There could be that other remote
possibility, that when it says on a staff note written in the White
House, written by David Strauss, ``BC made 15 to 20 calls and raised
$500,000,'' there is at least a slim chance, I would suppose, and maybe
I could ask my colleague if he wants to comment on this, that BC did
not refer to Bill Cosby or Boston College but Bill Clinton.
Mr. SOUDER. Especially when we look at the--it is hard to read the
small print, but it is talking about the $5 million needed by year's
end, refers to other specific individuals, and then it said BC made 15
to 20 calls, raised 500 K. Hard to believe that would not be Bill
Clinton.
Mr. SHADEGG. We are trying to bring some light to this discussion and
maybe some humor here, maybe we should do a national call-in, where we
put up a 1-800 number and ask the American people how many people think
BC in that note refers to Bill Cosby or Boston College or the cartoon
character BC or somebody other than Bill Clinton; and how many think
maybe BC in that White House note refers to 15 to 20 calls raising
$500,000 by BC, referring to Bill Clinton.
Mr. SOUDER. Kind of a credibility test.
Mr. SHADEGG. We could do that and let the American people call in and
tell us what they really think.
To continue the theme of mentioning a few controlling authorities
that the Vice President did not happen to notice.
Mr. SOUDER. Did the gentleman mention the HRC?
Mr. SHADEGG. The gentleman can talk about the HRC.
Mr. SOUDER. Well, there is one here that says HRC was making calls,
too, which I assume is the human resources counsel. I would not want to
jump to the conclusion it was Hillary Rodham Clinton.
[[Page H8134]]
Mr. SHADEGG. Hillary Rodham Clinton? Oh, no, I am certain that is a
coincidence. I doubt if it would be Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Mr. SOUDER. It is against the law. They would not do that.
Mr. SHADEGG. No, that is right. That is in the same note where it
said BC made 15 to 20 calls and HRC is making calls. I doubt if that is
Hillary Rodham Clinton. I am certain it is just someone else who
happens to have similar initials.
Mr. SOUDER. We will probably discover it after the statute of
limitations runs.
Mr. SHADEGG. No doubt shortly after the statute of limitations.
Just, again, reclaiming the time the gentleman has yielded to me
graciously, Al Gore, in his perusal of the statutes, could not find a
controlling legal authority. My staff found yet another one they
thought was interesting.
18 United States Code, section 641, which talks about converting
Federal property to a private use. That, of course, brought to my
staff's mind the idea that there was a notation, I believe, since we
are talking about notations on House documents, that said quote, ready
to start overnights right away, and was signed President Clinton.
President Clinton. Now, those initials BC, Bill Clinton? That would
be the same one?
Mr. SOUDER. Maybe it was supposed to have a P in front of this one.
Mr. SHADEGG. PBC?
Mr. SOUDER. Well, maybe it was Bill Cosby.
Mr. SHADEGG. There was one last one. The gentleman was just talking
about the use of the Buddhist temple and the innocence of the people
there. We found one more controlling authority that our friend Mr. Gore
might want to take a look at.
It was 18 United States Code, section 371, and 26 United States Code,
section 7201, which similarly make it a crime to misuse a tax exempt
organization such as, for example, a Buddhist temple which has tax
exempt status.
Mr. SOUDER. If the gentleman will yield for a second, I need to make
a brief point before yielding to the gentleman from Colorado.
Earlier the gentleman mentioned the White House coffees and the
$50,000 for the coffees and mentioned Starbucks. Starbucks is $1.27 for
me. I did not want people to think coffee at Starbucks was the same as
coffee at the White House.
Mr. SHADEGG. Good point. So coffee at Starbucks is $1.27, coffee at
the White House is $50,000.
Mr. SOUDER. Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Arizona once
again.
Mr. SHADEGG. If I could, briefly, while we are on this point, and
then I will be happy to yield back. We are trying to bring some light
and make this a little humorous, so I hope everyone watching
understands this is a little tongue in cheek.
We did discover a rather tongue-in-cheek memo from the White House,
actually probably not crafted in the White House because I doubt they
would let this memo out, but it says ``Clinton White House Lessons
Learned in the Campaign of 1996.''
I thought the gentleman mentioned some humorous things his friend had
sent him, and so I thought I would mention a couple of these things
that I thought were rather pointed in the vein of Clinton White House
lessons learned in the campaign of 1996.
First, lesson No. 1, ``Blame it all on the DNC chairmen.''
Lesson NO. 2, ``Don't give back illegal money until it's discovered
in a Senate hearing.''
Lesson No. 3, ``Make sure all donors know their 5th Amendment
rights'' against self-incrimination.
Lesson No. 4, ``The press won't cover the truth until after the
campaign.''
Lesson No. 5, ``Spin illegal international contributions as `foreign
investment,' helping the trade deficit, pro-labor.''
Mr. SOUDER. That is a good point, I never thought it as helping to
balance the trade. Get some of our money back.
Mr. SHADEGG. We are trying to help out the economy. Helps the trade
deficit and the labor movement.
Lesson No. 6, ``Sprint has the best rate for international calls.''
Mr. SOUDER. That is good to know, if I ever make one.
Mr. SHADEGG. If we are going to call overseas to get a contribution,
use Sprint, it is cheap.
Mr. SOUDER. They have done our field work for us.
Mr. SHADEGG. Lesson No. 7, ``Never put it in writing.''
This one Al Gore should have learned. Obviously, he does not have
friends.
Lesson No. 8, ``Friends don't let friends call from work.''
And one that touched on the point the gentleman went into at length
about what happened in this Buddhist temple, and the fact that people
there were extremely generous, as a matter of fact. This is an
important Clinton White House lesson learned in the course of the
campaign of 1996: ``Monks may not be as poor as you think.''
Another one, ``Don't settle for less.''
Yet another, ``Never sell the Presidency for less than $50,000,''
unless of course you can get $50.
Another one, ``Felons deserve a second chance: Donor mentoring.''
``The CIA can't keep a secret.''
Mr. SOUDER. That is something we just recently learned in these
hearings.
Mr. SHADEGG. The last one, and I will conclude: ``Leak it as soon as
you know it, so that before the hearing you can call it old news.''
That one we watched play out last week, where it was very important
in the Committee on House Oversight that we make all depositions
instantaneously public so that they could be old news by the time the
hearings were held, and we brought them out and brought them to light
and pointed out, oh, by the way this sentence in the deposition
demonstrates a crime.
Mr. SOUDER. Then the President says it is old news. ``They already
proved I did this immorally and illegally.'' What is news about this?
Mr. SHADEGG. If it was leaked last week or a month ago, it is old
news, even if it is just now revealed to show a crime.
I thank the gentleman and give back my time.
Mr. SOUDER. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan, who has been a
leader in a lot of these issues in trying to root out corruption in
government.
Mr. HOEKSTRA. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I appreciate
some of this tongue-in-cheek tonight, but I think we also recognize
that this is very serious business, and recently we have encountered
another whole aspect of what may be corruption in the administration.
We know that there is corruption.
What I am talking about is an action that the House took here last
week, on Friday, and we also took a similar action the week before, and
it deals with the Teamsters Union, where in 1996 the Teamsters had
another election for a Teamsters president.
The election cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 million. And
it is kind of like, well, I really hope that when the Teamsters run an
election and they spend $20 million, that the Teamster members are
entitled to a fair and honest election, and there are Federal laws in
place to make sure that that happens.
But there is one slight difference with the Teamsters election in
1996, in that the Teamsters did not pay for the election in 1996. They
did not pay for their own election. They did not pay for the printing
of the ballots, they did not pay for the counting of the ballots, they
did not pay for the facilities that were rented, they did not pay for
the campaigns; none of these things. The sad thing was, in 1996, and
over a period of about 2\1/2\, 3 years, the American taxpayers spent
about $20 million, the American taxpayers spent $20 million to pay for
a Teamsters election.
The Teamsters election was completed in December 1996, the ballots
were completed, counted early in 1997, and on August 22 the election
officer who oversaw the election process overthrew the election. She
looked at the election, looked at the charges that were made, and said
this was a fraudulent election and we are going to throw it out;
meaning we have to do it over again.
Mr. SOUDER. Reclaiming my time, I want to make sure that I and those
listening understand this. Was it Congress' intent to pay for that
election?
Mr. HOEKSTRA. No, we do not think so. It was a consent decree in
1989, where the Justice Department reached
[[Page H8135]]
an agreement on a series of steps and activities to root out corruption
out of the Teamsters and required a democratic election for the
president of the Teamsters in 1991 and another election in 1996, and it
was optional for the Justice Department or the executive branch to
decide who was going to pay for the election in 1996.
{time} 2130
In 1991, the Teamsters did exactly the right thing, they said this is
an internal operation. We would like Government Oversight to make sure
that Federal laws are adhered to and those types of things. The
Teamsters paid for their own election in 1997. It was a good, fair,
clean election. The people that we have interviewed and told us about
that said it was a good election, 1996.
Somewhere around 1993, 1994, we do not know exactly who or where, but
somebody said do not worry about that $20 million, Teamsters. The
Federal Government is going to pick up that tab. We will pay for it,
and who knows what you are going to do with that other $20 million, but
the Federal Government will pay for the election. We run the election,
and 9 months later we throw it out.
Mr. SOUDER. Reclaiming my time, as my colleague has pointed out
repeatedly in other issues, there really is not a Federal Government.
That is your people in the district of Michigan and mine in Indiana
that paid for that election. You are telling us that the Justice
Department decided that we were going to pay for the Teamsters
election.
Mr. HOEKSTRA. That is correct.
Mr. SOUDER. And then after, in effect, deciding for us that without a
vote that we were going to pay for the election, they were overseeing
the election that they now say is corrupt?
Mr. HOEKSTRA. That is absolutely correct. What has happened, and I
thank the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. Souder] for clarifying this. I
was right, the Federal Government paid for it. You were more correct
because, you know, when we in Washington spend $20 million, it is not
our money, it is taxpayer dollars. It was about $50 a vote for every
vote cast is what the American taxpayers paid for the Teamsters
election.
Now, the interesting thing is how did the election officer determine
to make this serious, you know, change in policy that said, I have
reviewed the election, and there is such corruption in this election I
am going to throw it out. And what she found in this process was that
there was money laundering. There was money laundering to vendors who
would bill the Teamsters for certain activity, never complete the
activities, but get paid for it and funnel money back into the campaign
of Mr. Carey.
There were political action committees, organizations, whose primary
intent and focus is to drive the agenda here in this House and drive
the agenda here in Washington, who all of a sudden started getting
extraordinarily large amounts of dollars from the Teamsters.
This is now the union money, funds coming to the union headquarters
in Washington and being sent somewhere with the understanding that if
we send you some money, oh, look, they gave me some money.
Mr. SOUDER. Reclaiming my time, is that because the union dues could
not be used directly for Mr. Carey's election?
Mr. HOEKSTRA. That is because the union dues could not be used
directly for the election of Mr. Carey. So they were laundered through
campaign organizations with a quid pro quo, you do this for me and I
will do this for you.
The end result is what do we have? We have $20 million of taxpayer
money that is right down the drain. We know that when the Teamsters ran
their own election, they ran a clean election. When the Federal
Government and this administration got involved in the process, we
spent $20 million of taxpayers' money and all we got was an illegal
election.
So we know that the Teamsters election was full of illegalities. That
is why it was overthrown. We know that there were lots of dollars that
were funneled out into congressional campaigns, meaning that I believe
that there were many congressional campaigns that we can accurately
describe as being tainted elections because the dollars got into those
elections in an illegal way. So we have got tainted Teamsters
elections. We have got tainted congressional elections. And we have $20
million of taxpayers' money right down the shooter.
I just want to add one thing, what we did last week, in a very
surprising vote, is Congress finally stood up twice in the last 10 days
and said, we are not going to pay for the rerunning of the Teamsters
election. We are going to follow the current law. We can run a
Teamsters election fairly. We know that we did that in 1991. We do not
need any change of the law to have Teamsters get a fair election. All
we need to do is follow the existing law.
In the last 10 days, this Congress and the other body on one occasion
have said, we are not going to pay for any more internal operations of
the Teamsters. But increasingly, in both cases, we had almost 190
Members of this House say, oh, yeah, we will let the taxpayers pay for
the rerun of this election. We have the Justice Department and Labor
Department right now figuring out ways to get some money, the money we
did not spend in 1996.
We are collecting some fines and penalties. Why are we collecting
fines and penalties? These are not wild allegations. There are three
people that have already pled guilty and have been fined and the
Justice Department saying, wow, here is some more money coming in,
these people who will pay for the rerunning of the election.
This House stood up and said, no more. We will supervise the
election. It is our job to make sure that the Federal laws are
enforced. That is our responsibility. That is the people's
responsibility. But it is not the people's responsibility to pay for
the printing and counting of ballots and to run the internal operations
of the union.
This is an interesting situation. We are going to be taking, I think
both of our committees are going to be taking an additional look at
this because of the involvement of taxpayers' dollars, the overthrowing
of the election, and how it may have gone into other parties of the
campaign process in 1996.
Mr. SOUDER. Reclaiming my time, I want to yield, if the gentleman
will, for a couple more questions just to reiterate, because it is
confusing to a lot of people how this occurred.
As I understand what the gentleman said, is that somewhere along the
line, around 1994 or thereabouts, the Justice Department decided that
the taxpayers should pay for the election, which had the Teamsters pay
for it out of their own dues, would not have left as many dollars for
the then President to go out and cut sweetheart deals with contractors
and with the Democratic Party in return for them giving money to his
campaign.
In other words, if the dues had been used for a fair election,
perhaps A, the president of the union might not have won, unless he
wasted all his dollars in the campaign, and B, there are Members of
Congress whose elections may have been different.
Is that what you are, in effect, saying?
Mr. HOEKSTRA. We are saying that, as a result of the American
taxpayer picking up the tab for the 1996 election, the American
taxpayer spent $20 million that the Teamsters organization did not have
to spend itself. I do not know what they did with that money, where
that money went. But I think it is a question that is worth asking.
Just as a side note to this, not only did the American taxpayer pay
for the Teamsters election in the U.S., now think about this, the
American taxpayer paid for the printing of ballots, paid for the
counting of ballots in Canada. We paid to run the private internal
organization of the Teamsters not only in the U.S., but also in Canada.
Unbelievable.
Mr. SOUDER. Reclaiming my time, I guess it kind of counters the point
that the gentleman from Arizona [Mr. Shadegg] was making earlier about
the balance of trade. We were getting money in illegal contributions,
but we were taking taxpayer dollars to pay for elections overseas.
My colleague would know this more than I, but my understanding was
that the losing candidate actually carried the Midwestern States, where
we are from, and lost the Canadian vote which we funded.
Mr. HOEKSTRA. If the gentleman would continue to yield, I believe
that
[[Page H8136]]
if the Teamsters election had only been an U.S. election, the result
would have been different. But because the American taxpayer picked up
the tab for the Canadian election, the result was different, and that
is what pushed Mr. Carey over the top.
And just a quick correction, before we get inundated with faxes, a
correction, Canada is not overseas.
Mr. SOUDER. It depends on how you define the Great Lakes. As a police
Midwesterner, those are big lakes to us.
Mr. SHADEGG. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, at the risk
of changing topics, and I think that is a vitally important issue about
which we are all concerned and it fits with the theme of this hour, I
notice we are running out of time, and I wanted to take a moment, both
of my colleagues are on the Committee on Education, to raise a separate
issue that was raised at the end of the last hour, and ask each of them
to comment on it, because I think it is an issue that the American
people need to know about.
My questions tonight arise out of a Wall Street Journal column that
appeared today that I hope each of my colleagues have seen. It is a
column by Lynne Cheney, and it carries the caption ``A Failing Grade
for Clinton's National Standards.'' If I could, I just would like to
talk about this article for a moment because it is so compelling to me.
I have a 15-year-old and an 11-year-old at home. As a matter of fact,
just before coming over here to the floor, I was on the phone with my
15-year-old and asking her some questions, and she was working on her
homework and doing a small project for me. Nothing is more important to
me than their education. And I am deeply interested that they get a
good education and get ahead in this life.
And that takes us to a debate that is at the fore of this Nation
right now and on which conferees between the House and Senate will be
meeting very soon, and that is the question of national testing. The
point I want to make here is that I have reasonable friends at home,
very bright people at home, who come to me and say, ``Congressman, I do
not understand. Why are you against national testing? Should we not, as
a Nation, want to know how our students are doing and want to compare
our kids in Arizona,'' my home State, ``with the children in other
States across the country,'' such as yours, Indiana. And I walk them
through this explanation. But this article really brings the issue
home.
I point out to them that the sad reality is that teachers will teach
to the test. And maybe that is not so sad. They want their students to
do well. So if they know the content of the test, they are going to
say, ``I better make sure my students learn the content of the test.''
So people say to me, okay, Congressman, if you are worried that a
national test will cause people to teach to the test, does that not
simply say that when the President picked objective areas, such as
math, and not more subjective areas, such as social studies, that that
really should solve the problem about national testing, we will test
English and we will test math and there are black and white, right and
wrong answers and we will see how kids are performing and we will not
get into the subjective areas like history?
And I point out to them that, while that sounds good, reasonable,
rationale people ought to be deadly opposed to National testing. And
this article makes it clear why: Because there are not black-and-white
areas in today's Washington, D.C. Education Department under Bill
Clinton.
And here is the point: The article by Lynne Cheney in today's Wall
Street Journal, and I hope my colleagues all have read it and I hope
America will read it, talks about a gentleman by the name of Steven
Leinwand. He sits on the committee overseeing President Clinton's
proposed national mathematics exams. He has written an essay, and this
gentleman is mainstream, new education, Washington, D.C. expert. In the
essay he explains why it is ``downright dangerous'' to teach students
things like 6 times 7 equals 42. He says it is downright dangerous to
teach students the multiplication facts.
Now why does he say that is dangerous? Because such instruction,
teaching kids their multiplication facts, ``sorts people out,'' Mr.
Leinwand writes, ``annointing the few who master these procedures and
casting out the many.'' His basic principle is, we cannot teach math to
kids because some kids will learn the answer, 6 times 7 is 42, and some
kids will not learn it; and the kids who do not learn it will feel bad.
Now, if that is the kind of mindset that is going to dictate Bill
Clinton's national testing and the teachers in America will be
compelled to teach to that, I think it is disastrous.
Let me conclude by pointing out, he writes another test for an
organization called the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics;
and they propose, through this committee, a national math exam that
will avoid directly assessing certain knowledge and skills, such as
whole-number computation. He does not want kids to be able to do
addition, subtraction, multiplication, or division because of this
sense that some of them will fail and some of them will feel bad.
And the organization says, in case this exam which they have written
might indirectly assess whether 8th graders can add, subtract, multiply
and divide, the committee recommends that, even for those basic skills,
students should have a calculator throughout the entire time period.
This is just amazing to me. But that is why I think national testing,
while it sounds good and sounds reasonable, is in fact an attempt to
impose a national standard and national agenda that the people in
Arizona do not really like.
{time} 2145
Mr. HOEKSTRA. The problem gets to be, and we have had hearings around
the country in my subcommittee. I chair an oversight subcommittee, and
we have been taking a look at education.
Mr. SHADEGG. Did a hearing in my district in Arizona.
Mr. HOEKSTRA. We have been in Arizona, and we also went to Delaware,
and the reason I bring up Delaware is, Delaware is the size of one of
our congressional districts, all right? So, you know, Delaware said, we
want a State test, and what Delaware did is, they spent 3 years
starting at the grassroots level to develop a State test. Remember, one
congressional district; Michigan has 16. It took them 3 years to
develop a test, because they wanted to get parental by, and they wanted
to get teacher by, and they want to get school administrator, business
community. They wanted the State to accept the test. Bill Clinton
wanted to take 10 months and, top down, drive a test and impose it on
all of America, on every school, on every child, and have them test,
the exact wrong. It is the ``Washington knows best'' mentality rather
than doing a grass, which is going on in the States right now; States
are developing tests, and it is a grassroots, bottom-up type of move,
not good enough for our President. Bill Clinton wants to be the expert,
says, I am going to develop a test, I am going to impose it on
everybody.
Mr. SHADEGG. Reclaiming my time, top down is just dead wrong.
I want to rebut one other argument in support of national testing,
and that is, the proponents of this idea said, well, States can opt
out, and Lynne Cheney, in writing this article which I commend to all
of my colleagues here in the Congress and to all of America, points out
that even if States choose to opt out, a Federal test will strongly
influence the textbooks because they are only a handful of textbook
companies, and they are going to write those textbooks to such a
national task.
And it seems to me the whole notion of, well, one or two States,
Arizona, can opt out; heck, Arizona opted out of daylight savings time,
one of, I think, only two States in the Nation which did. But in this
field, where Arizona just said, we do not want that national test, the
textbooks we would have to go purchase would be driven by that top down
Bill Clinton dictated, but I do not care if it was Ronald Reagan
dictated top down, one-size-fits-all standard, and I think it is a
mistake.
Mr. SOUDER. Reclaiming my time, because I would like to kind of tie a
couple things together here, and one of the things we are seeing is
that what has gone on in this country, it is hard for us, many of us do
not get up here every day and talk, but it does not pass the laugh
test. I mean a national test
[[Page H8137]]
where the person on the math board does not want to do 7 times 6 equal
42, because it might intimidate some people that they feel left out or
behind.
The idea that the taxpayers are going to pay for a Teamsters election
so the Teamsters can use their money, the leadership, to try to finance
their own race against what appears to have been the majority of the
Teamsters members of the United States, and we pay for Canadian
ballots, and then that money goes and elects other Members of Congress
who claim they want campaign finance reform.
How about those members paying for the Teamsters election who got and
benefited from the money of the Teamsters' members and the taxpayers of
the United States, and it flowed into their campaign. How about
following the current law?
Another debate that we are currently having that I simply cannot
fathom is on the Census, because it is fine to use sampling to try to
set up and understand where we are headed, but it is not fine to do the
actual count mandated by the Constitution by guessing. That would be
like going to the Clinton administration political appointees and
saying, we are going to throw one out of every five of you in jail
because we know at the end of this time, and when we get through, done
with everything, one out of five is going to jail. They may have the
wrong person, just like in the sampling that they have had around the
country, they may have the people in the wrong State. That is real sad,
but at least they got the rough number calculated.
It does not pass a laugh test. National tests do not pass the laugh
test. The funding of the Teamsters election, which the gentleman from
Michigan has twice now had this House go on record where, against the
Census sampling, it does not pass the laugh test, and, quite frankly,
the President of the United States threatened to recall lawmakers to
the Hill so that we would have a special session on campaign finance
and the people here in the House who keep saying this, it is a joke, it
is an insult to the intelligence of the American people in a book, now
discounted because it did not sell that great, called ``Putting People
First'' by Governor Bill Clinton and Senator Al Gore.
In campaign finance reform, to show you how humorous this is, it says
American politics is being held hostage by big money interests. Members
of Congress now collect more than $2.5 million in campaign funds every
week, like he did, while political action committees, industry lobbies,
and cliques of $100,000 donors buy access to the White House. This is
what Bill Clinton ran against, and he turned it into an art form.
This simply does not pass the laugh test, and it is so frustrating to
me, and I know that, and I thank the two gentlemen who are here tonight
on this special order who have been leaders in investigating this and
in campaigning against this, and I enjoy working with both of you on
the different committees.
I do not know if any of you have a concluding comment here, too, but
I wanted to get that last comment in. No matter what area we look at
right now, whether it is Census sampling, national tests, Teamsters
election, campaign finance reform, it is hard for me to believe the
American people are taking this seriously.
Mr. HOEKSTRA. If the gentleman would yield, I think it is pretty
exciting we have made some progress on the education issue again, but
it is interesting to watch the debate. In the Senate a couple of weeks
ago, they passed a motion that said, they passed an amendment that said
we are moving decisionmaking back.
____________________