HILL'S CASH EYED AS CHINESE-LAUNDERED
Hillary's Chinatown fund-raiser draws Edwards' criticism
Posted on 10/20/2007 10:25:34 AM PDT by Eva
With an endorsement of sorts from George Bush, Hillary has now rounded up about all the big names and moneybags in Washington politics. The President predicts she will get the Democratic nomination, and everything seems to be going her way. Never has the adjective "golden" found a more apposite noun to modify than "Ms. Clinton."
The woman has always had an affinity for gold. You can trace her appetite for bling back to her Arkansas days, when she was a partner in the Rose Law Firm. Questions arose about her billing clients, which have not yet been satisfactorily answered. Nor have the suspicions about her picking up that quick 100 grand in the commodities market been allayed. The commodities market is where they bet on the price of things like oil and pork belly futures; amateur investors get swindled but not Hillary. No amateur she when it comes to the dough-ray-me.
Hillary escaped political damage from accepting campaign contributions from Norman Hsu, the shadowy businessman who has been accused of bilking investors of $60 million in addition to running afoul of the election laws.
Then there is Pamela Layton. According to the Wall Street Journal:
When Hillary Rodham Clinton held an intimate fund-raising event at her Washington home in late March, Layton donated $4,600, the maximum allowed by law, to Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign.
But the 37-year-old Ms. Layton says she and her husband were reimbursed by her husband's boss for the donations. "It wasn't personal money. It was all corporate money," Mrs. Layton said outside her home here. "I don't even like Hillary. I'm a Republican."
The boss is William Danielczyk, founder of a Washington-area private-equity firm and a major fund-raising "bundler" for Mrs. Clinton. Mrs. Layton's gift was one of more than a dozen donations that night from people with Republican ties or no history of political giving. Mr. Danielczyk and his family, employees and friends donated a total of $120,000 to Mrs. Clinton in the days around the fund-raiser.
If Danielczyk did what the article alleges, he could go to jail. Reimbursing your employees for political contributions made in their names with your money is against the law. Whether Hillary's connection to Danielczyk will eventually bite her is anybody's guess. It is believed in the big-money circles where Hillary lives that the practice is common although done with more subterfuge than in Layton's case.
Both of the Clintons seem to have gone money-crazy. Bill is out loose on the world taking enormous amounts of money from anyone who pays him to appear anywhere and bragging about it. With a pension of $186,000 a year plus innumerable other perks, another ex-President might rein in the itchy palm urge, but Bill is not known as a self-control artist. Whether he is also acting as a bag man for his wife is something for future grand juries to investigate.
Joe Trippi, who devised Howard Dean's financing his campaign via the Internet three years ago, has weighed in on the ethics of Hillary's money-raising. Trippi, presently working for John Edwards, ripped into Hillary for hosting a fundraiser in Washington, D.C., for a select group of lobbyists with an interest in homeland security. Tickets for the Clinton fundraiser are $1,000 a ticket and $25,000 per bundler. And for that money you get more than a meal--you get to attend one-hour breakout sessions in four different areas of homeland security that will include House Committee Chairs and members of Congress who sit on the very committees that will be voting on homeland security legislation.
That no one in the Clinton campaign--including the candidate--found anything wrong with holding this fundraiser is an indication of just how bad things have gotten in Washington--because there isn't an American outside of Washington who would not be sickened by it. Trippi may have underestimated American indifference to graft and corruption, but he is right on the essentials. Much good it will do, for Hillary's fondness for the long green has not hurt her, at least so far. Besides, in politics, the adage goes, there is no such thing as dirty money.
The NationFri Oct 19, 4:15 PM ET
The Nation -- The Los Angeles Times ran an eyebrow-raising story this morning about how Hillary Clinton is raising money from a highly unlikely source: New York's Chinatown. "Dishwashers, waiters and others whose jobs and dilapidated home addresses seem to make them unpromising targets for political fundraisers are pouring $1,000 and $2,000 contributions into Clinton's campaign treasury," the paper reports. "In April, a single fundraiser in an area long known for its gritty urban poverty yielded a whopping $380,000."
According to the article, powerful Chinese neighborhood associations pushed residents to donate to the Clinton camp. The source of many of these donations remains a mystery. The Times examined the cases of more than 150 donors who provided checks to Clinton after fundraising events geared to the Chinese community. One-third of those donors could not be found using property, telephone or business records. Most have not registered to vote, according to public records.
Several dozen were described in financial reports as holding jobs -- including dishwasher, server or chef--that would normally make it difficult to donate amounts ranging from $500 to the legal maximum of $2,300 per election.
The Clinton campaign's response hardly puts the matter to rest. "In this instance, our own compliance process flagged a number of questionable donations and took the appropriate steps to be sure they were legally given," said Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson. "In cases where we couldn't confirm that, the money was returned."
The Edwards campaign was swift to react. "Clinton campaign contributions are raising eyebrows again," said Edward campaign manager David Bonior. "Many of their donors are not even registered to vote, and at least one denied even making any contribution at all."
The article--and the Clinton reaction--raises more questions than answers. Did officials in Chinatown invent the names and identities of campaign donors? If so, why? How involved was Chung Seto, Clinton's liaison to the Asian community and a former executive director of the New York State Democratic Party? How did the Clinton campaign verify the source of these donations? How many potentially illegal donations were eventually returned?
In regard to the link I posted, #3 in the series explains Whitewater.
“But the 37-year-old Ms. Layton says she and her husband were reimbursed by her husband’s boss for the donations. “It wasn’t personal money. It was all corporate money,” Mrs. Layton said outside her home here. “I don’t even like Hillary. I’m a Republican.”
I do have a problem with this statement. If such a request was made of me, I wouldn’t honor it. A company my husband worked for made official annual donations to The United Way and we refused to be part of it.
This smacks of strong arming by the corporation or employees of very weak moral character thinking a donation would advance their careers.
I’m thinking that we on the right really ought to drop everything and start focusing on this. I think it is a silver bullet that can kill Hill if we make it happen. Not many issues are more important than preventing America from falling back into the hands of these two white-trash grifters from Arkansas who will sell out this country in a minute once they regan the reins of power. They’ve been on the take from the Chinese for 20 years. It’s about damn time they got called on it.
I’ve been thiniking the same thing. The Rush brouhaha is nothing but but a planned distraction. Note that the Nation article was dated October 1. That means that the Hillary campaign knew that the press were digging into her campaign funding back in September, and were looking for something to distract the public.
The Hot Air link is a great link, lots of detail.
I haven’t heard any reports on the news because my husband has been monopolizing the tv with sports, watching multiple games at the same time. It’s driving me crazy.
BTTT
I have my own TeeVee. If I didn’t, I’d go nuts. He likes to watch the old black & white movies all the time.
Secret Asian Man
Secret Asian Man
Bringing In Big Dollars...
For The Campaign Finance Scam...
Thanks for the links and the clear evidence of Hillary’s dirty money.
I believe that the Hillary campaign drummed up the Rush issue to distract from the press coverage of her dirty money. Media Matters, the Hillary founded press group, was responsible for the first accusations against Rush, and I bet that you could make a pretty clear time line of the first coverage of Hillary’s campaign finance shenanigans and the Media Matters accusations against Rush. It has thrown Rush off his game and completely obscured the accusations against Hillary.
By the way, here is a blogger you might want to keep an eye on. He’s been keeping the Hsu thing alive.
That’s the idea. Here’s an article that I picked up from American Thinker. (She credits Lucianne Goldberg)
Clinton Returned $7,000, Campaign Says
By PATRICK HEALY
October 20, 2007
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s presidential campaign returned $7,000 in donations last spring that were linked to a fund-raising event in Chinatown in New York City, campaign officials said yesterday, acknowledging another instance where questionable donors came into Mrs. Clinton’s political orbit.
But unlike Mrs. Clinton’s trouble with the former fund-raiser Norman Hsu — whose extensive legal problems and dubious fund-raising practices came as a surprise — her campaign identified the concerns about the Chinatown fund-raising on its own, campaign officials said…
The Clinton campaign said that after the Chinatown fund-raiser in April, which raised about $380,000, aides conducted a standard review of the donor list: If donors’ stated professions seemed out of line with their donations — for instance, if a dishwasher gave $1,000 — the campaign sent letters asking them to affirm in writing that the money was their own.
In seven cases, with donations totaling $7,000, questions were raised, and those donors did not respond to requests to confirm their contributions. That money was then returned.
Clinton campaign officials said yesterday that they would look at any new information that suggested problematic fund-raising. But they defended their efforts to recruit Asian donors aggressively, and stood by the Chinatown fund-raiser.
“Asian-Americans in Chinatown and Flushing have the same right to contribute as every other American,” said Howard Wolfson, a campaign spokesman…
Campaign officials said yesterday that they could not ascertain whether the seven donations last spring were funneled from people other than the stated donors. That would be a violation of campaign finance law.
The organizer of the Chinatown event, Chung Seto, a former executive director of the New York State Democratic Committee, said yesterday that she knew of nothing improper about any donors at her event. Ms. Seto is a significant fund-raiser for Mrs. Clinton, campaign officials said.
No one has been disciplined as a result of the flawed donations, the officials said, and vetting procedures have not been altered.
What utter and shameless mendacity from the New York Times:
But unlike Mrs. Clinton’s trouble with the former fund-raiser Norman Hsu — whose extensive legal problems and dubious fund-raising practices came as a surprise — her campaign identified the concerns about the Chinatown fund-raising on its own, campaign officials said.
These Chinatown donations only became public because of yesterday’s article in the Los Angeles Times.
Behold what the LAT article quotes Hillary’s aides as saying:
Clinton aides said they were concerned about some of the Chinatown contributions.
“We have hundreds of thousands of donors. We are proud to have support from across New York and the country from many different communities,” campaign spokesman Howard Wolfson said. “In this instance, our own compliance process flagged a number of questionable donations and took the appropriate steps to be sure they were legally given. In cases where we couldn’t confirm that, the money was returned.”
Upon this very thin reed the New York Times decided it could re-write events to make Hillary Clinton out to be the real hero.
The same Hillary Clinton who shakes down money from Chinese gangsters, drug-runners and slave traders.
If donors’ stated professions seemed out of line with their donations — for instance, if a dishwasher gave $1,000 — the campaign sent letters asking them to affirm in writing that the money was their own.
Would it be too cynical to ask to see these letters? And to meet the Clinton staffers who have the time and the lingual abilities to write to these Chinese dishwashers?
Or did Hillary write the notes herself?
As was once her wont.
I’m sure you have already seen most of the material listed.
“In April, a single fundraiser in an area long known for its gritty urban poverty yielded a whopping $380,000.”
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion/?pid=244566
Many of Clinton’s Chinatown donors said they had contributed because leaders in neighborhood associations told them to. In some cases, donors said they felt pressure to give.
http://www.drudge.com/news/99785/clintonchinatown-fundraising-scandal
LOL, how did I know you were going to come up with a really good graphic??
Very nice!
* Hillary Shakes Down Chinatown
* Hillary Is Keeping $260K From Hsu “Associates”
* Shocker: Hillary Leads Fundraising Horse Race
* Complaint Says Hsu Reimbursed 2 Dem Donors
* WP Finds Past Shady Donors On Hillary’s List
* Hsu Paid For Hillary Staff’s Las Vegas Vacation
* Clinton Camp: Secret Service Doesn’t Vet Donors
* Hsu Wrote “Suicide” Letters Blaming Obama * Shocker: Hillary Would Like Returned Cash Back
* Questions About The Clintons Indian Money Man
* Justice Dept Probing Hsu’s Democrat Fundraising
* Indicted Paki Hillary Fundraiser Fled US In March
* WSJ Uncovers Chinese Money Funnel To The
I’m going to bump this one more time before I go get some work done.
Great graphic!
.
Good thread
Lol, thought you were asleep.
Bump!
This is from yesterday’s WSJ-Best of the WEB. It appears that, like Gore’s Buddhist Temple fund raisers, there is no controlling authority. So, that means that the work must be done by us and other grass roots organizers to get the word out and hold Hillary’s feet to fire on this one.
As Long as You Don’t Serve the Chicken That Way
Hillary Clinton’s campaign has been raking in money from New York’s Chinatown, the Los Angeles Times reports. A single fund-raising event in April brought in $380,000. John Kerry, by contrast, raised $24,000 from Chinatown in the entire 2004 campaign.
“Chinatown’s newfound role in the 2008 election cycle marks another chapter in the centuries-old American saga of marginalized ethnic groups and newly arrived immigrants turning to politics to improve their lot,” the Times says. But much of its story raises questions about this feel-good description. “Dishwashers, waiters and others whose jobs and dilapidated home addresses seem to make them unpromising targets for political fundraisers are pouring $1,000 and $2,000 contributions into Clinton’s campaign treasury,” the Times reports.
The paper tries, without much success, to figure out who these people are and how they can afford to write big checks to Mrs. Clinton:
Of 74 residents of New York’s Chinatown, Flushing, the Bronx or Brooklyn that The Times called or visited, only 24 could be reached for comment. . . .
The tenement at 44 Henry St. was listed in Clinton’s campaign reports as the home of Shu Fang Li, who reportedly gave $1,000.
In a recent visit, a man, apparently drunk, was asleep near the entrance to the neighboring beauty parlor, the Nice Hair Salon.
A tenant living in the apartment listed as Li’s address said through a translator that she had not heard of him, although she had lived there for the last 10 years.
A man named Liang Zheng was listed as having contributed $1,000. The address given was a large apartment building on East 194th Street in the Bronx, but no one by that name could be located there.
Census figures for 2000 show the median family income for the area was less than $21,000. About 45% of the population was living below the poverty line, more than double the city average.
In the busy heart of East Broadway, beneath the Manhattan Bridge, is a building that is listed as the home of Sang Cheung Lee, also reported to have given $1,000. Trash was piled in the dimly lighted entrance hall. Neighbors said they knew of no one with Lee’s name there; they knocked on one another’s doors in a futile effort to find him.
Salespeople at a store on Canal Street were similarly baffled when asked about Shih Kan Chang, listed as working there and having given $1,000. The store sells purses, jewelry and novelty Buddha statues. Employees said they had not heard of Chang.
Another listed donor, Yi Min Liu, said he did not make the $1,000 contribution in April that was reported in his name. He said he attended a banquet for Clinton but did not give her money.
Reading the story, one suspects—although the Times never raises the possibility, and offers no direct evidence that this is the case—that one or more contributors are evading the $2,300 donation limit by either giving money under phony names or laundering contributions through busboys and others who would not normally make political contributions.
If this is the case, it is an example of how campaign finance restrictions create incentives for corruption. (Mrs. Clinton voted for the McCain-Feingold law in 2001.) If the law allowed unlimited contributions but required full disclosure, we would know who was giving money to Mrs. Clinton. As it is, it appears as though some party or parties are doing so corruptly.
And even if this is all on the up-and-up, because of campaign finance restrictions, Mrs. Clinton is burdened with the appearance of corruption. Though to be fair, there may be no legal regime that can prevent that.
I don’t claim to be a ‘deep’ news watcher Eva, I mostly make animated graphics to parody the rudiments I am aware of.
It’s well known that the Clintons ‘gave’ China secrets. All Hillary has to do now is have her minions ‘set up’ a fund-raiser’ and I believe the Chinese will manage to siphon the money in any way they can.
Thank you for compiling all the info! I’ll bump it, and read it, and then bump it..and well, you know.
Keep up the great work!
I wish this was in the activism slot....this is what FR is all about. Reading, informing and spreading the NEWS about unethical issues...and then be an activist about it. ;-)
Those are some of the first names that I have seen, but frankly, I don’t have a clue about who they are. It will take someone who is a lot more informed than me to interpret that list of donors.
Well, we know what he was doing with his time. John Huang traveled extensively as the Riadys' principal agent in the United States. Among other places, he went to Little Rock to keep up his contact with then Gov. Bill Clinton. He raised money for Governor Clinton's reelection and he raised money for the campaign for President. The committee determined that in 1992 the Riadys were the largest single contributor to the Democratic National Committee, larger than any union, larger than any Hollywood star, larger than any special interest group connected with the Democratic Party. The No. 1 contributor to the Democratic National Committee was the Riady family.After the election, John Huang continued traveling the country as the Riadys principal agent in the United States, but he added a new wrinkle to his activities. He started hosting officials of the People's Republic of China, taking them wherever possible to introduce them to members of the Clinton administration.
In one case, he brought a Riady partner with connections to the Chinese intelligence apparatus to meet Vice President Gore. Now, why the People's Republic of China? Why would the Riadys be interested in courting favor with the Chinese? Public sources say the Riadys have more than $1 billion invested in China. We asked the CIA if there were other links between the Riadys and the Chinese. The answers are in S-407, the secret room here in the Capitol, and any Senator who wishes can repair there and see just how close the relationship is between the Riadys and the Chinese. I assure you it is very close.
This is what the committee says: `The committee has learned from recently acquired information that James and Mochtar Riady have had a long-term relationship with a Chinese intelligence agency. The relationship is based on mutual benefit, with the Riadys receiving assistance in finding business opportunities in exchange for large sums of money and other help'-- I said we would revisit crony capitalism. `Although the relationship appears based on business interests, the committee understands that the Chinese intelligence agency seeks to locate and develop relationships with information collectors, particularly persons with close connections to the U.S. Government.'
What did John Huang do at the Commerce Department? Well, we know from some of those lower level people that he attended a lot of meetings and that he was a very assiduous note taker. He was an information collector. But other than that, his superiors at Commerce said the same thing that his superiors at the Lippo Bank said: `We really don't know what John Huang did with his time. We really don't know what he did each day.'Well, we know at least some of the things he did. No. 1, we know he went to the White House 67 times while he was Deputy Assistant Secretary. I know Cabinet officers who would be jealous of the opportunity to go to the White House half that often. No. 2, we know that at least once or twice nearly every week in the entire time he was at the Commerce Department he walked out of his Commerce Department office, went across the street to Stephens Inc's Washington office where he received packages, FAXes, and phone calls; and then with the door closed in an office in that suite, he made phone calls and sent out FAXes. We do not know to whom. We do not know what was in those packages that he received there or why it was essential for him to go there at least once, and often twice, almost every single week for 18 months.
We also know that even though he had received close to $900,000 in severance from the Lippo Group, there was one tie with the Lippo Group that was not severed. They left him with a corporate telephone credit card, and he used that credit card to make over 400 telephone calls to Lippo officials--at least 232 of them to officials of the Lippo Bank. Many of these calls were made on his Commerce Department telephone, using the corporate credit card from the corporation from which, supposedly, he had been severed.
Now, here, therefore, is the structure: You have John Huang in the Commerce Department, in an area of great sensitivity, taking notes and getting briefed by the CIA, and in and out of the White House more often than a Cabinet officer. He is on the phone weekly, or more often, to Lippo executives who have very close ties to Chinese intelligence.
If ever there was a conduit that could be used to pass intelligence information from inside the Clinton administration to the Chinese intelligence apparatus, or Lippo, or both, that conduit was this: From the United States Government through the conduit created by John Huang to the Lippo Group or the Chinese Government. Was this what the Riadys hoped for when they paid for all those money-losing corporations? If it is, they certainly had it.
Now, I want to focus on the most famous of John Huang's fundraising activities--the April 29, 1996, fundraiser at the Buddhist Temple that he ran along with Maria Hsia. The amount of money he raised was not the largest amount, but it was the most significant amount. He raised $140,000, most of which had to be returned because the alleged donors were, in fact, reimbursed, dollar for dollar, in a way that is classic money laundering and clearly illegal.I focus on this not because it is the most famous, but because it is the best symbol of what appears to have been going on here. It has the most complete cast of characters. Here we have one event, and representing the Clinton administration was the Vice President, Al Gore; representing the DNC, its chairman, Don Fowler; representing the Lippo Group, John Huang, still carrying a Lippo credit card; and representing Chinese intelligence, Maria Hsia and Ted Sioeng.
I need to talk a minute about Ted Sioeng. There were press reports that indicated he was, in fact, connected with Chinese intelligence. When we were in room 407 getting a confidential briefing in executive session from the Director of the FBI and the Director of the CIA, I asked the question, `Is there any connection between Ted Sioeng and the intelligence operation of the People's Republic of China?' The answer I got was, `We don't know.' So I asked the question, `Aren't you interested?' `Well, yes.' I then asked the question, `Will you find out?' `Yes.' And then I asked the question, `When you find out, will you share that information with this committee?' `Yes.'
The next time we gathered in executive session with the Director of the CIA and the Director of the FBI, this was their opening comment: `We need to make a correction of our previous statements. It turns out that in response to Senator Bennett's questions, we went back and checked our files and discovered that we did indeed have information linking Ted Sioeng to the People's Republic of China.'
This was discovered in the CIA files. When they went to find the source of that information in the CIA files, they discovered that their source was the FBI. In fact, it was in both agencies and neither agency Director had known about this. I won't go into that matter further, because Senator Specter made a speech about it on the floor castigating the Department of Justice for not doing the very fundamental kind of activities that would have discovered that and prevented their Directors from being so embarrassed before the members of the committee.
It is time to summarize. What do we have here? We have a conduit that runs from the inside of the Clinton administration to the inside of the Chinese intelligence apparatus. It is a conduit through which could flow from the United States to the Chinese classified information about U.S. trade policy and strategy. It is also a conduit through which could flow from the Chinese, or Lippo, to the Democratic National Committee funds to support the reelection of President Clinton. We do know that funds did flow through that conduit from Lippo to the DNC--those funds that I identified that came through Hip Hing Holdings that have had to be returned. We do not know whether funds have come from the Chinese Government, either down through Lippo or directly through the conduit to the Democratic National Committee.
Thanks for the ping!
ping
Yes, Hillary has been working the Chinese Money Train for a long time. Thanks for reminding us.
Funny, I missed this one last night! Very nice.
. Servers acting up again
I’m sorry you’re having trouble today!
I’m sorry your thread didn’t get posted in the news/activism slot. It IS news. ;-(
BUMP!!
Hey, if you make a new thread, compiling all the links again, along with the new ones, maybe the moderators will leave it under the news/activism slot.
BUMP!!
I think that the moderators don’t want anything that will distract from their jihad against Rudy Giuliani.
Then my question is....should we be focused on publicizing the illegal activities NOW, or are the mods waiting until after hillary possibly gets the nomination. ???? I remember when it was OKAY to post info that exposed previous clinton ‘antics’ while they were in office. Why NOT be proactive prior to the primaries? :(
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