Posted on 01/26/2006 8:45:41 AM PST by Fedora
If Goodman were to run, what role might the Reids play in his campaign? Under the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 Senator Harry Reid and anyone who qualifies as his “agent” is theoretically ineligible to raise soft money for candidates. However after Rory Reid became Clark County Commissioner, he asked the Federal Election Commission to declare him unrestrained by this restriction on his father, arguing that he is not legally a fundraising agent of his father.
Four public interest groups filed objections to Reid’s request, but in June 2003 the FEC found in Reid’s favor. The FEC ruled that just being Senator Reid’s son and having served as Nevada Democratic Party Chairman in the past does not give County Commissioner Reid any present authority as Senator Reid’s fundraising agent, and therefore Rory is free to raise funds for the Nevada Democratic Party as long as he raises them on his own authority as a Clark County official rather than on his father’s authority.
Republican response to this ruling was divided, with some unconcerned, some anticipating further legal clarification from future rulings, and others complaining, “To have a county commissioner go before properties on the Strip and ask for unlimited soft money for the state Democratic Party when his father is at the top of the ticket sends a message.”
Ponder this: It was the kind of federal legislation that slips under the radar. The name alone made the eyes glaze over: "The Clark County Conservation of Public Land and Natural Resources Act of 2002." In a welter of technical jargon, it dealt with boundary shifts, land trades and other arcane matters — all in Nevada.
As he introduced it, Nevada's senior senator, Democrat Harry Reid, assured colleagues that his bill was a bipartisan measure to protect the environment and help the economy in America's fastest-growing state......... What Sen Reid did not explain was that the bill promised a cavalcade of benefits to real estate developers, corporations and local institutions that were paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in lobbying fees to his sons' and son-in-law's firms, federal lobbyist reports show.
The IRS is looking into phony trusts like these. They need to nail Reid's collusion with businesses---particularly officers of publicly-held companies---in the scheme that might include corporations' misusing corporate reserve accounts, concealing losses, inflating asset values and improperly accounting for transactions, as well as deferring profits into reserve accounts, improperly shifting capital funding to other projects to hide illegal payments to Reid, and might have employed money laundering schemes to siphon money into Reid's campaign accounts, in order to evade the IRS, SEC, FEC and US banking laws. The "trust" itself should be looked at for excessive "legal fees" and "admin fees" which are classic money laundering schemes.
Anyone with concerns should contact the SEC here: EMAIL enforcement @SEC.gov.
As one FReepers posted: Reid's comments about "going upstairs" to look at the FBI files on a Judge---to see why they had been filibustered---are chilling. Reid is a crook with a "God" complex. He and his ilk are not to be trusted. As a Dumbocrat, depend on Reid to use the well-rehearsed "victim" routine.
Victimization is a Dim's basic belief by which they blame and find others responsible for their own personal failures, then expect taxpayers, deep-pocketed individuals, the government, or the courts to bail them out.
For a Dim, it feels good to be in the throes of "victimization" and either A) causing victims, B) concocting victims, C) playing victim, D) commiserating over victims, E) subsidizing victims, and, F)creating another class of victims to bleed over.
Wally Northway, "Isle of Capri opens Coast's first land-based casino", The Mississippi Business Journal, Jan 02, 2006, Volume 28, Issue 1, Page 9:
On December 26, Isle of Capri Casinos Inc. reopened its land-based casino at the Isle of Capri Casino Resort in this Mississippi Gulf Coast city following Hurricane Katrina.
The casino, the first land-based casino to open since the change in Mississippi gaming legislation passed in October, includes 950 slot machines, a poker room with nine poker tables, 27 table games, two restaurants and 550 hotel rooms. Plans call for a new European spa and additional hotel rooms to open in the near future.
"Reopening the Isle-Biloxi marks a major milestone for the state of Mississippi, as well as our company. This casino was originally the first casino to open in the market back in 1992 and we are the first land-based Gulf Coast casino to open today following the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Our goal was to put our team members back to work as quickly as possible and I am happy to say that we have succeeded. Our team members are excited to get back to the business of welcoming guests in Isle Style," said Isle president and COO Tim Hinkley.
Federal Election Commission Advisory Opinion Number 2003-10. http://ao.nictusa.com/ao/no/030010.html
Federal Election Commission Public Hearing. Tuesday, May 17, 2005, 10:00 AM. www.fec.gov/pdf/nprm/cand_solicitation_party/20050517hearing.pdf
Research Bump!
Oh, see, the law has been changed in MS and I didn't even know it. Shame on me for not knowing that (since I have casino clients in MS). Thanks for pointing it out.
Key question: Did Reid deliberately raised more corporate money from publicly-held corporations than he needed, then divert some of the excess in a series of generous donations to non-profit groups that, on the surface, benefited their mutual causes?
The donations to non-profits might then be illegally converted, then funneled back to Reid‘s campaign coffers through donations by the N/P officers and their co-conspirators, or subsets of them
These complicated transactions should draw scrutiny in legal and political circles to determine the extent to which state laws and campaign finance laws were violated in schemes that appear to launder corporate donations to a candidate, and should raise questions that should be investigated regarding whether shareholders in publicly-funded corporations were deceived, and whether the true destination of corporate money was concealed (SEC is interested in this).
Sen Reid may also have used non-profit, ethnic, hyphenated, or faith-based groups as middlemen for campaign transactions by a pattern of Reid funneling money from his family-run foundations to these different groups, that was laundered, then landed in Reid's campaign accounts, in order to obscure, if not cover-up, the original source of donations to his campaign coffers.
Reid, his family, or his henchmen might also have directed that campaign donations be made in the names of others without their knowledge or consent.
When the financial merry-go-round stopped, non-profit, ethnic, hyphenated, and faith-based individuals---the groups Reid needs to endorse his election effort---end up with a lot of money, some of which was then laundered, illegally converted, then funneled back into Reid’s campaign coffers.
Millions of dollars in donations to Reid might never have been disclosed to campaign regulators, because the type of groups Reid used weren’t governed by federal law. The public-spirited donors might not always have known where their tax-deductible money was headed, and don't control funds once they're donated.
Money gets transferred all the time and remains disclosed only to the extent required to be disclosed by applicable state and federal law---this gets complicated.
In another variaiton, Reid and others may have conspired to raise more money than was needed and then routed some of that money to other causes, such as supporting state candidates. As a result, the Reid firms and his family might be beneficiaries as a collateral effect due to influence-peddling.
There might be a pattern of disguising the original source of money might have been an effort to hide Reid’s simultaneous financial and legislative dealings with Reid family clients. Clandestine meetings may have been held to help this along in order to get access and push the clients' interests, and to hide the genesis of campaign funding.
Thanks for the insightful analysis. With respect to your key question, there were two transactions mentioned in the article where I wondered if that type of scenario might be involved. One was the $25,000 Oscar Goodman PAC contribution to the Nevada Democratic Party under Rory Reid's chairmanship; I assume this was money left over from Goodman's first Mayoral campaign; how it was redistributed once it got to the Nevada Democratic Party and what laws such redistribution is subject to I don't know. The other was the $1.5 million contribution to Goodman's re-election campaign, which some have pointed out was seemingly in excess of what he actually needed. I of course have no knowledge of whether these transactions actually involved any campaign finance violations, but if someone were to investigate with your key question in mind those are two transactions which caught my eye.
BIG BTTT!!!!!
Nice work, thanks.
This is what differenciates FR from the rest of the sites.
wowowowowow, fedora...good stuff
Fedora did a great job with this.
Thanks for the kind comments and bumps! I'm glad to see other researchers have been digging deeper into some of Reid's dealings with Brown and others.
ping to some great research
Thanks for the ping!
Wonderful research, Fedora!
bttt
Thank you!
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