Torricelli raised cash - and concerns - for party (Global Crossing)

WASHINGTON - Time after time, Sen. Robert G. Torricelli (D., N.J.) has decried the damage done to American politics by big money.

In 1999, as the Senate debated campaign finance reform, he rose to say that "the confidence of the American people is at issue. . . . They believe they do not have an equal position, and it is money that is the heart of that problem."

But as chief of his party's Senate campaign fund for the last election, Torricelli raised money hand over fist - some of it from donors who stood to gain from steps he took as a senator.

He sided briefly with Microsoft Corp. in its battle with the Justice Department. He sided with the makers of Claritin on a patent extension that would keep the allergy pill's price up. He tried to amend the bankruptcy bill with language that would have helped a big donor. Sometimes he acted within weeks of a donor's giving.

Torricelli has said the legislative steps he took were based on the merits, not on donations. And though his actions sometimes put him at odds with party liberals, his fund-raising as chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) was a godsend: The Democrats came within a seat of retaking the Senate.

But as federal prosecutors investigate how money was raised in Torricelli's own 1996 campaign, his recent efforts on the party's behalf have rung alarm bells for some citizens' groups and campaign reform advocates. They contend that he made it look as if corporate money controls the agenda on Capitol Hill and has hastened the loss of public confidence that he often laments.

"There is the strong appearance that if you put money into the DSCC or into his campaign account, out comes a not-so-small favor from his legislative office," said Gary Ruskin, who, as director of the nonprofit Congressional Accountability Project, has studied Torricelli's record.

As chief of the DSCC from 1998 until December, Torricelli boosted fund-raising to $103 million, besting the Republicans for the first time on record. He brought an infusion of so-called soft money, the largely unregulated giving by businesses, labor and other interest groups.

Soft money will be debated again this week as the Senate considers bills to limit or ban it. To be sure, most of Torricelli's biggest donors gave heavily to both parties - a fact of life in the ever-expanding universe of campaign fund-raising. And if he tapped donors with interests on Capitol Hill, so did his GOP counterpart, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

Torricelli, 49 and Harvard-educated, emerged as a star in the 2000 campaign, overcoming the traditional GOP funding edge and helping recruit such successful candidates as Hillary Rodham Clinton and Jon Corzine.

Thomas A. Leonard, a Philadelphia lawyer and Democratic fund-raiser, likens Torricelli to Bill Clinton and Edward G. Rendell, saying the first-term senator has "the attributes that a great fund-raiser should have - charm, humor, availability and knowledge . . . and blessed with energy that is off the bell curve." Torricelli declined to be interviewed for this article. To questions about Senate actions that coincided with his donors' interests, his spokesman, Dale Leibach, quoted him as saying: "The apparent thesis of this story is irresponsible and contrary to the facts."

A DSCC aide said Torricelli had no choice but to raise as much as possible for his party, and pointed out that money often came from people on both sides of issues, allaying suggestions of favoritism. "For Democrats to agree to unilaterally disarm and to not use the rules of the game to our advantage would be a disservice, not only to ourselves politically but also to the constituencies and causes we serve," said Jim Jordan, DSCC executive director. "There is nothing hypocritical in playing the game under the rules as they are written while hoping to reform those rules."

Federal prosecutors began probing Torricelli's 1996 Senate campaign two years ago, focusing on allegations that some of his backers illegally funneled money through straw donors. His lawyers say he knew of no illegalities and is not a target of the inquiry, which to date has resulted in six people pleading guilty to campaign law violations. There has been no suggestion that prosecutors are looking at his more recent two-year tenure as head of his party's Senate campaign fund.

During those two years, the fund often received five- and six-figure sums from people with business pending on Capitol Hill.

The bankruptcy bill that the Senate approved last week affects every credit card user. But some of it is tailored to certain industries, and in October, Torricelli, a key Democratic sponsor, proposed wording that would help two companies.

His changes would have benefited NextWave Communications, a wireless telephone company, in its high-stakes fight with the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC had auctioned wireless licenses to NextWave but revoked them when the company failed to pay the full auction price of $4.7 billion. Another beneficiary would have been Global Crossing, a worldwide communications firm. Global had an option to invest some $200 million in NextWave - but only if NextWave regained its disputed licenses from the FCC.

A year ago, Global began giving to the DSCC. Its donations, along with those of its executives, totaled $337,768 - about two-thirds of it within weeks of when Torricelli, with Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R., Utah), proposed the wording that would have helped NextWave get its licenses back.

The effort to change the bill was short-lived: in informal House-Senate talks in October, sponsor Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R., Iowa) objected, saying the revision might threaten passage of the bill. Leo Hindery, who was Global's CEO until last year, and other company officials said the DSCC donations had nothing to do with Torricelli's proposal to assist NextWave.

"I'm sure we were aware of it and felt it would be great if it happened," said a Global official who asked not to be identified. He said the company, which also gave $251,500 to the Republicans' Senate fund in 1999-2000, saw the proposal as a long shot.

The bankruptcy bill drew intense lobbying by the credit industry, which poured six-figure sums into both parties' accounts last year. The bill makes it harder for people to use bankruptcy to erase debts.

Three weeks after Torricelli signed on as a cosponsor, Citigroup, the nation's largest credit card issuer, gave the DSCC $100,000. As the Senate debated the measure, MBNA Corp. of Wilmington gave $150,000 - far more than the Republican-leaning company had given Democrats before.

Frank Torres, lobbyist for the Consumers Union, contended the senator was "shilling for the credit industry and getting a bill on the table while ignoring his fellow Democrats and consumer advocates and women's groups and labor."

Last Feb. 11, amid talk that the Justice Department's antitrust lawyers would seek Microsoft's breakup, Torricelli wrote to then-Attorney General Janet Reno and Microsoft president Steve Ballmer.

"In my view, it is critically important for both sides to avoid extreme positions, such as proposals to break up the company, and instead work together to reach a balanced settlement," Torricelli wrote.

His letter came as two other top Democrats, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota and House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri, were also urging a settlement. Torricelli's words echoed Microsoft's position; the company was using the word extreme to describe suggestions of a breakup. Torricelli wrote that America's high-tech industry was "the envy of the rest of the world," a point Microsoft's Ballmer had made with the same phrase in a statement days earlier.

"Microsoft was working on Capitol Hill to educate members [on] the implications of a breakup on the company and the economy," Microsoft spokeswoman Ginny Terzano said last week.

The company and its executives were also giving to both sides in the 2000 campaign - $391,250 to the Democrats' Senate fund, and $407,123 to the GOP's. "Along with others in the industry, Microsoft has increased our participation in the political and policy process," Terzano said.

One of the nation's biggest defense contractors, Lockheed Martin, has a plant in Moorestown. In 1999, two dozen Lockheed executives gave to Torricelli's own 2002 reelection drive. Their checks totaled $36,000 and were part of a March 3 fund-raiser at Newark's Performing Arts Center, attended by President Bill Clinton.

On March 24, Torricelli, who was on the Foreign Relations Committee, and its chairman, Jesse Helms (R., N.C.), introduced a bill authorizing sale of restricted military equipment to Taiwan, including Lockheed's missile-tracking Aegis radar system.

A Lockheed spokeswoman said the donations to Torricelli were from executives of Lockheed IMS, which provides data services to state and local governments and does no military work, and had nothing to do with the Taiwan bill.

The Clinton administration strongly opposed selling sophisticated military gear to Taiwan, and the bill died in a committee. President Bush is expected to decide next month whether to approve the sales.

Why did company officials dig into their wallets for a senator not facing reelection for three more years? "It was made known to me that Torricelli was looking for contributions, and I responded," said Lockheed executive Robert Downing, of Kinnelon, N.J., who donated $2,000. "The company and its executives are fairly politically active. There are a number of politicians who support our interests, and we support theirs."

Torricelli introduced legislation in May 1999 that could have been worth billions to Schering-Plough Corp., a New Jersey drugmaker, by allowing it to seek a three-year extension on the patent for its popular allergy pill, Claritin.

The move, which Torricelli and the company said was needed to recover costs of developing the drug, triggered opposition from consumer groups. At hearings in 1999, a generic drug company said it could sell a month's supply of the drug for $15; Claritin was selling for $87. The bill died last year.

According to federal records, Torricelli introduced the bill one day after Schering-Plough - another big giver to both parties - donated $50,000 to the DSCC.

That same month, March 1999, Torricelli cosponsored legislation that would make it harder for people exposed to asbestos to sue manufacturers. A month later, the main corporate backer of the bill, G-I Holdings Inc., formerly GAF Corp., contributed $40,000 to the DSCC. By Election Day 2000, the company had given a total of $210,250. (It gave $85,000 to the Republicans' Senate fund.)

Here, Torricelli's role as the bill's prime Democratic sponsor angered some of his party's most generous allies: plaintiff lawyers who specialize in asbestos litigation. But they kept giving heavily to the party's Senate campaign fund.

Torricelli argued that GAF, based in Wayne, N.J., would face bankruptcy without the legislation - potentially leaving asbestos victims with no one to pay their claims. At the same time, he heard complaints from lawyers, unions and citizen groups that the bill made it harder for victims to get compensated. One group, Citizen Action, believed the bill "would have a devastating effect on people's lives," said Bridget Devane, its leader in New Jersey. She recalled her group's meeting with Torricelli, saying he repeatedly assured them "that the bill was not going to go anywhere, so we didn't have to worry about a thing."

We had Arthur Anderson in here last week performing an audit... one of the project managers here puts up big colerful signs outside her office, with such info as "Bugs Left To Fix: 5" and "Bugs Submitted: 3" etc... some office wag, who shall remain nameless, put one up that said, "Documents Left To Shred: 0"... for some reason the A.A. guys were a littel testy the rest of the week ;0)

I think you are on to something. I would like to also find out what Rubin's role in all of these cooked book schemes might be. His name has not come up. I just am a bit curious since he was praised so often for his knowledge of "high finance" - which we are now finding out was nothing more than "low" finance - as in dishonest, books cooking finance!

I said as much back in 1996, when the big creep sugar bubba was running for reelection. Try to tell someone this and they will think you are looney, though. I also figure that the dims also stole about 5 million votes in 1996 as they did in 2000, but people always look at the fringes of the issues. I did a simple numerical analysis on the poll figures vs the outcome and such and predicted that Dole would lose no matter what he did. Someone at the DoD could probably back me up on this if they ran the numbers. But of course since the 1,000 pound gorilla isn't moving the furniture in the living room, he is not in the living room!

Another issue you could look at is the "1,000,000 new jobs, then 2,000,000 new jobs ...then 16,000,000 new jobs" line the Clintonistas always propagated. It got to the point that vertually everyone in America would have had to have gotten a new job by the time the election was over. Big numbers fraud. One thing Bush has not ever done that I know of is say he's created such and such millions of new jobs. America is not getting its monies worth out of the investigative media. They are all lackies.

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