Time: Fri Jul 11 12:43:02 1997
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Date: Fri, 11 Jul 1997 12:31:06 -0700
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From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: SLS: Proof of Red Chinese wire transfer to Democrats (fwd)
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<snip>
>
>GOP Questions Source of $325,000
>
> DNC Ex-Official Testifies
> for 2nd Day at Senate
> Fund-Raising Probe
>
> By Edward Walsh
> Washington Post Staff Writer
> Friday, July 11, 1997; Page A04
> The Washington Post
>
> —Former Democratic National
> Committee finance director
> Richard Sullivan withstood a
> second day of questioning by the
> Senate Governmental Affairs
> Committee yesterday at a hearing
> in which Republicans disclosed
> the apparent source of two of the
> more mysterious contributions to
> President Clinton's reelection
> effort last year.
>
> Yogesh K. Gandhi, the head of a
> California foundation who claims
> to be the great-grandnephew of
> the late Indian leader Mohandas
> Gandhi, contributed $325,000.
> But according to Sen. Susan
> Collins (R-Maine) and
> documents released by GOP staff
> aides, a few days after Gandhi
> made the contribution, he
> received a total of $500,000 in
> two wire transfers from an
> account in a Japanese branch of a
> U.S. bank that was held by
> Yoshio Tanaka, a Japanese
> business associate of Gandhi.
>
> Republican committee aides said
> the two wire transfers of
> $250,000 each were clearly the
> source of the Gandhi contribution
> and that they did not know what
> happened to the remaining
> $175,000 that was not
> contributed. But Democratic
> aides countered with copies of
> Gandhi's bank records that they
> said showed his account regularly
> received large deposits by wire
> transfer.
>
> Gandhi, who made the
> contribution after attending a
> Democratic fund-raising event
> that was attended by Clinton, has
> been a largely peripheral figure in
> the morass of questionable
> campaign fund-raising practices
> that led to the investigation by
> two congressional committees
> and a Justice Department task
> force. Sullivan, who reiterated
> that he had no knowledge of
> illegal contributions from foreign
> sources, was not even questioned
> about the Gandhi contribution.
>
> The second contribution, of
> $50,000, was made by
> Democratic fund-raiser Johnny
> Chung, who was allowed to take
> five Chinese businessmen to the
> White House to watch Clinton
> make one of his regular Saturday
> morning radio broadcasts. Sen.
> Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) disclosed
> that three days before Chung
> made the contribution, $150,000
> was transferred into his bank
> account from the Bank of China,
> but Specter provided no other
> details.
>
> Amid these disclosures,
> yesterday's hearing went over
> familiar ground, with
> Republicans questioning Sullivan
> on the circumstances surrounding
> the hiring of former Commerce
> Department official John Huang
> as a DNC fund-raiser, whether
> White House coffees for
> contributors with Clinton were
> illegal fund-raising events in a
> government facility and whether
> Vice President Gore knew that an
> event he attended at a Buddhist
> temple in California was a
> fund-raiser.
>
> Throughout the day, the
> soft-spoken Sullivan did not
> budge from his previous
> assertions on these issues. Near
> the end of the day, Sen. Robert
> G. Torricelli (D-N.J.) said his
> two days of testimony had
> produced no evidence to support
> the opening charge of committee
> Chairman Fred D. Thompson
> (R-Tenn.) that there is an
> ongoing plan by the Chinese
> government to undermine the
> U.S. political system, in part
> through the use of illegal
> campaign contributions.
>
> Huang is a central figure in the
> web of questionable fund-raising
> practices leading up to the 1996
> election. Under questioning by
> Thompson, who was more
> aggressive than he had been on
> Wednesday, Sullivan said that his
> acknowledged concern about how
> Huang would conduct himself at
> the DNC was because of Huang's
> lack of experience and not
> because he thought Huang would
> seek contributions from foreign
> sources, which are banned by
> U.S. election laws.
>
> "If I had any inclination that John
> Huang would raise foreign
> money, I would have personally
> walked him to the elevator and
> walked him out of the building,"
> he said.
>
> Sullivan also said Huang was not
> removed from responsibility for
> coordinating fund-raising events
> that Clinton attended because of
> concern about foreign money.
> Rather, he said, DNC officials
> were dissatisfied with the amount
> Huang was raising in small
> individual contributions, which
> are matched by the federal
> government, and worried about
> an "appearance" problem because
> Huang often had foreign nationals
> at fund-raising events, even
> though they could not legally
> contribute to the party.
>
> Sen. Robert F. Bennett (R-Utah)
> raised the name of Roger
> Tamraz, an Egyptian-born U.S.
> citizen and Democratic
> contributor who has been charged
> with embezzlement from a
> Lebanese bank. Bennett
> produced a memo written by
> Gore's staff that described
> Tamraz as an "American citizen
> with a shady and untrustworthy
> reputation" who should not be
> allowed to meet with senior
> administration officials
>
> Bennett asked Sullivan why,
> despite this warning, Tamraz was
> later invited to the White House
> four times. Sullivan said he
> relayed the memo's warning to
> the "appropriate people" at the
> DNC and "obviously he was
> invited" anyway.
>
> "At the very least, all the
> safeguards broke down regularly
> and seriously at the DNC,"
> Bennett said.
>
> At the hearings, which are to
> resume Tuesday, it was also
> disclosed yesterday that an
> associate of Huang's who also
> raised substantial sums of money
> for the DNC, Charles Yah Lin
> Trie, received a wire transfer of
> $149,985 from a Bank of China
> account in Hong Kong around the
> time he made large contributions
> to the DNC last year. Sullivan
> said he did not know the source
> of the Trie donations.
>
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========================================================================
Paul Andrew Mitchell : Counselor at Law, federal witness
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