Ralston, Rove, Abramoff, and the 2004 Election.

[bleever]

This past Friday brought the resignation of Susan Ralston, Karl Rove's executive assistant, who immediately prior worked in a similar position for Jack Abramoff. This came upon the heels of the release of a report by the House Government Reform committee, detailing new evidence about Abramoff's contacts with the White House, largely through Susan Ralston, on a whole host of issues, ranging from Indian casinos to political appointments in different areas of the executive branch.

A White House statement said that Ralston, who according to the report received free tickets to sporting events and concerts in possible violation of the law, was resigning because she did not want to "be a distraction" to the White House.

But to understand the plausibility of this explanation, we need to know something about Ralston's position in the White House:



That's her, sitting next to Rove on election night, November 2004.

Velvet Revolution put it nicely in January of 2006:

1/5/06: SUSAN RALSTON, ASSISTANT TO JACK ABRAMOFF, KARL ROVE AND GEORGE BUSH, KNOWS EVERYTHING

If someone were to ask who the key to the Republican corruption vault is, Susan Ralston's name would be at the top of many lists. She has been the personal assistant to serial briber Jack Abramoff and serial leaker Karl Rove. She is also a special assistant to George Bush. According to RawStory, Mrs. Ralston has been repeatedly called to testify before the grand jury investigating Mr. Rove. It appears that she also been called to testify before the Abramoff grand jury because she was in charge of his skybox giveaways.

However, there is one event on which she has not yet testified -- the 2004 presidential election. In the accompanying photo, on November 2, 2004, Mrs. Ralston sits next to Karl Rove keeping track of the election results as they came in. We would like to know if there is any truth to the reports that Rove was told that GW was losing the election and so he went to the WH war room to maniulate the votes in a half dozen swing states. Our curiosity is strong because of Mrs. Ralston's duties at the time as White House Liaison to the Bush-Cheney ’04 (BC’04) campaign. "I work on the coordination of all activities between the campaign and the White House, including the Republican National Convention," she told Asian Fortune. Indeed, since it appears that she has a Forrest Gump-like history of being at the heart of the most scandalous political crimes of the Bush Administration, the odds are that she is the Rosetta Stone for all information about crimes committed around the election.

http://www.velvetrevolution.us/#010506

Remember that Rove recalled about election day that he knew the exit polls were wrong because of his own "internal" polling. Remember also that Abramoff lobbied for Diebold and has ties to the creation of HAVA, which required electronic voting with no paper trail. (Greenberg Traurig lobbied for Diebold in 2004 bills A8833B, S6207, A9731, A9725, A9433.) Neil Volz, who worked for HAVA author Bob Ney in senior positions from 1995 to 2002, joined Abramoff at his lobbying firm Greenberg Traurig in February 2002. Volz has since pleaded guilty to lobbying and fraud offenses, as has Ney.

In addition, we know that Ralston testified on multiple occasions to Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's grand juries investigating the Plame leak, specifically regarding why phone calls from Matt Cooper of Time Magazine to Karl Rove did not appear in the phone logs.

One more telling detail from the House Committee on Government Reform's report: at one point, Jennifer Farley of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, who was fielding dozens of contacts from the Abramoff team about political positions in the Department of the Interior (and who also discussed her own employment prospects at Greenberg Traurig) warned Greenberg lobbyist Kevin Ring that "it is better not to put this stuff in writing in their email system because it might actually limit what they can do to help us, especially since there could be lawsuits, etc."

Abramoff replied, "Dammit. It was sent to Susan on her rnc pager and was not supposed to go into the WH system."

http://i.a.cnn.net/cnn/2006/images/09/29/final.abramoff.report.pdf


All in all, we are talking about a deeply-embedded team player with exceptionally detailed knowledge in a number of overlapping spheres. She sat next to Rove on election night, at that bank of computers in the White House dining room, as Karl did whatever he did as the voting totals did a statistically nonsensical flip in Bush's direction. And we are to believe that she has retired because she got Springsteen tickets?

There must be more. Stay tuned.

[Blue_In_AK]

1. Thank you. Excellent post. Recommended.

edit to add - I personally think the Abramoff scandal/lobbyist influence is a far more serious issue than the Foley matter ... but whatever works to win us back the House and Senate. Bill Moyers' expose of Abramoff really opened my eyes.

[Botany]

2. Waterboard her in the Bleever Pond

[bleever]

3. I have a feeling she's already in a "stress position".

Not to mention having to pay for her own basketball tickets from now on.

[Patsy Stone]

4. The $64,000 question is:

Will anyone make her tell her tale? It seems that her entire job history, everywhere, consisted getting people on a list. Except on election night, then her job was to get people OFF the list.

Here are some more articles about her:

http://www.newsflash.org/2004/02/pe/pe003369.htm
"As Rove’s executive assistant, she described her typical 13- to 15-hour work day as tough. Her job, she said, include 'assisting her boss in strategic planning, political affairs, public liaison and inter-governmental affairs efforts at the White House.'"

This is how we do it in Abramoff's world: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/docs/ralston.memo.4202000.html

"On April 20th, 2000, Jack Abramoff's personal assistant Susan Ralston wrote a memo outlining guidelines for doling out skybox seats to clients, politicians and Capitol Hill staffers."

Also, some more history from Josh Marshall: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/006598.php

"IN ALL THE Abramoff business I'm surprised there has not been more mention of Susan Ralston. In Jack Abramoff's heyday at Preston Gates and then later at Greenberg-Traurig, Ralston was Abramoff's executive assistant, the one who helped dole out the skyboxes, basically administratively ran his whole shop as near as I can figure.

"Then when Karl Rove came to town, she took pretty much the same job with him, becoming his gatekeeper at the White House. She was of course one of many Team Abramoff players who got seconded into the administration. Given the close relationship between Abramoff and Grover Norquist, it's probably not surprising that she also had an arrangement with Norquist in which he gave her direction on who to let through to Rove."

:hi:

[bleever]

5. More:

http://www.inq7.net/globalnation/col_gln/2004/sep20.htm

Susan Ralston is easily the most influential Filipino-American in the Bush Administration. As the only Fil-Am with an office in the West Wing as executive assistant to Karl Rove, Susan is involved in overseeing the strategic planning, political affairs, public liaison, and inter-governmental affairs of the White House.

At a press conference earlier in the day, Ms. Ralston was asked if President Bush supported HR 677. She replied that the question should be directed to the President. She was then asked if she personally supported HR 677. She replied that she does "not do policy."


and...

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Susan_B._Ralston

Susan Bonzon Ralston, Special Assistant to the President & Assistant to the Senior Advisor Karl Rove, was Jack Abramoff's executive assistant at Preston Gates and Ellis and later at the Greenberg Traurig law and lobbying firm, where "she served as the assistant director of governmental affairs. Before moving to the nation’s capital, she was an office administrator for M&J Wilkow, Ltd., a commercial real estate firm in Chicago, Illinois."


(http://www.philippinefestival.org/pfc2003ma12.html)

"Ms. Ralston assists Mr. Rove in overseeing the strategic planning, political affairs, public liaison, and intergovernmental affairs efforts of the White House."


"As presidential adviser Karl Rove set up shop in the West Wing in 2001, he was looking for an assistant to serve as the trusted gatekeeper of his new fiefdom. Superlobbyist and Republican fundraiser Jack Abramoff was happy to lend a hand. Abramoff knew just the right person for the job: his own assistant, Susan Ralston. She interviewed with Rove and got the position," Peter H. Stone wrote (http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2004/0327nj1.htm) in the March 27, 2004, National Journal. "For a staunch conservative and smooth GOP operative like Abramoff, losing a valuable aide was well worth the opportunity to ingratiate himself with the president's senior political adviser."

[bleever]

6. The "mc pager" riddle is solved.

Initial reports (which can be found widely doing an internet search) suggest that Abramoff's angry reply in that one instance was that certain messages were sent to Ralston's "mc pager".

However, a close look at the pdf of the House Committee's report makes it clear that it does indeed say "rnc pager", almost certainly a reference to the Republican National Committee.

See it here, on page 46 of the report:

http://i.a.cnn.net/cnn/2006/images/09/29/final.abramoff.report.pdf

[DoYouEverWonder]

19. She also uses RNC and Bush Campaign email addresses

If she was a full time WH staffer, she should have been doing everything through the WH email system.

Of course the WH, did not want records of all these interactions, so they deliberately worked around the system.

[jayctravis]

20. That's not "mc", it's "r n c"

At least to my eyes.

[kimmerspixelated]

7. You suppose Fitz

has talked to her about...everything? This is quite interesting, but certainly something must really be up for her to jump ship now. I think they ought to put Ms. Ralston on the stand. And I think these stories should be on every front page as well.

[bleever]

8. She has been before him more than once, and we knew

that Fitz has made inquiries into matters beyond the narrow Plame story into things like the Nigerian forgeries. But nobody is saying, from either side.

It's been many people's fondest wish that his investigation would lead him into matters related to the conduct of the election.

[fooj]

9. Excellent post, bleever.

:toast:

Yes. There is MUCH more. I can't wait until these treasonous, rat bastards get EVERYTHING that they deserve.

I believe.

[bleever]

10. DU was the first place this connection was discussed,

as far as I can tell by googling.

DU: :yourock:

:hi:

[glitch]

11. K & R for very interesting. Bleever: yourock nt

[texpatriot2004]

12. Oh, there's more...much more

Thanks Bleever for this post and thanks for your contributions to DU.

[autorank]

13. When "recommend" is just not enough --->AMAZING

Good grief. What next? Patrick Fitzgerald should call her back on the stand and ambush her with
some seriously questions like: produce a log of all your phone calls on election eve 2004, all of
them.

That would tell the story. Rove wouldn't make the calls, he'd have someone else do it. And that
someone else would have to be someone he trusts, not just a flunky, too dangerous.

Now Ralston is gone. Why? Certainly they didn't want to let her go. It's for a petty reason.

Everybody in DC gets tickets to sporting events, even me. It's no big deal, especially since our
teams suck and there are always spare tickets lately. Nobody should take this seriously. Besides
she left with the "distraction" excuse. Well guess what folks, that's not going to cut it.

She left. Where did she go? What is she doing now? Who is paying the freight?

What great questions. Answers would tell a lot about what's going on.

Just an amazing post Bleever. I've always liked this pic you throw up from time to time. Now I see
why you've kept it alive.

[bleever]

14. Hold the phone --

She was in charge of the phone in Plamegate; Cooper's call to Rove wasn't logged because "it was forwarded from" yada yada.

She was in charge of the phones election night, as you say.

Phone records.

Very informative indeed, though probably not extending to the records of the phone Karl is holding, with the white label taped on the receiver. But a good step forward.

[karynnj]

15. She obviously did good work in 2004

"Ms. Ralston was promoted after the 2004 election, getting the title special assistant to the president and a raise to $122,000, from $64,700."


http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/07/washington/07ralston.html?hp&ex=1160193600&en=5609894ec8caa69d&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Has anyone here gotten a raise like this?

[autorank]

16. I' d say that's "hush" money...don't fly commerical with her...

[bleever]

17. The title of "Special Assistant to the President" means

what, exactly? She got her picture taken with him once or twice, but apparently didn't directly serve the pResident except as one of Rove's minions.

Here's hoping she becomes a special assistant to the Special Prosecutor.

[bleever]

18. Does anyone remember the e-voting firms with DOD contracts

linked to lobbying violations? Info that came out around the time of Clint Curtis's affadavit?

[Patsy Stone]

21. Yang Enterprises?

Tom Feeney?

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1064 (BradBlog video link to Curtis' House testimony)

http://www.hermes-press.com/criminal_vote.htm Nice site: "How American
Elections Became a Criminal Enterprise".

This site includes this tidbit:

"Now we come to Representative Tom Feeney (R-Fla.). Remember him? After inventing a "constitutional crisis" in 2000 when he was Speaker of the House in Florida, Feeney moved up to the U.S. congress.

"In 2003, Abramoff's NCPPR paid for Feeney's Scottish golfing jaunt with Ralph Reed, who would be chairman of the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign for the southeastern United States. Feeney strongly supported touch-screen voting installations in time for the 2004 election, perhaps relying on his expertise as an attorney and lobbyist for Yang Enterprises, Inc. (YEI), a position he occupied throughout his tenure as a Florida legislator.

"Brad Friedman was way ahead of the pack in exposing Feeney's questionable entanglement as general counsel and registered lobbyist with client YEI:

"Curtis, a life-long Republican up until then, had been a programmer at YEI, which had several top-secret clearance contracts with the state, NASA and other government agencies. Curtis' understanding at the time was that the prototype he was being asked to create (built to the very precise specifications of Feeney) was to address Feeney's concerns that the Democrats might attempt to electronically rig the election and Feeney wanted to know what to look out for in that event. After informing YEI CEO Mrs. Li-Woan Yang that he would not be able to hide the vote-flipping routines in the software source-code as Feeney had requested, Curtis testified that Mrs. Yang informed him that the program was needed to 'rig the vote in South Florida.'"

[bleever]

22. I may be conflating

but I thought that at some point those contracting for, and getting big bucks for creating this technology got tripped up by lobbying regulations, and had to burrow deeper into DOD's black budget to continue their operations. There were name changes involved. It's one of those memories that I can't pin down, and might be misrememberated.

Thanks for caring.