DeLay, Hastert and Lott
Eleven million dollars can buy a lot of access in Washington. Especially if your lobbyist is Jack Abramoff.
Take Beningo Fitial, the current governor of the Northern Marianas Islands, a U.S. territory in the Pacific. He and his company, along with their trade lobby and funds doled out by the islands at his prodding, spent $11.5 million dollars lobbying Washington between 1995 and 2002.
Fitial—who became Speaker of the Marianas House after a coup organized by Abramoff’s associates and former aides of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay—was treated like a king.
~snip~
In other words—Abramoff seems to have arranged for a non-head of state for a tiny island in the Pacific to meet with the three most powerful men in the United States of America. But that’s not all: Fitial also met with then-Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-TX) and Senate Interior Department Appropriations Chairman Conrad Burns (R-MT). Fitial appears in photographs with Burns and Delay -- enlarged from tiny thumbnails in his hometown paper -- at left.
~snip~
Fitial also said he was pleased most by the fact that Lott recalled their meeting in a previous year. He said, "I think our efforts in Washington will continue to pay off for the CNMI people.”
And pay off they did: The Mariana’s $11.5 million, channeled through Abramoff, crushed numerous attempts to impose minimum wage and labor laws on the island territory. The tropical hotspot where Tom DeLay spent New Years in 1998 playing golf remains a haven for U.S. garment manufacturers—including Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger and Gap—who enjoy the loosely enforced minimum wage of $3.05.
Multimillion dollar Abramoff client gave $50,000 to GOP after meeting with Bush, DeLay, Hastert and Lott-Rawstory
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
