Alabama governor accused of violating campaign finance laws

[Bitwit1234]

Filed by Muriel Kane

Alabama's Republican Governor Bob Riley may have attempted to conceal illegal corporate donations to his 2002 and 2006 campaigns by representing them in campaign finance reports as having come from individuals according to an investigation carried out by the Montgomery Independent.

Riley's campaigns have been under close scrutiny during the past several weeks, with questions being raised about his narrow victory over incumbent Don Siegelman in 2002, followed by Sieglelman's prosecution on what many consider to be trumped up charges when he proposed to run again in 2006.

An ongoing RAW STORY investigation series, has explored the 2002 Alabama governor's elections, in which Riley pulled ahead only when a last minute change in the tally switched several thousand votes in one county from Siegelman's column to Riley's and the state's Republican attorney general refused to allow a recount. Karl Rove is alleged to have been directly involved in that election, working together with longtime Alabama GOP operative William Canary.

The Montgomery Independent has not found that in 2006, the Riley campaign reported the use of airplanes owned by two corporations as if they were personal "in kind" donations from the presidents of those corporations. It also listed the provision of an advertising billboard as a personal donation from the president of the ad agency. Together, these in kind donations had a value of over $25,000 far beyond the $500 limit allowed for any one corporation in a single election cycle.

Montgomery Independent publisher Bob Martin has called for further investigation of the matter, stating in an editorial. "The question which stands out front and center is whether or not the listing of individuals instead of the true corporate donors was intention, as in to bypass the legal limits on corporate donations or was just a mistake in reporting."

Although still expressing willingness to give Riley a chance to clear himself, Martin is prepared to call for legal action if he does not. "This is a serious violation of the law on the part of the governor's campaign if what we have uncovered cannot be refuted - just as serious as the matters for which former Governor Don Siegelman was convicted. The governor must come clean on this and correct his campaign reports. If he doesn't either the state attorney general or the Montgomery district attorney should take action."

[flashl]

1. K&R n/t

[MagickMuffin]

2. I wonder what the name of the airline is

From a post I started back in July of this year. Link below

But eventually she put together such a revealing picture of a very rich federal judge who owned companies doing millions upon millions of dollars worth of business with the U.S. government, including making uniforms for the FBI and training Saudi and Iranian pilots - all while doing business with the Justice Department in eliminating Siegelman from politics forever.

Amazingly, Justice Fuller received a $178 million contract through a privately held company to train pilots and navigators for the U.S. government DURING THE SIEGELMAN, SCRUSY TRIAL. The company is called Doss Aviation of Alabama.

For another company called Aureus International that is listed as a division of Doss Aviation on the company's Website, Fuller is also listed as the majority owner, according to Ms. Simpson's research. The company does a comparable amount of business making uniforms for the U.S. military and the FBI, which played a major role in the investigation and prosecution of Siegelman and Scrushy.



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1384629

It would be interesting if Doss or Aureus is involved. Maybe Siegelman can move out to make room for Justice Mark Fuller and Gov. Bob Riley:evilgrin:

I just hope this gets the attention it deserves. It could expose a lot of corruption.

[BearSquirrel2]

3. Wonder if they'll put him in lock down ...

You gotta wonder if they'll put Riley in prison under lock down. The big difference here is that Riley actually accepted benefits. All Siegelman did was appoint a campaign contributor to an unpaid committee.

[demommom]

4. kick

[Judi Lynn]

5. Hope we'll be hearing a lot more about this. It's really important. Thanks, Bitwit1234. n/t

[L. Coyote]

6. Bush, Abramoff, Nordquist, Rove, Riley, Reed, Cornyn ... quickly raised $1.15 million

Local papers are finally catching on to the facts? long in the news now elsewhere, and here on DU, of course.

"Republican lobbyists and activist groups collected tens of millions of dollars from Indian tribes seeking to preserve their casinos. Now those payments are the focus of Senate and Justice Department investigations."

FROM: Abramoff and Kark Rove Linked to Prosecution of Ex-Alabama Governor and Campaign Finances
Jun-01-07 http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1023111

June 3, 2005 - Boston Globe by Michael Kranish - http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0603-08.htm
Gambling, GOP Politics Intertwine, Casino Payments Seen as Influential

In 1999, Don Siegelman, the Democratic governor of Alabama, proposed a lottery that would have pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into public schools and even provided free college education for most Alabama high school graduates.

Reed, rallying religious conservatives, set out to try to defeat it ... quickly raised $1.15 million .... money came from Norquist's group, Americans for Tax Reform. Norquist ... got the funds from an Indian gaming tribe ...At the time Reed raised the money, he was working for Abramoff ... and Abramoff represented the Mississippi tribe.

Siegelman ..."'I don't know how they can sleep at night taking money from the Indian casinos to deny Alabama schoolchildren...."

.... Abramoff, meanwhile, appears to be the central focus ....

[L. Coyote]

7. PAC Gives $300K to Riley, After Getting $50 Million State Contract

Janu 27, 2006 - http://alelections.blogspot.com/2006/01/pac-gives-300k-to-riley-after-getting.html
PAC Gives $300K to Riley, After Getting $50 Million State Contract


Eddie Curran at the Mobile Register has a revelatory piece about Bob Riley's re-election fundraising. According to filings with the Sec of State, a PAC called Alabamians for Technology donated $300,000 in December to Riley's re-election campaign.

There doesn't seem to be any speculation that anything illegal took place, but there sure are a lot of unseemly details.

-- The PAC was formed, and largely bankrolled, by executives who benefited from a $50 million state contract.
-- The PAC was formed on Dec 16, 2005 and just three days later gave the $300K to Riley.
-- The PAC had taken $325K which means the $300K given to Riley accounts for over 92% of the PAC's monies.

[L. Coyote]

8. Bob Riley's Abramoff Problem = Riley's press secretary was Michael Scanlon

Jan 05, 2006 | PoliSciZac | http://alelections.blogspot.com/2006/01/bob-rileys-abramoff-problem.html
Bob Riley's Abramoff Problem


..... The whole Abramoff business is pretty sordid and complex. It's been difficult to keep up with all of the details, but it's pretty plain it's not good news for the Republican party, at least at the national level .... Previously I mentioned US Rep Robert Aderholt's (R-Haleyville) tenuous connection to tainted Abramoff money and just yesterday US Sen Richard Shelby (R-Tuscaloosa) returned a $1,000 contribution ...

But the Alabama Republicans holding their breath aren't all on Capitol Hill; many are in the Governor's office. During his first term in Congress, Bob Riley's press secretary was Michael Scanlon. After leaving Riley's office Scanlon worked for US Rep Tom Delay (R-TX) and then finally joined the lobbying operation of Jack Abramoff. .. Scanlon has pled guilty to bribing public officials (including congressmen) and defrauding Indian tribes ....

..... Riley penned a fund-raising letter in the late 1990s for the US Family Network which was basically an Abramoff front group.

If this is all the damage to come out of the Abramoff/Scanlon mess then Riley shouldn't take much of a hit. But if there continues to be smoke surrounding the governor's relationship with these two poster children for public corruption....

[L. Coyote]

9. Conspiracy to violate state election code = "donation of $500,000"

Conspiracy to violate state election code
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Conspiracy_to_violate_state_election_code

In Alabama

In 2002, at the "same time that House majority leader Tom DeLay allegedly conspired to send $190,000 in corporate money through the Republican National Committee to candidates for the Texas Legislature," Michael Scanlon, who "was working with Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff on behalf of Indian gaming tribes" and one of DeLay's former aides, made "an even larger donation to the Republican Party," Michael Kranish wrote in the October 1, 2005, Boston Globe.

A "donation of $500,000" in checks from Scanlon's company Capitol Campaign Strategies within weeks "showed up" at the Republican Governors Association as a $600,000 check written by the Republican Party to Bob Riley, "the Republican candidate for Alabama governor."

"One of Abramoff's top clients was a Mississippi Indian tribe, the Choctaws, which hoped to stop or slow the expansion of legalized gambling in neighboring Alabama," Kranish wrote. "Riley opposed the expansion of gambling and thus was favored in the election by the Choctaws. Scanlon, in addition to having once worked for DeLay, also had once worked as a staff member for Riley."

"'It is similar' to the DeLay case, said Melanie Sloan, director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, arguing that that donation's purpose, as in the DeLay case, was to bypass state laws.

"Under Alabama law, a person can give unlimited funds to a state candidate, but a corporation can give no more than $500 per election cycle, according to a spokesman for the Alabama secretary of state. Scanlon's group would have been banned from contributing anything more than $500 to Riley," Kranish wrote.

[L. Coyote]

10. Bush-DeLay-Abramoff Indian Casinos Campaign Money Laundering Operation

Edited on Sat Jun-02-07 03:00 PM by L. Coyote
The Bush-DeLay-Indian Casinos Campaign Money Laundering Operation
(Wampum ‘til they’re dead)
by Laurence A. Toenjes
http://www.opednews.com/toenjes_101504_Bush_DeLay.htm


The largest single flow of monies into the DeLay nexus is from the set of six Indian tribes who “hired” Jack Abramoff and Mike Scanlon to help promote the tribes’ interests. .... they managed to extract from the tribes is at $66 million and counting. This is the amount estimated by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee to have been paid to Scanlon alone. .....

.... there is enough evidence to draw monetary links among some of these major political players.



Jack Abramoff received at least $21 million in tribal monies during the period April, 2001 to October, 2003, paid to him by Scanlon ....
... Abramoff is a major Bush supporter, listed on the website of Texans for Political Justice (TPJ) as a Bush Pioneer in 2004. The Pioneers are scouts responsible for bringing in at least $100,000 to the Bush war chest.

Reed is listed on the TPJ website as a Bush Ranger, which puts him in the $200,000-plus category. ......

Mike Scanlon at one time was a staff member and spokesperson for Tom DeLay, playing a key role in DeLay’s earlier successful drive to impeach President Bill Clinton. In October, 2002, Scanlon sent $500,000 to then-candidate for Governor of Alabama, Bob Riley. These funds apparently flowed through the Republican Governors Association and the Republican National State Elections Committee, increasing to $600,000 by the time Riley received them. ......

===============================
So many of these corrupt players keep appearing in the "Arkansas Project" effort to impeach Clinton???

[FogerRox]

11. Governor Don Siegelman is a political prisoner, he committed no crime