1996 Fund-Raising Scandals Bring Stiff Penalty Politics: The FEC levies a record $719,000 in fines against DNC and other groups for arranging illegal contributions from foreign sources. September 21, 2002|From the Washington Post
WASHINGTON — The Federal Election Commission disclosed Friday that it has imposed a record-setting $719,000 in fines against participants in the 1996 Democratic Party fund-raising scandals involving contributions from China, Korea and other foreign sources. The FEC documents describe Democratic fund-raisers who set specific prices for foreign nationals to make illegal campaign contributions in return for meetings with then-President Clinton and Vice President Al Gore. A Democratic finance vice chair, for example, said organizers would have to contribute a total of $100,000 in return for Gore's appearance at a Buddhist temple in Los Angeles. Those penalized included the Democratic National Committee, the Clinton-Gore campaign, the Buddhist temple and nearly two dozen people and corporations acting as conduits for illegal contributions. All have agreed to pay, according to the documents. The total in fines would have been significantly higher except that some of the corporations have folded and others were dummy operations, with no assets, set up as conduits for money from China, Venezuela, Canada and other countries. Foreign individuals and organizations are barred from contributing to federal elections. In some cases, foreigners who would have been subject to fines could not be located and served with papers. In other cases, which sometimes produced minor news coverage, the individuals pleaded guilty in criminal cases and are bankrupt. http://articles.latimes.com/2002/sep/21/nation/na-fec21 Did John Lewis skip the 1997 Clinton innauguration? -- -- Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PoliticalForum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
