-Caveat Lector- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1417-2002Feb12.html
WJPBR Email News List [EMAIL PROTECTED] Peace at any cost is a Prelude to War! Panel: Clintons Took $362,000 in Gifts By Ellen Nakashima Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, February 13, 2002; Page A04 A House investigative panel reported yesterday that former president Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton took with them at least $362,000 in gifts worth $260 or more when Bill Clinton left office, and asserted that the former first family may have undervalued dozens of gifts, some in a possible attempt to avoid disclosure. Of that amount, about $63,000 was not reported on the Clintons' financial disclosure forms. The law requires that in most cases gifts valued at $260 or more be disclosed. The information was released as part of a year-long investigation into gifts received by the Clinton White House led by Rep. Doug Ose (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Government Reform subcommittee on energy policy, natural resources and regulatory affairs. Ose chaired a hearing yesterday on legislation to standardize presidential gift rules. The former president's office issued a statement denouncing the report as "blatantly partisan." The inquiry comes a year after reports that the Clintons had plans to keep for personal use $190,000 worth of furnishings, flatware and china given as gifts over their eight years in the White House. Prompted by the outcry, they paid the donors for $86,000 worth of gifts and returned $28,000 worth of furniture. Ose said he would refer the information his staff gathered to the Justice Department for possible criminal investigation. A knowing failure to report a gift or falsification of information subject to disclosure rules is a violation of federal law that carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison. The gifts not heretofore disclosed, according to the report, include two Lenox crystal bowls each valued at more than $25,000, and $739 worth of Liz Claiborne cosmetics. Gifts that the report suggests are undervalued include a $249 Yves Saint Laurent suit, an $800 Ferragamo coat and a $150 Tiffany silver necklace. The former president's office countered Ose's charges of failure to disclose, saying that the Lenox bowls, for example, were gifts from Congress and that the rules specifically advise not to report anything received from relatives or the U.S. government. Spokeswoman Julia Payne said the Clintons "followed all the rules." She said the White House used an independent professional appraiser (Hagen & Hagen, used by former presidents George Bush and Ronald Reagan) or used donor or store information. In all, the report said the Clintons took with them 14,445 gifts. The rest of the 94,178 gifts they received generally go to either Clinton's presidential library or the General Services Administration. Two percent of the gifts kept were appraised at $260 or more, in most cases requiring disclosure, according to the report. "The total value of gifts retained by the former first family creates at least an appearance problem," Ose said. "The fact that so many gifts were undervalued raises many questions, including whether some were undervalued deliberately." Phil Schiliro, staff director for Rep. Henry A. Waxman (Calif.), the panel's ranking Democrat, charged that the committee's GOP majority was hewing to a double standard. It has ongoing probes into the Clinton administration on campaign finance, gifts, pardons and White House e-mails but has not opened one inquiry into the Bush administration, he said. "It's just striking that it's almost as if, for the purposes of our committee and investigations, the Clinton administration had never left office," Schiliro said. "The White House talks about ending partisan investigations, but if it's a Democratic administration, different rules apply." The report said that at least 30 gifts were misplaced or lost, including a $1,200 Boukhara rug. It also said the Clintons accepted 15 shares of Coca-Cola stock valued at $1,027, despite the fact that they were advised by the White House counsel not to accept 10 shares of General Electric stock. Payne said the Coca-Cola stock was a gift to the Clintons' daughter, Chelsea, who was not a public figure and could keep it, while the GE stock was a gift to the president. The report also said that $38,617 worth of fine flatware went to Hillary Clinton in December 2000, after she was elected to the Senate but before she took office. The Senate forbids acceptance of gifts worth more than $50. Payne said Hillary Clinton paid for those gifts. Ose, who said he launched his inquiry to bolster the case for his legislation, denied that the Republicans acted out of partisan motives. "This is not a witch hunt to bash the Clintons," he said at the hearing. "I introduced my bill in March of last year. . . . We have tried to collect the facts." Several laws involving six federal offices and agencies govern the receipt, valuation and disposition of presidential gifts. Ose's bill would establish a single agency as the sole entity for keeping an inventory of all White House gifts, domestic and foreign. Rep. Patsy Mink (D-Hawaii) urged a ban on keeping White House gifts for personal use. "All gifts ought to be considered gifts to the nation," she said. Staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report. *COPYRIGHT NOTICE** In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and educational purposes only.[Ref. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ] Want to be on our lists? Write at [EMAIL PROTECTED] for a menu of our lists! 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