It Was His Voice on Tape, Gore Admits
NewsMax.com
Thursday, July 20, 2000
After an aide suggested that the voice on an incriminating tape recording wasn’t the voice of the vice president, Gore admitted that he is the one who can be heard on a tape saying that illegally financed political ads should be shown to a wealthy Indonesian now under criminal investigation by the Justice Department.
"It’s impossible to tell anything from the tapes," the aide had told reporters. "Who concluded it was his [Gore's] voice? Burton did."
Gore’s admission came after Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., wrote to Attorney General Janet Reno demanding that the DOJ investigate the issues raised by the tape recording.
On the tape Gore can be heard speaking about political ads to Arief Wiriadinata, an Indonesian citizen who was found to have made more than $400,000 in illegal donations to the Democratic Party that had to be returned.
"We ought to show Mr. Riady the tapes, some of the ad tapes," Gore can be heard telling Wiriadinata. James Riady, an Indonesian billionaire and friend of President Clinton, is suspected of campaign funding irregularities.
Burton, chairman of the House Government Reform Committee, said that on a Dec. 15, 1995, tape of a White House coffee with major political donors, Gore can be heard making the comment.
"It would indeed be extraordinary for the vice president to suggest showing political issue advertisements to an Indonesian billionaire who lives in Jakarta, Indonesia,'' Burton wrote Reno on Tuesday.
"Your Justice Department is completely disinterested in asking a single question about what appears to be a suggestion by the Vice President to show illegally funded political advertisements to ... Riady,'' he added.
Riady, one of the key figures in the campaign fund-raising scandal of 1996, is now under criminal investigation by the Justice Department's campaign finance task force for reimbursing political donors.
The so-called soft-money contributions made by Riady were used to fund a Democratic National Committee "issue ad" blitz aimed at bolstering Gore and President Clinton’s bid for re-election in 1996. Soft-money donations must be used for general party purposes, and not for any one candidate. Moreover, Riady is said to have donated money coming in from overseas, a violation of U.S. campaign finance law.
"Did Mr. Gore know anything about Mr. Riady’s campaign contributions and how they related to the issue advertisement campaign?" Burton asked in his letter to Reno.
Riady, Wiriadinata and others were accused of making illegal campaign contributions during the 1996 campaign. The Democratic Party ultimately returned Wiriadinata’s contributions.
Gore said that Burton’s "interpretation [of the taped remarks] is a partisan political attack, coming in the months before the election.
"That is to be expected and this is not a surprise. ... This has all been out there for years,'' Gore said on CNN. |
