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“DOES MONEY TALK?” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Commerce was published in the Extensions of Remarks section on pages E985 on May 20, 1997.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
DOES MONEY TALK?
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HON. GERALD B.H. SOLOMON
of new york
in the house of representatives
Tuesday, May 20, 1997
Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, they say that money talks. If it doesn't, enough of it certainly seems to gain access to the White House. At least, that seemed to be the case for the Riady family of Indonesia. A recent Washington Times editorial reminds us that the Riady family has given various Democrat candidates and committees nearly $2 million since 1991. It also seems to have been money well spent, because Riady managed to have one of their own, John Huang, strategically placed at the Commerce Committee.
Mr. Speaker, a White House or a foreign policy for sale is not a laughing matter. I submit the Washington Times editorial in today's Record.
What Mr. Riady Wants
The Pacific Leadership Council (PLC), a fund-raising and influence-seeking organization formed in the 1980s by Lippo Group magnate James Riady, Maria Hsia and John Huang, all of whom figure prominently in the Democratic Party's growing money scandal, was anything but indirect about its motives. One original PLC member acknowledged to the Los Angeles Times recently that the group's political support ``wasn't altruistic at all.'' The Riady family and its PLC colleagues
``wanted to know what kinds of appointments and what kinds of contracts we could get out of all this,'' the member candidly admitted.
How much is ``all this''? According to the Times, the now-disbanded PLC and its members donated about $500,000 through 1990, $250,000 of it to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC). Since 1991, Riady-controlled corporations, their executives and close associates have donated nearly $2 million to various Democratic committees and candidates, including more than $850,000 to the Democratic National Committee (DNC). Since the presidential election, the DNC has returned $450,000 it received from the daughter and son-in-law of a Riady business partner.
At one PLC fund-raiser held in his home in April 1988, Mr. Riady raised $110,000 for the DSCC. Four days later, Mr. Riady wrote a highly detailed three-page memo to Ms. Hsia instructing her to ``follow up and let me know of progress'' in pursuing the numerous quid pro quos Mr. Riady meticulously outlined in a summary appropriately headlined, ``DSCC Issues and Agenda.'' Indeed, so blatantly and crassly self-interested was Mr. Riady's modus operandi that the then-DSCC chairman, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, later described Mr. Riady's letter to Ms. Hsia as a ``raw, graphic memo'' reflecting the kind of special-interest agenda that is
``usually communicated discreetly and verbally, not in writing.'' Mr. Riady was even more direct in a second memo that month, this one sent to DSCC Executive Director Robert Chlopak: ``The issues and concerns that were discussed [at the Riady fund-raiser] need to be followed up and actions need to be delivered.''
Among other things, Mr. Riady wanted the Democratic senators to ``impress upon Taiwan to allow Asian-American banks (or at least the Bank of Trade [the former name of LippoBank] to be allowed to open a branch office in Taiwan.'' He also sought ``appointments of Asian-Americans to policy-making positions in the federal government.'' As it later developed, thanks in part to a letter of recommendation overflowing with praise from Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, Mr. Riady's former top U.S. executive, Mr. Huang, was appointed to an influential position in the Commerce Department, where he received more than 100 secret briefings, including CIA information about China, and routinely telephoned LippoBank from his office. The FBI is now investigating whether economic espionage occurred and whether the Riadys, Mr. Huang or anyone else may have laundered and then funneled illegal campaign contributions from the Chinese government. In March, the vice president of the Asian-American Business Roundtable charged Mr. Huang with attempting to funnel $250,000 illegally to the DNC through the group's members. Meanwhile, Mr. Huang has asserted his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in refusing to cooperate with a congressional investigative committee.
And whaddya know? After Sen. Daschle could ``personally attest to John's strong background'' in a 1992 letter to the Clinton transition team, Sen. Daschle's aide recently told the Times that the senator ``actually doesn't know John Huang well at all.'' Moreover, after receiving a telephone call from an irate President Clinton at one o'clock in the morning following Wisconsin Sen. Russell Feingold's call for an independent counsel to investigate Mr. Clinton's 1996 fund-raising, Sen. Daschle has managed to close the barn door, locking in all the other Democrats except Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York.
As for Ms. Hsia, she later helped Mr. Huang arrange the illegal fund-raiser at the tax-exempt California Buddhist temple where Vice President Gore shook down impoverished monks, bagging nearly $150,000, much of which the DNC has promised to return. More laundering problems. As a founding member of the PLC, Ms. Hsia enticed then-Sen. Gore to visit Taiwan in 1989, promising him in a letter that she ``will persuade all my colleagues in the future to play a leader role in your [next] presidential race'' if ``you decide to join this trip.'' Although political contributions from foreign nationals who are not U.S. residents are expressly forbidden, the PLC had planned to use that trip ``to recruit new members overseas and potentially to raise some money for PLC,'' according to a document obtained by the Los Angeles Times.
Whether it is bankrolling Webster Hubbell to the tune of
$100,000 during the period when he was supposed to be cooperating with the Whitewater prosecutor or whether it is orchestrating nearly $2 million in political contributions from family and associates to Mr. Clinton and associates, one thing ought to be clear by now: James Riady does nothing for nobody that is not intended to benefit his interests, including White House access to lobby for expanding trade with China and to downplay Indonesia's notorious human-rights record on East Timor.
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