What is the threshold to link somebody to corruption?
What is the threshold to link a candidate to a bad person and/or group?
Is it one point of linkage? Will a social connection do the trick? Or do you need a financial link? Or do you need a link of legislative action or non-action?
Will one link do? Or do you need more?
How tight does the linkage need to be?
Judging from the press, the GOP and the Clinton campaign one link is all you need if the candidate is black. If the candidate is a white Republican or a Clinton, then you will need many more links to make a scandal drive a news cycle.
Fine.
These are the rules.
The bar is high for some and low for other.
That’s the American way.
Clinton or McCain require multiple ties to corruption and/or links to people with problematic histories in order for anybody to dig into those links.
Well, the links are there.
In the case of Hillary Clinton there are multiple links of contact, money and action to the sweatshops of Saipan and the Chinese family behind the abuse. And if one applies the "weatherman" standard of connection, she is also linked to the Abramoff scandal.
To the jump...
As those who have been following my Diaries know, I have mostly written about the growing Jack Abramoff Scandal, the Republican Culture of Corruption and the abuse on the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) a US Territory in the Western Pacific.
In 2006, and again in this cycle, I have shared my research with writers, reporters, campaigns, bloggers, filmmakers and others seeking to explore the Abramoff Scandal. Recent stories about Don Young and Bob Schaffer were supported by some of my work. More are in the works.
In making connections to the Abramoff Scandal, the most tainted funds—the dirtiest money—would come from one of two sources:
- A direct donation from Jack Abramoff, his wife Pam, or his inner circle of about a dozen key lobbyist partners such as Michael Scanlon, Tony Rudy, Ed Buckam, Neil Volz, etc.
- A direct donation from family members or key employees of the Tan Family operating out of Hong Kong and the Mariana Islands.
Money from the Tan Family was an important indicator of corruption as they were (and are) the force behind the system of human trafficking and abuse that has flourished on the Mariana Islands. Over time money from the Tan Family flowed to corrupt local officials on the CNMI, Jack Abramoff, Tom DeLay, George W. Bush and the Republican Party—lots and lots of money.
In my book, money from the Tan Family is worse than money from Jack Abramoff.
Tan Family money is cash directly tied to crimes against humanity. It is money earned off of exploitation and theft of labor. It is money made off of human trafficking. It is the definition of "dirty cash".
Over in Colorado, former GOP Congressman Bob Schaffer is taking a lot of heat for his links to the Abramoff scandal. What really links Bob to the scandal is not a direct link with Jack Abramoff, rather it is his work with and donations from the Tan Family and their employees. The Democratic Party is using the $7,300 he received as a hard link between Bob and the Tan Family, especially the $2,000 he received from Willie Tan’s brother, Jerry Tan.
And they should.
The money is part of the hard link between Schaffer and the sweatshops, human trafficking and labor abuse on the Mariana Islands. It should be tied around his neck and sink his campaign. Bob Schaffer is way too corrupt to get into the US Senate and the money from the Tan Family is evidence of that corruption.
Amazingly, Bob Schaffer shares that same Tan Family money linkage with a Democratic Senator and she is running for President.
This is a problem we need to address during our primary. We can not have our nominee linked to Jack Abramoff and Hillary Clinton is linked to him.
I’ve been working on Abramoff’s web of corruption for almost a decade.
Back in 2005, I wrote about how "There are ZERO Democrats who took Abramoff money."
The scandal was, for the most part, a Republican owned and operated scandal. The goal was to establish the Republican Party as the ONLY effective Party in the United States. Only the most gullible and/or greedy Democrats would be pulled into the edges of Jack’s web of influence. And back in December of 2005, I could not find any Democrat with direct links to Jack Abramoff and/or the Tan Family.
I did not know it, but Senator Hillary Clinton had already made a liar out of me when I posted that Diary.
Between September 30 and October 2 of 2005 Willie Tan and four other family members gave Senator Clinton $10,000:
KIM LAM, PEK, Homemaker; 9/30/2005; $2,000
TAN, JOISE, N/A/Homemaker; 10/2/2005; $2,000
TAN, RAYMOND, Luen Thai/President; 9/30/2005; $2,000
TAN, SIU L, Tan Holdings Corp./Chairman; 9/30/2005; $2,000
TAN, WILLIE, Luen Thai/COO; 9/30/2005; $2,000
The only Republican who ever received this much direct support from the Tan Family was George W. Bush, and they gave him even more.
Willie’s brother Raymond Tan gave to both Hillary and George, which was odd because when Raymond filed papers with the Hong Kong stock exchange to take a Tan Family company (Luen Thai) public, he declared himself to be a Chinese National.
Now a direct money link from core members of the Tan Family, including the patriarch Tan Sui Lin, would be a red flag for any Republican I was researching. If I had known about the Tan money going to Senator Clinton back in December 2005, I would not have been able to write "There are ZERO Democrats who took Abramoff money." Her acceptance of this cash taints her and our Party.
When Senator Clinton accepted the Tan Family money she linked herself to Jack Abramoff and the worse crimes of his scandal: the sweatshops, human trafficking and labor abuse on the Mariana Islands.
I discovered the donations to Senator Clinton when they were reported in early 2006. On April 22, 2006 I posted a Diary about it. I followed that up with action. Over the next year and a half I made calls, I wrote letters and emails. I visited her Senate office. I visited her Senate campaign office.
Brick wall every time.
Time passed. More campaign FEC reports were filed. The money was not returned.
Then she started running for President.
I wrote another Diary and tried again to get somebody in her camp to return this dirty money. I wrote more emails. I made more calls and visits. I contacted people I knew who were connected to Senator Clinton. They tried to pass the information along. No luck.
Once I even ran into I ran into Terry McAuliffe on the streets of DC. I explained this issue to him and placed a detailed list of the donations into his hands. Nothing happened.
I bent over backwards trying to understand why her campaign would not just return this tainted cash. I made excuses; I rationalized the facts to make them look better for her.
I did not want to believe she knowingly sought and accepted this tainted cash. And yet, tonight it is clear that she did. It is clear she will not return the money unless it is raised as a campaign issue.
It should be raised, especially in advance of next week’s Guam Caucus.
Now, whenever I mention this issue, supporters of Senator Clinton will claim that she never did anything for the money and that it is only $10,000 that was for her 2006 Senate race. They make the claim that one link of cold hard cash should be over looked. Perhaps that would be a good argument if it was only one link between her and the Tan Family—but it is not.
There are multiple links between Senator Hillary Clinton and the corruption of the Tan Family. And those links stretch back to 1995 and continue to this day.
Recently I wrote about the US Senate finally passing Senate Bill 2739. This was the legislation to reform the Mariana Islands that Jack Abramoff and the Republican Party had successfully obstructed every year since 1995. It passed the Senate by a vote of 91-4. Soon it will be signed into law.
Five Senators did not vote on S. 2739. The five include the three Senators running for President. Under most circumstances that would not be a big issue. S. 2739 was going to pass, but Senator Clinton had an ethical responsibility to vote for this legislation and against the wishes of her sweatshop-owning-patrons.
She has taken money from the Tan Family and they have been and still are doing everything the can to block reform on the Mariana Islands.
Her supporters used to tell me that I could count on Senator Clinton to vote against the interests of the Pirates of Saipan. Nope. Instead of standing up to her corrupt donors, she ducked the issue and skipped the vote. That puts her absence on this vote in a different category than Senators Obama and McCain.
By avoiding a vote on CNMI reform legislation Senator Clinton did not take a stand against the sweatshops, human trafficking and labor abuse on the rogue US Territory. It is the same type of inaction that Jack Abramoff and the Tan Family used to reward the Republican Party for—money came in and a guarantee of no action was given in exchange.
But it is not only the $10,000 donations and the absence on the CNMI vote that should be of concern. There are more links between Senator Clinton and the Tan Family.
A few years ago, the Tan Family created a multi-national Corporation, Luen Thai, to expand the reach of their business and give it a patina of respectability. They specialize in helping brands "outsource" their textile manufacturing for profits. (If you live in North Carolina it is a big part of the reason the textile jobs have left the USA.)
The head of Luen Thai USA is a fellow named Richard Helfenbein. Along with his family, he has added another $16,000 of Tan Family money to Senator Clinton’s campaigns.
Helfenbein is also a neighbor of Senator Clinton in Chappaqua, NY and his son is a big supporter of Senator Clinton. He served as her first Page, as an intern in her office, worked with Bill and he is working on her Campaign for the White House.
Perhaps the Tan Family gave her the money in 2005 to please their Head of operations in America. Perhaps it costs a few bucks to become a Senate Page or intern in Senator Clinton’s office. Perhaps the money is not connected to her non-action on CNMI reform and instead it is connected to fishing regulations, textile trade with China or another piece of legislation in Tan Family agenda before the US Government.
The one thing I know for certain is that the Tan Family does not give away money, especially to politicians. Every dollar is an investment and they have recently invested $26,000 in Senator Clinton directly and through their Head of American operations.
Back in 1995 they were also investing in the Clintons.
In 1995, the Republicans had taken over Congress and the new head of the Resources Committee had CNMI reform Legislation on a fast track. By the spring, the Pirates of Saipan had hired Jack Abramoff to block it. They also decided to make an investment in the Clinton Administration.
The Northern Mariana Islands are a chain of islands that begin 40 miles North of Guam, in fact Guam and the CNMI are part of the same chain of islands. Both Territories share many things. The indigenous peoples of Guam and the CNMI are linked through history, tradition and ancestors.
The two Territories entered the American Family through different paths.
The CNMI voted in the 1970s to be part of the USA and became a Commonwealth. That meant rules of how the CNMI would be integrated into the USA were established. A goal was to protect the culture of the indigenous people so local control of immigration, customs and labor laws were granted to the CNMI. Instead of protecting the local culture, the loophole was quickly exploited by Chinese entrepreneurs and the CNMI politicians they easily bribed.
Guam, on the other hand, never had a chance to vote on becoming part of the United States. They were part of the spoils of the Spanish American War and in many ways they are still a colony. There are very legitimate claims on Guam for local control and indigenous rights. After the CNMI finalized their agreement with the Federal Government, people on Guam wanted a similar deal.
And for different reason, so did the Pirates of Saipan. The Tan Family wanted to expand their sweatshops to Guam. By 1995, converting Guam into a Commonwealth just like the CNMI was a priority for Willie Tan.
The trouble was that nobody in Washington would take it up. The idea of a Commonwealth of Guam was DOA every year since 1988.
Then Hillary Clinton took a trip to Guam.
On September 4, 1995 Hillary Clinton was on her way to China for the Fourth World Conference on Women. There she would get high praise for speaking out for human rights and the rights of women.
According to page 1378 of her 1995 WH schedule Hillary Clinton stopped in Guam on her way to China.
She was on Guam for just a little over two hours. It was enough time to stop by the local Hyatt Hotel, meet some 300 folks, hear a few children sing, give a brief talk, get a gift and head back to her re-fueled plane for the next leg of her trip to Beijing .
The guests greeting Senator Clinton included Willie Tan, the Chinese entrepreneur who was building a multi-national corporation based on stolen labor in the sweatshops flourishing on the nearby island of Saipan.
I am not sure what Senator Clinton told the crowd gathered to meet and greet her on Guam, but I am pretty certain that the rights of the women being abused on the nearby Mariana Islands was not on her agenda.
After she left the hotel the guests at her reception stayed and converted the event into a fundraiser in Hillary Clinton’s honor. As a result of the gathering over half a million dollars was raised for President Clinton’s re-election effort and the DNC. At least $25,000 of that came directly from the Tan Family.
And the money caused the Clinton Administration to change their attitude on the goals of creating a Commonwealth of Guam. The Washington Post on February 16, 1997 broke the story with the headlined: Signs of Policy Shift on Status of Guam Appeared After Contributions to Democrats. I have not found it online but here are some key graphs:
On Sept. 4, 1995, Hillary Rodham Clinton stopped for several hours on this tiny tropical outpost in the Western Pacific, capping her visit with a shrimp cocktail buffet hosted by the island's governor, Carl T. Gutierrez (D).
The first lady's pit stop -- made on her way to the United Nations women's conference in Beijing -- kicked off the biggest political fund-raising effort ever on this trade-wind caressed chunk of American territory 6,100 miles west of California.
Three weeks after Hillary Clinton left, a Guam Democratic Party official arrived in Washington with more than $ 250,000 in campaign contributions. Within six months of that, Gutierrez and a small group of Guam businessmen had ponied up more than $ 132,000 for the Clinton-Gore reelection campaign and $ 510,000 in "soft money" contributions to the Democratic National Committee, making the island, with its 140,000 residents, the biggest donor to the Democratic Party per capita of any territory in the United States.
That money generated some attention for the goal of local immigration and labor control:
The contributions from Guam were followed late last year by signs of a significant and controversial change in the Clinton administration's policy toward the island, which will mark its centennial as a possession of the United States next year. [snip]
Since 1988, Guam's politicians have been asking Washington to approve a law called the Guam Commonwealth Act, which would give the territory -- not federal authorities -- the right to determine who could come to the island. The law also would transfer from the federal government to Guam authorities the power to enforce labor regulations.
This movement to extend the exploitation of the Mariana Islands to Guam seemed to be going nowhere. Then Hillary Clinton stopped by Guam for a quick speech and those who heard her decided to hold a fundraiser for her husband and the DNC the moment she was out the door. Worse, the effort seemed to be directed by a DOI official:
Until last year, successive U.S. administrations had been wary of the legislation. But in December 1996, John Garamendi, the Clinton administration's point man on island issues, circulated an internal report supporting key provisions of the bill.
Today, John Garamendi is a Clinton Super Delegate and Lt. Gov. of California. Back in the mid-1990s he was part of the anything goes fund-raising ethic that plunged both major political Parties into moral twilight:
In a phone interview, Garamendi acknowledged that the administration's policy on Guam was changing, but he denied it was connected to donations.
"The beginning of flexibility occurred when I took over this job [in January 1996] and began representing the issues in a way that the administration found acceptable," he said. That involved convincing administration officials that the U.S. government had been treating Guam as a colony for too long.
A White House official, speaking on behalf of Hillary Clinton, said the first lady was not aware at the time of Gutierrez's fund-raising activities, but did not find it inappropriate. "The event was not a fund-raiser, but it would not be surprising if the governor used her appearance subsequently to encourage people to support her husband's candidacy," said the official, who declined to be named.
So, like the 2005 Tan Family money, Senator Clinton also had no problem with the 1995 Tan Family money:
A look at those in Guam who contributed to the Clinton reelection effort also raises concerns, officials say. One of the donors involved in the fund-raiser attended by Hillary Clinton is being investigated for bribery connected to narcotics trafficking. Another prominent donor is Willie Tan, whose Saipan-based garment companies donated at least $ 17,500 to the DNC, according to records from the Federal Election Commission. In 1992, a Tan company was ordered by the federal government to pay $ 9 million in back pay and damages to 2,500 workers who had been denied overtime wages.
This money was embraced even though the abuses of the Marianas Islands were well known and other members of the Clinton DOI were actively fighting the abuse and opposed to the effort to extend the problem to Guam:
Garamendi's proposals on Guam policy, made in a seven-page report, are contentious because U.S. officials fear that if local authorities on the island are given the right to decide who can come there, they will import thousands of low-wage laborers from Asia and subject them to poor treatment, including an effective ban on unions and other civil rights. These officials point to Guam's northern neighbor, the U.S. Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas Islands, known in the area as Guam's "ugly sister."
Congress gave those islands control over immigration in 1976, and since the mid-1980s businessmen have shipped in more than 29,000 low-wage laborers from Asian countries to work in 18 garment factories built to take advantage of the fact that goods made in the Marianas are "Made in the USA" and not subject to U.S. customs quotas. The average worker labors for $ 2.90 a hour at least 60 hours a week in horrendous conditions that one U.S. Department of Labor official described as "feudal servitude."
The Washington Post story embarrassed the Clinton Administration. It became part of the litany of attacks from the Right Wing and the media. As far as I know, the money was never returned, but the forces in the Clinton Administration who were opposed to the Pirates of Saipan won out over the folks like John Garamendi who would appease those running the sweatshops for a few sacks of blood money.
In the end, the Clinton Department of Interior fought a valiant effort to end the abuse in the Mariana Islands, but they were defeated by Jack Abramoff, Tom DeLay and the Republican Party.
Many in the Clinton Administration fought for justice in the CNMI and many still do.
As for Senator Clinton, hers is a record of silence on the issue and her actions seem to be more supportive of the Tan Family than supportive of the victims of their system of abuse.
In 1995, she visited Guam and hung out with Willie Tan. Then he joined others in a fundraiser in her honor when she left. A decade later Willie and his Family would give her $10,000 and their head of Tan Family American operations would kick in another $16,000.
One point of a connection is just a piece of data. So are a couple of points.
Three points can make a straight line.
Multiple points of contact can show a pattern.
There are multiple points of connection between Hillary Clinton and the Tan Family. It shows a pattern that she has repeated with other shady funders—a pattern where any money is good until it generates bad press.
Her Tan Family money should generate some bad press.
Tell this story. Pass the links around.
Challenge the press to explore it. Certainly this should be at least as interesting as having a weatherman in your neighborhood.
When it comes to this story, I think Hillary Clinton has met the threshold to link her to the corruption of the Tan Family and by extension to Jack Abramoff.
Others may disagree, but the more I dig the more connections there are.
Whoever says she has already been vetted isn’t paying attention.
These donations put Senator Clinton at odds with two key groups in the Democratic base, labor and women, and this money connects her to the sweatshops, the Jack Abramoff scandal and the Culture of Corruption in Washington.
Did I mention she is pro-lobbyist as well?
Oy!
She is our weakest candidate and we nominate her at our peril.
Cheers