My friend Dengre emailed me yesterday, asking if I'd read the latest CREW announcement on my favorite criminal subject, Italia Federici. Seeing that we'd spent Sunday travelling from Mojave NP back to the coast at Malibu, and then Monday running errands all day, I'd missed it. Bad me.
But while CREW had the basics, their source for the info, the Legal Times had the real low down:
Federici is Latest Target in Abramoff Probe
By Emma Schwartz
Legal Times
April 2, 2007
Italia Federici, the one-time girlfriend of a convicted former senior official at the Interior Department, is a target of the ongoing federal influence-peddling investigation into the activities of former lobbyist Jack Abramoff, according to court documents obtained by Legal Times.
In a letter dated Jan. 19, the Justice Department informed Federici, founder of the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, that she was a target of the federal probe.
"The investigation is focused on the allegedly illegal manner in which you operated the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy," wrote Stephanie Evans, a trial attorney in the department’s Tax Division.
The reason the Tax Division is investigating Italia Federici and her organization, the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, aka, the Committee for Republican Environmental Advocates, aka, Coalition of Republican Environmental Advocates, aka Renew our Urban Centers, is that CREA's filings to the IRS indicate the organization received no income from 2001 until 2006. Of course, it came to light during the Abramoff scandal and subsequent Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearings that CREA accepted upwards of $500,000 in donations from Jack Abramoff's tribal clients. None of those contributions were reported.
What the Legal Times and other traditional (and non-traditional) media outlets seem to miss is that Federici was way more than Steven Griles' sometime girlfriend, someone who benefitted, politically, financially and socially, from that relationship. In fact, I would argue that Federici was the key to Griles entry into the Norton Interior Department, as she knew Secretary Norton much better than Griles, who had merely worked under James Watt with Norton back in the Reagan Administration for a few years. It's clear from many of the CREA emails released in the Abramoff investigation that Federici's access reached not only into Norton's office (she regularly checked Norton's schedule with her personal assistant) but into the Department of Energy, where early on in the Bush Administration, before Griles was even confirmed, she was meeting with key officials.
Federici's ties to powerful people went well beyond Griles and Norton. A former TV journalist from Connecticut, she cut her political teeth on Jeb Bush's failed 1994 gubernatorial campaign, and was a bright enough star to be sent out to work on Norton's failed 1996 Senate campaign. Afterwards, Federici received her formal training as a GOP operative at the highly respected Republican Leadership Program of the Rockies. Soon thereafter, 27 year-old Federici formed the Committee of Repubican Environmental Advocates, with Gale Norton, Grover Norquist (who had also helped out on Norton's Senate race), and DC-fundraising diva Julie Finley on top of the extraction-industry front-group's letterhead; but it was Federici who ran the ship from the beginning.
Very early on, CREA was on Texas Governor George W. Bush's radar. From "An Inventory of Governor George W. Bush Policy Office Records at the Texas State Archives, Staff memoranda, January-October, 1997":
John Howard
[4 folders]
[Subjects include: emission reduction and grandfathered programs; air quality; environmental cleanup programs; Southwest Travis County Water District; water planning; water rights; groundwater; vehicle emissions testing; Federal Safe Drinking Water Act; Texas Natural Resources Conservation Commission; Texas Water Development Board; Coalition of Republican Environmental Advocates; Environmental Protection Agency; run-off waters; water quality; New Mexico; environmental issues with Mexico; ozone; and carbon pollution]
In fact, this is the earliest citation I've found so far for CREA.
In 1998, CREA moved from Colorado to Washington, amid much pomp and circumstance with the reigning Republican elite. From a 2001 WaPo article on Norton (a repeat cite from a post I wrote on CREA last spring):
On a June evening in 1998, in the big ballroom of the J.W. Marriott on Pennsylvania Avenue, Gale A. Norton hosted the national kickoff for an organization she founded that is now called, after several name changes, the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy.
To understand why environmentalists in Washington are so worried about President-elect Bush's choice of Norton for interior secretary -- and why conservatives are applauding the nomination -- CREA is a good place to start.
The organization was conceived by Norton, then the outgoing Colorado attorney general. Its purpose: to confront an "overriding problem," as its first mailings put it, that "over the last two decades, Democrats have created the impression that they are the defenders of the environment while Republicans are environmental destroyers. Our bad guy image hampers the election of Republican candidates and makes it difficult to promote common-sense policies."
Norton, through CREA, vowed to do something about that. The June gathering was part of her plan. The gathering included a Who's Who of GOP powerhouses in Congress.
The guest of honor was Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (Miss.). The keynote address was delivered by House Speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.). The sponsors for the gala that night included the National Coal Council, the Chemical Manufacturers Association, the National Mining Association, the Chlorine Chemical Council and the political consulting firm of Karl Rove, one of Bush's closest advisers.
So what else happened when Federici moved to DC? From Steve Griles' criminal docs from the DoJ (Organization A being CREA, Person A being Federici):
Organization A," which purports to be a tax-exempt organization under Internal Revenue Code Section 501(c)(4), was founded in 1997 and run by "Person A." Since its inception, Organization A operated through contributions from donors. In or about June 1998, Person A set up Organization A in Washington, D.C. Thereafter, GRILES took an active interest in Organization A and began assisting Person A in raising funds to support Organization A until GRILES was confirmed as DOT Deputy Secretary. From sometime in 1998, and continuing through early or mid 2003, GRILES had a personal and, at times, romantic relationship with Person A. GRILES and Person A remained close friends for some time after their romantic relationship ended.
Federici was apparently very successful at making friends. A January 2000 invitation-only reception for outgoing GOP Chair Haley Barbour was hosted by CREA on the Hill, and subsequent Chair Jim Nicholson co-hosted a party with CREA for Gale Norton in March, 2001. At the 2000 Republican Convention in Boston, CREA co-sponsored an event with Massachusetts governor Paul Cellucci. CREA was invited to many US government sponsored environmental conferences, as well as some international ones. Federici gave numerous talks and even had a paper published in the Ripon Society's quarterly magazine. DC's most influential Republican socialite, Julie Finley, sat on the board and hosted monthly dinner parties for the organization. The Legal Time's article cited above indicates that Federici was willed $10,000 by Margaret Alexander Parker, the GOP's uber-fundraiser who died last November from leukemia at age 48. Federici may currently be too great a political liability for Republican moneymen (and women) nowadays, but this obviously wasn't always the case.
But the GOP should be afraid, very afraid, should Federici turn state's evidence. Much more than her old boyfriend, Griles, Federici has the potential to bring down many more with her. Julie Finley, a former member of CREA'S board of directors and hostess of many dinners between Interior officials and business leaders with interests in the Department, is currently the United States Ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, a job she received, ironically, just as the CREA-Norquist parts of the Abramoff scandal were breaking, conveniently getting Finley out of town. However, Finley's previous resume is chock-full of uber-insider GOP goodies: Founding member of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, the WISH List (Women in the Senate and House), the U.S. Committee on NATO, Chair of the Project on Transitional Democracies, Steeing committee for the Republican Leadership Council, and according to her official government bio, served "as DC Republican Party Chairman from 1992 through 2000 and as DC Republican National Committeewoman from 2000 through 2004. She has also served in a number of capacities on the Republican National Committee", including as co-chair of the Republican National Committee's major fundraising arm, Team 100.
Even potentially more damaging, however, is Federici's long-standing personal and professional relationship with Grover Norquist. Norquist was one of CREA's initial founders back in 1997, and helped moved Federici to Washington. CREAs official office was for some time located within Norquist's own ATF offices, and Federici used Norquist's home address as her own in contributions reported to the FEC. It was Federici's friendship with Norquist which got her hooked up with Abramoff in 2001. With all the indications that Norquist actively participated in Abramoff's influence and access-peddling schemes, he has much to worry should Federici sing. Frankly, I'm surprised he's not personally footing her attorney bills, forcing her instead to turn to the Public Defender's Office.
Then there's Federici's connections with Barbor and Nicholson, as well as numerous Republican Congressmen who actively supported CREA's activities. Should unredacted Abramoff emails ever be released, the names of those Congressmen will be made public.
(As an aside, with Federici now being named at a target by DoJ for tax purposes, co-Abramoff-money-launderer Amy Ridenour should be sweating bullets.)
It is a mistake to underestimate the importance of the DoJ's investigation of Italia Federici. The question we should all be asking ourselves, will the caged bird sing?
You can read much, much more on Federici at my home site, where I've been following this subject in detail since 2004.