In June
1996, Forbes magazine reported that the Democratic National Committee
was using overnight stays at the White House as a perk to entice wealthy donors
to make six-figure contributions to the party. For a contribution of $130,000,
“you can spend the night in Abraham Lincoln’s bed,” ABC News’s David Brinkley,
picking up on the Forbes item, said on This Week With David Brinkley, the
Sunday-morning television show. “But be warned. I am told Lincoln’s bed is hard
and lumpy.”
“This has become an urban myth,
like the alligators in the sewers of New York,” Amy Weiss Tobe, the DNC’s press
secretary, told the Center for Public Integrity. “It is just not true.”
There’s nothing unusual, of
course, about politicians and political parties “servicing” their donors and
fund-raisers. In the summer of 1995, the DNC—in a letter signed by the party’s
co-chairmen, Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut and Donald Fowler, and first
disclosed by the Chicago Sun Times —offered potential supporters a “menu” of
rewards. A contribution of $100,000 or more, for example, would get a donor two
meals with President Clinton, two meals with Vice President Albert Gore Jr., a
slot on a foreign trade mission with DNC leaders, and other benefits, such as a
daily fax report and an assigned DNC staff member to assist with their
“personal requests.”
Fowler responded to charges
that the party and the President were selling access and influence to
contributors by saying that such fundraising efforts would continue until the law
requires both parties to operate differently. “Until the system is changed, we
will not unilaterally disarm,” Fowler reportedly said, accurately reflecting
the fact that every party and administration have given special treatment to
its biggest supporters. A Democratic lobbyist familiar with perks for
contributors told National Journal that spending the night at the White House
was like having access to “the best candy store in town.”
The
Center for Public Integrity has determined that, since 1993, more than 75
Democratic contributors and fundraisers have spent the night in the White House—mostly
in the Lincoln or Queen’s Bedrooms—as guests of President and Mrs. Clinton. When
guests spend the night in the Lincoln or the Queen’s Bedroom, they receive
five-star treatment. At night, the beds are turned down and breakfast menus placed
on the beds. Guests may choose where they would like to eat breakfast— possibly
in the solarium or the sitting room next to the Lincoln Bedroom—and which
newspapers they would like to read in the morning. Most guests receive a pass
to roam the White House’s residential quarters. Almost every guest with whom
the Center for Public Integrity spoke said that spending the night in the White
House was an honor.
It is important to note that
not all of the overnight guests at the White House are contributors or
fund-raisers. Ann Lewis, the Clinton campaign’s deputy manager and director of
communications, sent a letter to Brinkley in which she pointed out that many
others have slept in the Lincoln Bedroom, including “the cook from Clinton’s
old governor’s mansion in Little Rock, a theology student with his wife and two
children, and an old friend who is not well, and the president’s pastor and his
wife, and none of them paid as much as a dime,” Brinkley said on the following
week’s program. Other overnight guests have included former President George
Bush; former President and Mrs. Jimmy Carter; Leah Rabin, the widow of Yitzak Rabin,
the late Israeli Prime Minister; former Texas Governor Ann Richards; and Lee
Iacocca, the former chairman and chief executive officer of Chrysler Corporation.
The
Democratic fat cats who’ve spent the night at the White House include Steven
Grossman, the president of Massachusetts Envelope Company, and his wife,
Barbara. They attended a state dinner for the president of Brazil in April 1995
and, later that evening, retired to the historic Queen’s Bedroom. Steven
Grossman told the Center that it was “a memorable evening” and that he was
“honored” to have been invited to the White House. When asked what he thought
about David Brinkley’s report on sleepovers at the White House for substantial
contributions to the Democratic Party, Grossman replied, “I have no comment.”
The Grossmans have contributed
at least $400,000 to the Democratic Party and to Clinton since 1991. In 1994,
Clinton appointed Barbara Grossman, who is a professor of theater at Tufts
University, to the National Council for the Arts. Steven Grossman is the
president of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and has been a
managing trustee of the DNC. Grossman, a former chairman of the Massachusetts Democratic
Party, told the Center for Public Integrity that he has “a working relationship”
with President Clinton that goes back many years.
Another Democratic contributor whom
President Clinton invited to spend the night at the White House was Lew
Wasserman, the former chairman of MCA Inc., an entertainment conglomerate.
Although Wasserman has spent the night in the White House at the invitation of
various presidents, his clout within the Democratic Party has given him special
access to Democratic presidents.
In the late 1970s, the late
John White, then the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, informed Wasserman
that the Democratic Party might have to vacate its Washington headquarters
because of a financial short-fall brought on by the multimillion-dollar debt
from the 1968 presidential campaign. Wasserman proceeded to take out his
checkbook and write a substantial check that kept the DNC offices open, White
told the Center in a 1993 interview.
What did Wasserman seek in
return? Not anything, really, White told the Center. But there was one
occasion, he recalled, when Wasserman was coming to Washington and couldn’t
find a hotel room. He called White, who telephoned the owner of Washington’s
expensive Madison Hotel, imploring him to accommodate Mr. Wasserman.
Unfortunately, no room was available. White smiled proudly and recalled that he
finally found overnight lodging for the wealthy Hollywood mogul—at the White
House, in the Lincoln Bedroom. This favor for Wasserman, White said, was “just
a small thing.”
Wasserman and his wife, Edie,
have spent the night in the Lincoln Bedroom at least twice during the Clinton
presidency and have contributed at least $450,000 to Clinton and the Democratic
Party since 1991. He has also contributed to Clinton’s Legal Expense Trust,
established by the President and Mrs. Clinton to help pay for their mounting
legal bills from the Whitewater investigation and the Paula Jones sexual
harassment lawsuit. In 1992, Wasserman invited 100 of his friends to attend a
fund-raiser for Clinton and the Democratic Party sponsored by the Hollywood
Women’s Political Committee. The minimum price of admission: $5,000. In June
1996, Wasserman hosted a fund-raiser that raised more than $1 million for the Democratic
Party. Over the years, Wasserman has contributed more than $1 million to the
Democrats. He declined the Center’s request for an interview.
Here is a partial list of
Democratic contributors and fund-raisers who have spent the night at the
Clinton White House since 1993.
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TRUMAN
AND ANITA ARNOLD
Truman
Arnold is the chairman and chief executive officer of Truman Arnold Companies,
a wholesale petroleum distributor in Texarkana, Texas. Arnold, the founder and
former owner of the Roadrunner convenience store chain, also has construction,
banking, and cattle interests. He was the Democratic National Committee’s
finance chairman for five months in 1995. He was the chairman of the 1992
Clinton-Gore campaign in Texas and headed the campaign’s 1992 energy advisory
committee. In 1995, Clinton spent the night at their home in California, and in
1996, the Arnolds were guests at a state dinner for French President Jacques
Chirac hosted by the Clintons. Truman Arnold Companies frequently provided air transportation
for Clinton when he was governor of Arkansas. Truman Arnold did not respond to
the Center’s inquiries.
JERRY
AND STEPHANIE ATCHLEY
Jerry
Atchley is the president and chief executive officer of Southern Skies, an
Arkansas-based broadcasting company that owns several radio stations, including
KSSN (FM) in Little Rock. Atchley declined to be interviewed.
DICK
AND ANDREA BATCHELOR
Dick Batchelor is a former
Florida state representative. In 1991, he organized the first fund-raising
event in Florida for Clinton’s presidential campaign. According to Batchelor,
the event raised only $8,000. “I was there early on and did their first
fund-raiser when nobody knew who Clinton was,” he told the Center for Public
Integrity. “I got people to come because they owed me something or I owed them
something. I told them to come because he [Clinton] is a good man.”
In 1993, the Orange County Commission
hired Batchelor to lobby the federal government for a slice of the federal
transportation pie. News accounts at the time suggested that Batchelor had been
hired at least partly because of his connections to the Clinton Administration.
In 1994, Clinton appointed Batchelor to a U.S. delegation that witnessed the elections
in South Africa.
In October 1993, Batchelor and
his wife spent their 10th anniversary in the Queen’s Bedroom. “There was the reception
that they [the Clintons] customarily have for their friends,” he said. “Jody
Powell and Larry King were there, and we watched [the movie] Rudy.”
ALLEN BIRD
Allen
Bird is a senior partner at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock, Arkansas, where
Hillary Rodham Clinton was a partner. In the 1970s, Bird worked as a statehouse
lobbyist for then-Governor Clinton. After Clinton’s election, Bird moved to the
nation’s capital to open a Washington office for the Rose Law Firm. In November
1994, the office was closed and he returned to Arkansas. Bird told the Center
for Public Integrity that he didn’t want to talk about his overnight stay at
the White House because it was “personal business.”
CURT
AND CHARLOTTE BRADBURY
Curt
Bradbury, a former president and chief executive officer of Little Rock-based
Worthen National Bank, is the chief operating officer of Stephens Inc., one of
the nation’s largest investment banking firms. He is presently a member of the
State Board of Higher Education in Arkansas, and in 1994 Clinton appointed him
to the President’s Committee on Arts and the Humanities. During the 1992
presidential campaign, Bradbury was a member of the Clinton Gore Arkansas
Finance Council. In 1992, while Bradbury was still with Worthen National Bank,
the bank extended a $3.5 million line of credit to Clinton’s presidential
campaign. “I would like to be in a position to think I could call the President
of the United States and give him my views,” Bradbury told the Arkansas Times in
1992. After Clinton’s election, Bradbury was invited to join the American Banking
Association’s board of directors.
Bradbury said that he and his
wife, Charlotte, will never forget spending the night in the Lincoln Bedroom in
1993. “There is a handwritten Gettysburg address [in the Lincoln Bedroom], so
it’s like being in a museum,” he told the Center for Public Integrity. “The
night JFK was shot, his brother Bobby spent the night there. They say you could
hear him weeping. If you don’t feel like you’re absorbing history, you’re
missing the point.”
PHILLIP
AND DIANE CARROLL
Phillip
Carroll is a senior partner at the Rose Law Firm. He and his wife, Diane,
stayed in the Lincoln Bedroom the night after White House associate counsel
Vince Foster, a former partner in the Rose Law Firm, committed suicide. In a
letter to the Center for Public Integrity, Carroll wrote: “My wife and I flew
to Washington, D.C., on July 21, 1993, to be with our dear friend, Lisa Foster,
and her children. We left home on short notice and originally intended to fly
back home that evening or to spend the night with our daughter, who lives in
Washington D.C. ... After spending several hours at Lisa’s home, we returned
to the White House and were escorted to the Lincoln Bedroom, where we spent the
night.”
CHEVY CHASE
Chevy
Chase, an actor who has been one of Clinton’s biggest supporters in Hollywood,
co-sponsored a $1,000-a plate fund-raiser for Clinton in 1992 with actor
Richard Dreyfuss, producer Jon Peters, and playwright Neil Simon. Chase has
performed at several fundraisers to benefit the Democratic Party, including one
in Little Rock in 1992 that raised $3 million. In 1994, Chase performed at
another Democratic fund-raiser, in Washington, D.C., and left with President
Clinton after the event. Chase did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
MIKE CONWAY
Mike
Conway is a partner in the Chicago-based law firm of Hopkins and Sutter. He was
a classmate of the Clintons at Yale Law School. In 1992, Conway was the
chairman of Lawyers for Clinton. In June 1996, Conway was a guest at a state
dinner for Irish President Mary Robinson. “I have known the Clintons for 24
years—I’m their friend,” Conway told the Center for Public Integrity in
explaining why he wouldn’t answer questions about his overnight stay at the
White House.
MICHAEL
AND BETH COULSON
Michael
Coulson is the president of Coulson Oil Company in Little Rock. In 1988,
Coulson’s wife, Beth, was appointed to the Arkansas Court of Appeals. Critics
of the appointment, according to the Dallas Morning News, charged that she had
little experience for the job and got it only because of her husband’s close
ties to Clinton. Michael Coulson has contributed to the Presidential Legal Expense
Trust, which the Clintons established to help pay their mounting legal bills
from the Whitewater investigation and the Paula Jones sexual harassment lawsuit.
Michael Coulson did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
H.
TYNDALL AND CARRIE DICKINSON
Tyndall
Dickinson is the president of McGeorge Contracting Company in Sweet Home,
Arkansas. He has contributed to Clinton’s Legal Expense Trust.
RICHARD DREYFUSS
Richard
Dreyfuss is an actor whose interest in politics is so keen that he has his own
“personal political adviser,” according to The Washington Post. The “adviser,”
Donna Bojarsky, has scheduled meetings for Dreyfuss with Presidents and prime
ministers. In 1992, Dreyfuss gave stump speeches on Clinton’s first campaign
bus trip and cosponsored a $1,000-a-plate fund-raiser for Clinton with actor
Chevy Chase, producer Jon Peters, and playwright Neil Simon. Dreyfuss spent a
night in the Lincoln Bedroom in April 1996 and had an early-morning chat with
Clinton, who woke him at 7:20 a.m. to talk politics, according to The
Washington Post. “They let you call anywhere,” Dreyfuss told a reporter for
Time magazine, “so I called my kids from the Lincoln Bedroom.”
PATRICIA DUFF
Patricia
Duff and her former husband, Mike Medavoy, were early Clinton supporters and
helped to introduce Clinton to Hollywood by hosting fundraisers. In 1992,
Clinton was a guest at their Coldwater Canyon home on one of his early trips to
California as a presidential candidate. Duff is a member of the Hollywood
Women’s Political Committee and the founder of Show Coalition. Both
organizations are credited with giving Clinton a broader audience of supporters
in Hollywood. Clinton made four trips to Los Angeles at the coalition’s
invitation. Duff is also heading Women Vote!, a get-out-the vote drive that’s
affiliated with EMILY’s List, a political action committee dedicated to helping
more women win elections. In 1995, Duff and her husband, Ron Perelman, the billionaire cosmetics magnate,
hosted a $1 million event for Clinton in Palm Beach, Florida. They also hosted
an exclusive meeting for potential big-ticket contributors with Leon Panetta,
the White House chief of staff. Duff did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
DAVE
AND MARGARET ELDRIDGE
Dave
and Margaret Eldridge have their own consulting firm, Eldridge & Eldridge,
in Little Rock. Dave Eldridge is a former vice president of Arkansas Power
& Light Company; Margaret Eldridge is a former vice president of Twin City
Bank in Arkansas. She has contributed to Clinton’s Legal Expense Trust.
Margaret Eldridge told the Center for Public Integrity that she and her husband
stayed in the Lincoln Bedroom at the invitation of Hillary Rodham Clinton,
adding that they were invited because they are “family friends.” They have
given only modest contributions to the Democrats, she said.
RICHARD FRIEDMAN
Richard
Friedman is a wealthy Boston-based real estate developer. He owns restaurants,
hotels, and shopping centers, as well as a 20-acre estate on Martha’s Vineyard
where the Clintons vacationed for two summers. Friedman has since taken to
calling his home the “Clinton Cottage.” By all accounts, Friedman is a colorful
multimillionaire who gravitates toward the rich and famous. “I love people who
have a tremendous amount of creative energy— whether they are in Hollywood,
business, or the White House,” Friedman told the Boston Business Journal, “Highly
successful people excite me.”
Friedman has hobnobbed with Barbra
Streisand on the ski slopes of Aspen, Colorado, and dined with Mike Medavoy,
the former chief executive officer of Tri-Star Pictures. Both Streisand and
Medavoy have been overnight guests at the White House. In December 1995,
Friedman joined other Democratic insiders in the White House for dinner and a
movie with the President. After dinner, the guests made their way to the theater in the
east wing of the White House for a private screening of Nixon, Oliver Stone’s
three-and-a half-hour epic. Friedman bowed out of the movie, according to a guest
that evening, to spend more time in the Lincoln Bedroom. Friedman did not respond
to the Center’s inquiries.
DAVID GEFFEN
David
Geffen, the co-founder of DreamWorks SKG, is considered a key fund-raising
strategist in Hollywood for Clinton’s re-election campaign. He has hosted
several fund-raisers for Clinton: one, with DreamWorks SKG partners Steven
Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg, raised $2 million in 1995; another two in
Geffen got “a perk any
Washington lobbyist would die for: phone chats with White House chief of staff
Mack McLarty.” He told Time magazine: “I have no active involvement in trying
to influence legislation of any kind.” He attended a state dinner for Russian President
Boris Yeltsin in 1994. Geffen
did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
Top
Secret
The
names of overnight guests at the Clinton White House are a closely guarded
secret.
“This is their [the First
Family’s] home, and they have guests visit them all the time,” Neel Lattimore,
Mrs. Clinton’s press secretary, told the Center for Public Integrity. “Mrs. Clinton
and Chelsea have friends that spend the night, but these names are not
available to the public.”
Friends of Mrs. Clinton and
Chelsea, however, aren’t the only guests who spend the night at the White
House. The Center for Public Integrity determined that many Democratic contributors
and fund-raisers have been invited to spend the night at the White House. Over
the past few months, the Center asked White House officials for a list of all
guests who have stayed overnight at the White House at the invitation of President
and Mrs. Clinton, but they repeatedly side-stepped all inquiries, referring the
Center to other offices.
The Center asked George
Stephanopoulos, a senior adviser to President Clinton, whether he knew of
Democratic contributors who had been invited to stay in the Lincoln Bedroom. “I
don’t know anything about that,” Stephanopoulos said, directing the Center to
the White House Social Secretary’s office.
“I don’t think there is a list
like that,” Heather Raiden of the Social Secretary’s office told the Center.
“No one in the White House will release that kind of information about guests
anyway. I think it’s for security reasons.”
The Center for Public Integrity
sent Freedom of Information Act requests to the counsel to the President and to
the Secret Service. “The Office of the President, including the President’s
immediate personal staff and units within the Executive Office whose sole
function is to advise and assist the President, is not an ‘agency’ for purposes
of FOIA,” Marvin Krislov, an associate counsel to the President, replied in a
letter. “Consequently, FOIA does not establish a statutory right to the
documents that you have requested from the Office of the President, if such documents
exist.”
The Center sent a follow-up
letter to Krislov, pointing out that the White House could voluntarily provide
the documents even if FOIA did not apply. He did not reply to the letter, nor
did he return subsequent telephone calls from the Center. Krislov resigned from
the White House on March 31, 1996, to become the Labor Department’s deputy
solicitor for national operations. John Simpson, the Secret Service’s Freedom
of Information and Privacy Acts Officer, said that the Secret Service doesn’t “have
a list like that and we wouldn’t break it down like that ... who stayed in
what rooms and who stayed overnight.”
The Center determined that the
Office of the Usher at the White House is the custodian of records that include
overnight guests. “These records are for private use by the First Family,” said
Dennis Freemyer, an assistant usher who has worked in the White House for four
administrations. “They have always been used that way for every President, and
we do not divulge information to the public or press about these records.”
The usher’s logbook records the
movements of the President, First Lady, and others in the family quarters at
the White House, including the hour the President gets up in the morning, eats
dinner at night, who visits the residential quarters, and which rooms guests
stay in. Such logbooks have been maintained for more than 100 years and reflect
the comings and goings in the residential quarters of the White House. At the
end of a presidential term, when the First Family leaves the White House, the
logbooks are presented to the First Lady.
As White House records go, the
usher’s logbooks are clearly one of the best-kept secrets. “I worked in the
Carter Library for ten years before I came to work on the Bush project, and I can
tell you I have never heard of these records and I have never seen them,” David
Alsobrook, the acting director of the Bush Presidential Materials Project, told
the Center. Nor have the archivists working with presidential papers at the
National Archives and at the Reagan and Carter libraries heard of them.
The reason that archivists, and
many other experts the Center talked to, have never heard of the logbooks is
that Presidents have typically categorized them as personal records. The
Presidential Records Act of 1978 draws a distinction between “Presidential
records” and “personal records,” noting that the government “shall reserve and
retain complete ownership, possession, and control of the Presidential
records.”
The law defines personal
records as “all documentary materials ... of a purely private or nonpublic
character which do not relate to or have an effect upon the carrying out of the
constitutional, statutory, or other official or ceremonial duties of the
President.”
Who
decides which records are “Presidential” and which are “personal”? The
President. “The act says that the incumbent president and his staff decide what
are personal records and what are presidential records,” Nancy Smith, an
archivist at the National Archives, said. The applicable portion of the law
reads as follows: “Documentary materials produced or received by the President,
his staff, or units or individuals in the Executive Office of the President ... shall, to the extent practicable, be categorized as Presidential records or
personal records upon their creation or receipt and be filed separately.”
The line between personal
activities and “constitutional, statutory, or other official or ceremonial
duties of the President” seems to be blurry since government officials and foreign
dignitaries, to name a few, often visit the President on official business in
the First Family’s residential quarters.
Although President Lyndon B.
Johnson donated his logbooks to the LBJ Library in Austin, Texas, the records
were considered to be part of Johnson’s most confidential papers and only
became open to the public in 1993.
In 1974, Patricia Nixon did
away with the logbooks because she felt that they “were too personal—what time
they get up, what they eat for breakfast, the names of their friends coming in,”
according to a 1974 column in The Washington Post.
JOSEPH GELLER
Joseph
Geller is a partner in Geller, Geller & Garfinkel, a law firm in Dania, Florida,
and the chairman of the Dade County Democratic Party. Geller did not respond to
the Center’s inquiries.
GORDON GIFFIN
Gordon
Giffin, a lawyer with Long, Aldridge & Norman, an Atlanta-based firm, ran
Clinton’s Georgia campaign in 1992. He was also the personnel director of
Clinton’s transition team. When Erskine Bowles resigned as White House deputy
chief of staff in 1995, Giffin’s name surfaced as a possible replacement. He
was the finance chairman of the Georgia Democratic Party. In 1993, Clinton appointed
Giffin to the board of directors of the Overseas Private Investment
Corporation. Giffin did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
GARY DAVID GOLDBERG
AND DIANA MEEHAN
Gary
David Goldberg, a television producer, and his wife, Diana Meehan, a writer,
have been active Clinton supporters. In December 1992, Meehan hosted a women’s
economic summit at their house, and the 50 attendees drafted a platform that
they submitted to Clinton’s pre-inaugural economic conference. Goldberg insists
that Hollywood has no influence over, or special access to, Clinton: “We’re not
there making health care policy,” he told ABC News’s Nightline in May 1993.
Earlier in the year, Goldberg and other celebrities met privately with the
President to discuss a strategy for selling Clinton’s health care reform plan.
The Center was unable to contact Goldberg or Meehan.
BRIAN
AND MYRA GREENSPUN
Brian
Greenspun is the editor and president of the Las Vegas Sun. He was Clinton’s
college roommate. Greenspun has been instrumental in introducing Clinton to Las
Vegas contributors, and in 1996 Clinton attended a $25,000-a-couple luncheon
that Greenspun hosted in his Las Vegas home. According to The Houston Chronicle,
a number of gambling industry executives attended the luncheon, including
Stephen Wynn, the chairman of Mirage Resorts Inc. In 1993, Clinton appointed
Greenspun to the White House Conference on Small Business. Greenspun did not
respond to the Center’s inquiries.
MARK
AND LIBBY GROBMYER
Mark
Grobmyer, a godson of the late Jackson Stephens, was a member of the Clinton-Gore
Arkansas Finance Council during the 1992 presidential election. Grobmyer, a
lawyer with Arnold Grobmyer & Haley, often does work for Stephens Inc. He
was a law student at the University of Arkansas while Clinton was teaching
there. A longtime friend of Albert and Tipper Gore, he introduced Clinton to
Gore in 1988. Mark Grobmyer did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
STEVEN
AND BARBARA GROSSMAN
Steven
Grossman, the president of Massachusetts Envelope Company, and his wife,
Barbara, are big contributors to the Democratic Party. (See above.)
TOM HANKS
Tom
Hanks, the actor, hosted a fundraiser at the Century Plaza Hotel in West Los
Angeles in 1995 that raised more than $1 million for Clinton. Hanks spent the
night in the White House after a screening of Apollo 13. The next morning,
Hanks and Clinton had breakfast together before the President presented the
Congressional Medal of Honor to James Lovell, the commander of the ill-fated
Apollo 13 mission, whom Hanks portrayed in the movie. Later in the day, in
speeches at the National Press Club, Lovell and Hanks denounced plans to cut
NASA’s budget. Hanks did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
BOB AND
REBECCA HERNREICH
Bob
and Rebecca Hernreich of Fort Smith, Arkansas, and Vail, Colorado, are longtime
supporters of Clinton. Bob Hernreich is a former owner of Sigma Broadcasting
Corporation, which had two television stations in Arkansas. He also has real
estate and health care interests. The Hernreich family has given Clinton more
than $40,000 since 1981 and are among his top ten career patrons, according to The
Buying of the President. Bob Hernreich did not respond to the Center’s
inquiries.
FRANK KUMPURIS
Frank
Kumpuris, a retired surgeon in Little Rock, met Clinton in 1982 when he became
involved in Clinton’s third gubernatorial campaign. Clinton later appointed
Kumpuris to be a trustee of the University of Arkansas Board. Kumpuris did not
respond to the Center’s inquiries.
M. LARRY
AND SHELIA LAWRENCE
M.
Larry Lawrence, who died in January of this year, was a wealthy real estate developer
whose properties included the Hotel del Coronado in San Diego. Over his
lifetime, Lawrence contributed at least $10 million to Democrats, according to The
New York Times. In 1994, the Federal Election Commission fined Lawrence $7,179
for excessive yearly campaign contributions. In 1992, Lawrence served on
Clinton’s national finance board, and his wife, Shelia, headed the Clinton-Gore
campaign in southern California. In 1994, Lawrence was sworn in as ambassador
to Switzerland and his wife as special envoy to the World Conservation Union in
Geneva, Switzerland. She resigned from the post in November 1994. Larry Lawrence’s
confirmation was held up in the Senate for more than two months while
Republican critics and the 11,000 member American Foreign Service Association
questioned his credentials for the position, arguing that he’d been chosen only
because he was a big Democratic contributor. President Clinton spent his first
vacation in office at the Lawrences’ mansion in Coronado, California. Shelia
Lawrence did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
JAMES
AND MARCIA LYONS
James
Lyons, a lawyer with the Denver-based firm of Rothgerber Appel Powers &
Johnson, has been a longtime confidant of Bill Clinton. When the Whitewater
deal surfaced as a potential campaign issue in 1992, Clinton asked Lyons to
write a report about the deal in an effort to dampen the news media’s interest
in the subject. Lyons’s report said that the Clintons had lost $59,000 on the
Whitewater venture. In October 1993, Clinton named Lyons to be the U.S.
Observer to the International Fund for Ireland, an unpaid post that allows Lyons
to continue practicing law in Denver. Lyons did not respond to the Center’s
inquiries.
DAVID MATTER
David
Matter and Clinton were classmates at Georgetown University, where Matter
managed Clinton’s unsuccessful 1968 campaign to be senior class president.
Matter is the chief operating officer and president of Oxford Development Company,
a Pittsburgh-based real estate leasing company. He managed Clinton’s 1992
campaign in western Pennsylvania and headed the primary campaign in 1996. The
Center was unable to contact Matter.
RICHARD
AND JENNIFER MAYS
Richard
Mays runs Mays Law Firm in Little Rock, Arkansas. In 1980, Clinton appointed
him to fill a vacancy on the Arkansas Supreme Court, and in 1991, Clinton
appointed him to the state Ethics Commission. Mays was a key fund-raiser in
Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign and organized an event “for the black
community in Washington, D.C., that brought in more than $500,000,” according
to Arkansas Business. Mays did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
MIKE MEDAVOY
Mike
Medavoy, a Hollywood executive who left Tri-Star Pictures in 1994 to form his
own production company, and his former wife, Patricia Duff, were early supporters
of Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign. Medavoy and Duff helped to introduce
Clinton to Hollywood by hosting fund-raisers for him. Clinton was a guest at
their Coldwater Canyon home on one of his early trips to California as a
presidential candidate. Clinton paid tribute to Medavoy at a 1992 motion
picture awards dinner. Medavoy did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
H.
MAURICE AND ELIZABETH MITCHELL
H.
Maurice Mitchell is a former law partner of Jim Guy Tucker, who resigned as
governor of Arkansas following his conviction on May 28, 1996, in a Whitewater-related
loan case. He was a member of the Clinton-Gore Arkansas Finance Council in 1992
and is on the Clinton-Gore National Finance Board for the 1996 re-election
effort. In June 1995, Mitchell was the chairman of a luncheon at the Excelsior
Hotel in Little Rock that raised more than $1 million for Clinton’s re-election
effort. Mitchell did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
PETER
AND EILEEN NORTON
Peter
Norton, the successful computer entrepreneur who created Norton Utilities, is a
big Democratic contributor. Norton has retired from the computer industry and
now devotes his time to his family and the Norton Family Foundation, a
philanthropy that supports cultural and humanitarian projects. Eileen Norton is
on the board of the Children’s Defense Fund; Hillary Rodham Clinton is a former
director of the organization. In June 1994, Mrs. Clinton visited the Nortons at
their home in Santa Monica, California. The Center was unable to contact the Nortons.
MERLE
AND DELORIS PETERSON
Merle
Peterson is a former state senator from Arkansas whom Clinton appointed in 1985
to the Arkansas Development and Finance Authority (he retired in 1995). In
1992, he was a fundraiser for a $100-a-seat event for Clinton. He has also
contributed to Clinton’s Legal Expense Trust. In an interview, Peterson
recounted telling Clinton that “all I wanted out of the campaign was dinner at
the White House.”
In November 1993, Peterson and
his wife were staying in a hotel in Washington when a White House aide called
them and invited them to come to the White House for dinner and to spend the
night in the Lincoln Bedroom, Peterson told the Center. When asked about David
Brinkley’s on-air remarks about the Lincoln Bedroom, Peterson replied, “That’s
the lousiest statement I’ve ever heard.” Peterson said that should he be
invited to spend a night in the Lincoln Bedroom again, he would decline the
offer because “it is not that much fun.” The Lincoln Bedroom, he added, “is not
your uptown hotel room,” and because the bed is four feet off the floor, “you
have to jump to get into bed.”
WILLIAM
AND CAROLYN RAINER
William
Rainer, a co-founder of Greenwich Capital Markets, a bond-trading company, was
one of Clinton’s key supporters on Wall Street during the 1992 campaign. After
a lifetime of supporting Republicans, Rainer, a fellow Arkansan, switched
allegiance from President Bush to Clinton because, he told Investor’s Business
Daily at the time, he had “great confidence in Clinton’s leadership.” Rainer
and his company each loaned the Clinton-Gore Inaugural Committee $100,000. In
1994, Clinton appointed Rainer to be the chairman of the U.S. Enrichment
Corporation, which oversees the Energy Department’s procurement of uranium.
Rainer did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
SKIP
AND BILLIE RUTHERFORD
Skip
Rutherford is a paid Clinton campaign adviser with Cranford Johnson Robinson
Wood, a Little Rock-based public relations firm that is working on a number of
campaign-related activities, including Whitewater damage control. In 1993,
Rutherford was invited to a surprise costume party for Hillary Rodham Clinton
and was among a number of overnight guests that evening at the White House,
Rutherford told the Center. Rutherford was an assistant campaign manager of the
1992 Clinton Gore campaign, chairman of the Arkansas Democratic Party in 1989,
and the vice president for public and governmental affairs at Arkla Inc. when Thomas
F. (Mack) McLarty, Clinton’s former chief of staff, was its chairman and chief
executive officer. As a member of the Clinton-Gore Arkansas Finance Council,
Rutherford was instrumental in raising money for the 1992 campaign. In June
1995, Rutherford helped to coordinate a fund-raiser that brought in more than
$1 million for the Democrats.
STANLEY
AND BETTY SHEINBAUM
Stanley
Sheinbaum, an economist by training, is a liberal political activist and prominent
Democratic fund-raiser. He is a former University of California regent and
president of the Los Angeles Police Commission. Sheinbaum declined to be interviewed
for this project. (Sheinbaum hosted a reception for the Center for Public
Integrity on March 4, 1996, after a panel at UCLA.)
SIDNEY AND LORRAINE SHEINBERG
Sidney
Sheinberg, a former president of MCA Inc., is a co-founder of The Bubble
Factory, a Los Angeles-based motion-picture production company. Sheinberg is a
longtime Democratic contributor. In 1996, he attended a gathering of Hollywood
executives, who have collectively contributed millions of dollars to the
Democrats over the years, at David Geffen’s Malibu home, where Clinton was the
guest of honor. Sheinberg did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
W.
MAURICE SMITH
W.
Maurice Smith is the former chairman of the Bank of Cherry Valley, a tiny institution
in northeastern Arkansas that from 1983 to 1988 may have made more than
$400,000 in unsecured personal loans to then-Governor Clinton. These loans
surfaced during the Whitewater investigation because of allegations that they
were paid off by James and Susan McDougal, the Clintons’ partners in the Whitewater
venture, and others who may have received favors from the governor, according
to the Christian Science Monitor. Smith was a top gubernatorial aide to Clinton
and the director of the State Highway Department during the last five years of
Clinton’s governorship. In 1982, when Clinton was running for governor, Smith
helped him to raise $1 million. Smith has also contributed to Clinton’s Legal
Expense Trust. The Center was unable to contact Smith.
ROY AND MARY COURI SPENCE
Roy
Spence is the co-founder and president of GSD&M, an advertising and public
relations firm based in Austin, Texas, that has been a paid consultant to
Clinton’s advertising team. Spence met Clinton when they were working on George
McGovern’s 1972 presidential campaign. He helped to prepare Clinton for his
speech to the 1992 Democratic National Convention and his 1995 State of the
Union address. Spence’s advice—to stay focused on “the heart of the heartland
and not the belt of the beltway”—is well-known around the White House,
according to The Dallas Morning News. Spence made a loan of less than $100,000
to the Clinton-Gore inaugural committee. He did not respond to the Center’s
inquiries.
STEVEN AND KATE CAPSHAW
SPIELBERG
Steven
Spielberg, a director, producer, and studio executive, and his wife, actress
Kate Capshaw, have been key Democratic Party fund-raisers and contributors. In
April 1995, they hosted a fund-raiser with Spielberg’s partners in DreamWorks
SKG, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg, that raised $2 million for the
Democratic Party. After the fundraiser, Clinton spent the night at Spielberg’s
home in Pacific Palisades, California. Spielberg did not respond to the
Center’s inquiries.
CHARLES
AND BARBARA STACK
Charles
Stack, a partner in the Coral Gables (Florida)-based law firm of High, Stack,
Lazenby, Palahach & del Amo, raised more than $7 million for Clinton’s 1992
presidential campaign, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. In 1994, Stack hosted
a dinner for the Democratic Party that raised $3.4 million. After Clinton became
President, he nominated Stack to a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
11th Circuit. But Republicans, led by Senator Robert Dole, now the GOP
presidential nominee, opposed Stack’s confirmation. Dole questioned Stack’s
qualifications for the job, accusing Clinton of choosing him only because he’d
raised “millions and millions of dollars” for the 1992 campaign. On April 22,
1996, Dole called on Clinton to withdraw the nomination. A little more than two
weeks later, Stack removed himself from consideration. Stack did not respond to
the Center’s inquiries.
MARY STEENBURGEN
[& Larry David & Alan Dershowitz]
Mary
Steenburgen, an actress, is a supporter and a longtime Clinton friend from
Arkansas. The Clintons and daughter Chelsea attended Steenburgen’s 1995 wedding
to actor Ted Danson. Steenburgen did not respond to the Center’s inquiries.
WARREN
AND HARRIET STEPHENS
Warren
and Harriet Stephens are part of one of the wealthiest families in the United
States. Warren Stephens is the chief executive officer of Stephens Inc., one of
the nation’s largest investment banking firms. Although the Stephens family
primarily votes for and contributes to Republicans, it gave considerable
support to Clinton when he was governor and during his first presidential
campaign. Some reports say that the family and its employees contributed more
than $100,000 to Clinton’s 1992 campaign. Stephens Inc. made a loan of more
than $100,000 to the Clinton-Gore Inaugural Committee. Nonetheless, Warren
Stephens told the Center that he would not support Clinton’s re-election. As
for his night in the Lincoln Bedroom, in 1993, he said: “It was really
special—a thrill. I don’t know exactly what gets you an invitation. I don’t
know why I got invited, but it was a damn nice honor.”
BARBRA STREISAND
Barbra
Streisand, the actress and singer, is a staunch Clinton supporter. Streisand
came out of semi-retirement as a singer in 1986 by hosting and performing at a
fund-raiser at her Malibu home to benefit the Hollywood Women’s Political
Committee, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and Democratic
candidates. The event raised $1.5 million. At another fund-raiser in September
1992, she sang a modified version of “It Had To Be You,” titled “It Has To Be
You,” that was dedicated to Clinton, according to the Seattle Times. After a
June 1996 fund-raiser at the home of Lew Wasserman, the former chairman of MCA
Inc., Clinton invited Streisand and some others back to his hotel, the Sheraton
Miramar in Santa Monica, to talk politics, according to USA Today. Streisand
has also contributed to Clinton’s Legal Expense Trust. Streisand did not
respond to the Center’s inquiries. (The Streisand Foundation has given a grant
to the Center.)
SUSAN THOMASES
Susan Thomases, a partner in
the New York City-based law firm of Willkie Farr and Gallagher, is one of
Hillary Rodham Clinton’s oldest friends and has been one of her closest
advisers. Thomases was to have run the Clinton reelection effort in New York,
but another prominent lawyer has filled that position. Thomases had a “special
access” pass to the White House until press scrutiny ended the practice in
1994. Employees of Willkie Farr and Gallagher’s gave a total of nearly $50,000
to Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign, according to The Buying of the President,
and Thomases and a colleague at the law firm each gave $1,000 to Clinton’s
Legal Expense Trust. Thomases has testified before the Senate Banking Committee
concerning the Whitewater affair. Thomases did not respond to the Center’s
inquiries.
HARRY THOMASON AND LINDA
BLOODWORTH-THOMASON
Harry
Thomason and Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, both television producers, introduced
Clinton to wealthy contributors in Hollywood in the 1992 presidential campaign.
The Thomasons are both from Arkansas and are close friends of the Clintons.
They were the first non-family members to spend the night in the Lincoln
Bedroom after Clinton became President. The Thomasons co-chaired Clinton’s
inaugural committee, and they had “special access” passes to the White House until
press scrutiny ended the practice in 1994. On April 25, 1996, Harry Thomason’s
lawyer said that the Justice Department had dropped its investigation of the
role played by Thomason in the White House travel office matter. The pair
produced “The Man From Hope,” a documentary about Clinton, for the 1992
Democratic National Convention. They are working on a documentary sequel for
the 1996 convention in Chicago, according to the Sacramento Bee. In 1993, the
Thomasons invited the Clintons to vacation in their leased oceanfront estate in
Summerland, California. The Center was unable to contact the Thomasons.
ALICE WALTON
AND JOHN AND CHRISTY WALTON
Alice
Walton and her brother John are part of the $23 billion Walton empire, based in
Arkansas, that includes Wal-Mart, a chain of discount stores. Alice Walton, the
president of Llama Company, a brokerage firm, and one of the wealthiest women
in the United States, held a major fund-raiser for Clinton in New York City a
week before the state’s presidential primary in 1992. John Walton has also
raised money for Clinton. Alice Walton did not respond to the Center’s
inquiries. The Center was unable to contact John Walton.
LEW AND EDIE WASSERMAN
Lew
Wasserman, the former chairman of MCA Inc., an entertainment conglomerate, has
raised more than $1 million for the Democrats over the years. (See above.)
CARL
AND MARGARET W HILLOCK
Carl
Whillock, a former state legislator and former president and chief executive
officer of the Arkansas Electric Cooperatives Corporation, was a vice president
of the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville when Clinton was a law professor
there. As David Maraniss describes it in his book, First In His Class, when
Clinton decided to run for Congress in 1974, Whillock was the first person he
told. Whillock proceeded to go through a file of names to put Clinton in touch
with “key contacts all across the Third Congressional District,” Maraniss
wrote. After Clinton was elected governor, he appointed Whillock to be the
chairman of his State Tax Reform Commission. Whillock told the Center for
Public Integrity that he and his wife stayed in the Lincoln Bedroom but haven’t
contributed very much money to the Democratic Party or to Clinton. “We are old
friends of the Clintons,” he said. “It was just awesome. When you walk in [to
the Lincoln Bedroom], you see the Gettysburg Address. Did you know that they
signed the Emancipation Proclamation in there?”
Christopher Adasiewicz and Meredith Milton contributed to this story.
Guest
|
Company
|
Contributions from Guest and Guest’s
Family
|
Contributions from Company
|
Contributions from Company Employees
|
Arnold
|
Truman Arnold Companies
|
24 750
|
135 950
|
2 750
|
Atchley
|
5 120
|
|||
Batchelor
|
Dick Batchelor Management
|
3 750
|
4 335
|
|
Bird
|
Rose Law Firm
|
1 830
|
12 750
|
|
Bradbury
|
Worthen Bank
|
16 000
|
16 501
|
11 900
|
Carroll
|
Rose Law Firm
|
1 250
|
12 750
|
|
Chase
|
55 250
|
|||
Conway
|
Hopkins and Sutter
|
3 900
|
2 100
|
|
Coulson
|
Coulson Oil Company
|
16 950
|
10 000
|
|
Dickinson
|
McGeorge Contracting Company
|
7 200
|
250
|
|
Dreyfuss
|
3 850
|
|||
Duff
|
6 000
|
|||
Eldridge
|
Eldridge & Eldridge
|
6 660
|
250
|
|
Friedman
|
2 420
|
|||
Geffen
|
DreamWorks SKG / Geffen Company
|
389 000
|
39 000 / 10 000
|
|
Geller
|
Geller Geller & Garfinkel
|
1 635
|
250
|
|
Giffin
|
Long Aldridge & Norman
|
1 250
|
5 950
|
|
Goldberg
|
60 750
|
|||
Greenspun
|
Greenspun Management
|
74 450
|
45 000
|
3 000
|
Grobmyer
|
Arnold Grobmyer & Haley
|
2 000
|
3 000
|
|
Grossman
|
437 240
|
|||
Hanks
|
5 250
|
|||
Hernreich
|
Sigma Properties
|
66 906
|
1 000
|
|
Kumpuris
|
5 500
|
|||
Lawrence
|
Coronado Properties
|
8 780
|
75 500
|
15 000
|
Lyons
|
Rothgerber Appel Powers & Johnson
|
6 750
|
2 200
|
|
Matter
|
Oxford Development Company
|
5 000
|
8 250
|
|
Mays
|
Mays & Crutcher
|
30 400
|
15 000
|
11 000
|
Medavoy
|
Tri-Star Pictures
|
6 000
|
3 500
|
|
Mitchell
|
Mitchell, Williams, Selig, Gates & Woodyard
|
14 875
|
18 150
|
|
Norton
|
350 750
|
|||
Peterson
|
16 375
|
|||
Rainer
|
Greenwich Capital Markets
|
46 000
|
8 000
|
22 000
|
Rutherford
|
Cranford Johnson Robinson Wood
|
1 750
|
7 750
|
|
Sheinbaum
|
22 000
|
|||
Sheinberg
|
MCA Inc.
|
267 150
|
74 500
|
59 150
|
Smith
|
11 750
|
|||
Spence
|
GSD&M
|
25 250
|
6 000
|
|
Spielberg
|
Amblin Entertainment /
DreamWorks SKG
|
236 500
|
5 850 / 39 000
|
|
Stack
|
High, Stack, Lazenby, Palahach & del Amo
|
7 300
|
2 000
|
|
Steenburgen
|
2 000
|
|||
Stephens
|
Stephens Inc.
|
24 000
|
21 000
|
18 250
|
Streisand
|
81 500
|
|||
Thomases
|
Willkie Farr and Gallagher
|
18 050
|
47 025
|
|
Thomason
|
35 075
|
|||
Walton
|
216 800
|
10 000
|
200 / 1 900
|
|
Wasserman
|
MCA Inc.
|
459 273
|
74 750
|
59 150
|
Whillock
|
Arkansas Electric Cooperatives Corporation
|
5 708
|
10 000
|
1 000
|
The
Center for Public Integrity 1634 I Street, N.W. Suite
902 Washington, D.C. 20006
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