It’ll take weeks for reporters fully to plumb the depths of Harold Ickes’s newly released — but still heavily “redacted” (i.e., censored) — fund- raising correspondence. But a couple of items already stand out. First there’s the R. Warren Meddoff controversy. Meddoff, you’ll recall, is the man who approached President Clinton at a fund-raiser in late October with news that a friend of his, one William R. Morgan, had $ 5 million to give to the Democratic party — provided he could get a tax deduction for it. Ickes called Meddoff the next day to follow up and told him it was doable. Ickes next faxed Meddoff the bank-account numbers of the Democratic National Committee and several non-profit organizations working to turn out Democratic votes — and asked him to ask Morgan to pony up.
The story was always that Ickes & Co. got cold feet about this deal and dropped it almost immediately. Good thing, too, since solicitations from government property using government-owned telephones and fax machines are illegal. But it turns out there’s a memo written by Ickes dated Nov. 19, two weeks after the election, in which Ickes requests further research on Meddoff and his wealthy friend. Seems they were still pursuing the $ 5 million, illegal or not.
Another Ickes-file oddity: Though the legal defense fund established to help defray Bill and Hillary Clinton’s Whitewater attorney’s fees may not by charter accept contributions from labor unions, a June 3, 1996, memo by Ickes indicates they found a way around this inconvenience. According to Ickes, Gerald McEntee of the government-employees union AFSCME had recently urged his individual members to help the Clintons out. Ickes reports that the members are complying with McEntee’s request.
Finally, something not in Ickes’s files, but related to the White House coffee scandal they involve. Invited to a June 17, 1996, White House coffee, as reported by The Hill newspaper: Dr. George “The Killer” Tiller of Wichita, Kansas — the nation’s most prominent late-term abortionist.
Proof that the president knows who his friends are.
