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 For Immediate Release
Oct 5, 2000 Contact: Press Office
202-646-5172
CLINTON-GORE ADMINISTRATION ORDERED BY COURT TO TURN OVER DOCUMENTS IN PORTALS SCANDAL CASE

Clinton Appointee Rules Against Administration on Document Request Related to Gore Scandal

Portals Real Estate Project Benefitted Gore Fundraisers, Hurt Taxpayers

(Washington, DC) The Honorable Ricardo M. Urbina, U.S. District Court Judge, ruled last week that the Clinton-Gore Administration must waive fees and turn over to Judicial Watch documents relating to a controversial government leasing arrangement that benefitted individuals close to Al Gore. In response to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request on the Portals leasing controversy, the General Services Administration had sought to make Judicial Watch pay for thousands of documents before turning them over and sought to summarily dismiss a FOIA lawsuit Judicial Watch brought to obtain the documents. Judge Urbina ruled in favor of Judicial Watch. Publically available evidence suggests that Gore confidants benefitted, at the expense of taxpayers, from million dollar contingency fees in a lease deal between the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the Portals Washington, DC office project, which is run by another Gore supporter.

Without expressing any opinion on the underlying merits of the allegations, Judge Urbina ruled on September 25, 2000, that, among other things:
    ...the court agrees that the (Judicial Watch) FOIA request...implicates important public interests. To begin with, federal taxpayers paid for the FCC’s lease of the vacant Portals office space, which gives the public a direct and tangible interest in information bearing on the lease and the events surrounding it. Specifically, the public has an interest in information which could help them decide whether an agency’s expenditure of their tax monies was based on sound financial or functional considerations or on other, arguably less appropriate considerations...Closely related is the fundamental public interest in information bearing on the alleged possibility that the Vice President and others violated legal or ethical standards in connection with the FCC-Portals lease. Neither of these interests is peculiar to the plaintiffs or their supporters. (emphasis added)
“The decision by Judge Urbina is a significant victory for not only Judicial Watch, but for the American taxpayer. We are hopeful we can get to the heart of a scandal that some estimate cost the U.S. taxpayer tens of millions of dollars in unneeded costs – all, allegedly, to benefit a small group of Gore cronies,” stated Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

Judicial Watch, Inc. is a public interest law firm that investigates and prosecutes government corruption.

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