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| For Immediate Release | |
| Dec 20, 2000 | Contact: Press Office 202-646-5172 |
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George W. Bush Installs Chief Fundraiser As Head Of Commerce Department Follows Long Line Of “Money Men” At Agency, Including Brown, Kantor, Mosbacher, And Baldridge Judicial Watch To Watch Closely Activities Of “Corporate Welfare” Chief (Washington, DC) Today, President-Elect Bush will announce his cabinet appointment for Secretary of Commerce. The individual’s name is Don Evans, the chief fundraiser of the Bush-Cheney Campaign. Mr. Evans follows a long line of fundraisers who have been installed by Republican and Democrat administrations, including but not limited to Malcolm Baldridge, Robert Mosbacher of the Reagan-Bush years, and, of course, Ron Brown, Mickey Kantor, and Bill Daley of the Clinton-Gore Administration. Indeed, Ron Brown pushed then President-Elect Clinton for the job, knowing its “potential.” Ron Brown then took the misuse of the Commerce Department to new heights in not only doling out corporate welfare as usual, but also selling taxpayer-financed seats on Commerce Department trade missions and high technology to the Chinese in exchange for campaign contributions and personal gratuities. The Commerce Department has always been employed as a bastion for misuse of taxpayer monies, and for this reason, prior Republican administrations rightly wanted to abolish the agency. However, in the end, Republican lawmakers lacked the guts to take on the vested corporate interests, which have not only lined the pockets of Democrats, but also their own. Indeed, this is why the Republican Congress over the last four years conspicuously refused to investigate the Clinton-Gore Administration’s illegal sale of seats on trade missions and high technology to the Chinese for campaign contributions – since the Republicans also benefitted from donations from the involved companies. Judicial Watch has investigated this and is pursuing justice in its several lawsuits against the Clinton-Gore Commerce Department. Indeed, the Court recently allowed for further discovery, including the depositions of Bruce Lindsay and Doris Matsui. “Despite his typical fundraising past, Judicial Watch hopes that Don Evans will be a more exemplary Commerce Secretary than his predecessors, who used their fundraising background as a means to misuse taxpayer funds for political purposes. If Mr. Evans strays from the ‘straight and narrow,’ Judicial Watch will be prepared to act swiftly and vigorously by all available legal means,” stated Judicial Watch Chairman and General Counsel Larry Klayman. “However, the fact that Mr. Bush has placed a fundraiser again at the Commerce Department, is not a good omen,” he added. |
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