Why didn't those White House videotapes turn up until months after they were subpoenaed by Congress? On ABC's This Week on Oct. 12, White House counsel Charles F.C. Ruff put the blame on officials in the White House Communications Agency, "who pushed the wrong button or asked the wrong questions of the computer." But in sworn testimony a day and a half earlier, the head of the office responsible for videotaping executive mansion events, including President Clinton's DNC political coffees at the White House, said he never received a full copy of the four-page directive requesting the tapes. An hour after the ABC broadcast, White House scandal spokesman Lanny Davis offered this explanation: "We understand the military office, when it was producing copies of the directive, may have inadvertently neglected to photocopy the first two sheets of the directive, in which reference to materials relating to 'coffees' was expressly included."
Journalists pored over the tapes after their release Oct. 14, prompting CNN Crossfire host Pat Buchanan to quip that it was like "watching America's Most Wanted." Viewers could see Johnny Chung, John Huang, Pauline Kanchanalak, and Charlie Trie, among a host of other characters who have fled the country rather than testify about their role in the fundraising controversy.
Some of the most damaging moments of the tape come from a May 21, 1996, White House luncheon, in which President Clinton lauds donors for giving "soft money" to the Democratic National Committee for use in "this long-running, constant television campaign ... [that] has been central to the position I now enjoy in the polls."
Advertisements purchased with money from the DNC's soft account, which is virtually unlimited and unregulated, are restricted to political party advertising, not candidate advertising. Mr. Clinton's admission that the ads were responsible for boosting his campaign bolster arguments that the president's campaign violated federal election laws.
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Issue: "Peretti on publishing"
October 25, 1997
Evolved