Burns' Jan. 25 birthday will provide the stage for a campaign fundraiser where costs to attend or host range from $500 to $2,000.
“Cassidy & Associates is a well-respected firm and we are appreciative of their allowing the campaign to use their conference room for this event,” said Mark Baker, Burns' campaign chairman, in a statement released Wednesday. “This fundraiser is no different than others the campaign has had in D.C.”
Burns accepted nearly $150,000 in campaign donations from Abramoff, his clients and associates. The Montana senator, who also sits on the Senate Appropriations Committee, also remains under fire for directing a $3 million school construction grant to the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe of Michigan, a former client of Abramoff.
Additionally, Abramoff's clients in the Northern Marianas Islands benefited from Burns' legislative actions. And an Associated Press review found that lobbyist Todd A. Boulanger attended one of the Northern Marianas meetings with Burns and his staff. Boulanger now works for Cassidy & Associates.
Abramoff pleaded guilty to three felony charges Jan. 3., including conspiracy, fraud and tax evasion. His crimes include bilking at least four tribal clients of $80 million. The former lobbyist operated loosely within the walls of Greenberg Traurig, formerly considered one of K Street's most respected lobbying firms.
As campaign money comes and goes, Burns' re-election team plans to continue “aggressive” fundraising tactics in Montana and elsewhere, Baker said. Hence, the senator's birthday party at Cassidy & Associates lobbying firm.
Said Baker, “Senator Burns doesn't operate on the philosophy of guilt by association.”
Reporter Jodi Rave can be reached at (406) 523-5299 or at jodi.rave@lee.net
Tribal council rejects Burns' offer of Abramoff money
By NOELLE STRAUB of the Missoulian D.C. Bureau
WASHINGTON - Sen. Conrad Burns will hand control of $111,000 in campaign contributions related to confessed felon Jack Abramoff back to its original donors, as first promised, after the Montana-Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council rejected Burns' offer of the cash as too political.
The Montana Republican had vowed to return the money to tribes in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Michigan that had given it to a now-defunct campaign account, but then said legal questions prohibited him from doing so. His campaign instead cut a check to the Montana-Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council, whose lobbyist is a former Burns staffer.
But at a board meeting Tuesday, the group voted not to keep the money.
“We just felt it's important we share solidarity with other Indian tribes in this time of controversy,” said L. Jace Killsback, the group's treasurer. “It seemed to us kind of political reasoning for him giving us the money.”
The group met with Burns for an hour after the board meeting but did not inform him of the decision, instead talking with him about tribal concerns such as federal funding for health care and law enforcement.
Mark Baker, Burns' campaign chairman, on Wednesday called the decision by the Montana-Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council “disappointing.”
“We will contact the tribes who originally donated the contributions to the Friends of the Big Sky non-federal committee, which is no longer in existence, and determine from their counsel (to) which charitable organization a comparable contribution should be given,” Baker said, adding that any remaining funds will be divided evenly among Montana's tribal colleges.
But a leader of one of the tribes said he would tell Burns just to keep the money. Carlos Hisa, lieutenant governor of the Tigua tribe of El Paso, Texas, said Burns should focus on aiding the Abramoff investigation and not on “cleaning his hands” by refunding contributions. Hisa added that returning the money would somehow imply the tribe's money was tainted.
“Our money isn't tainted in any way, you don't have to return it,” he said. “It's Abramoff that's making all this money look bad, it's not the tribes.”
Hisa had said last week that if Burns were to return the money, it should go to the original donors rather than to other groups. But he said Wednesday that some tribes might see Burns' offer as an insult.
“We gave our money to you in good faith,” Hisa said of the contribution to Burns. “It's Abramoff that misled us and maybe him.”
The tribe gave $20,000 to Burns' now-defunct account.
Whether to accept Burns' check was the “hot topic” at the Montana-Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council board meeting Tuesday, Killsback said.
Killsback, a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribal Council, said the tribes would have had great use for the money but have a “different moral standard” that kept them from taking it.
“Each tribe had letters from their governments, had government representatives' testimony on their reasoning not to accept that money, and they ranged,” he said.
Killsback also noted that the Montana-Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council held a leadership election Tuesday that played a role in the decision not to take the money.
James Parker Shield, vice chairman of the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians of Montana, said the tribal members at the board meeting “decided that this wasn't our money and it wouldn't basically be the right thing to do to take it.”
“It should go back to whoever gave it to them, or the senator could decide to give it to some worthy cause or whatever, it's not really our call, we didn't really have any interest in having that money,” Parker Shield said. “Certainly the tribes don't need to have the accompanying interest that comes along with accepting that money.”
The group did not inform Burns of their decision at the meeting.
“When you compare the amount of need that we have for health care or law enforcement or economic development in Indian Country, this amount of money pales in comparison, so it didn't really occupy a lot of our time,” Parker Shield said.
Burns announced in December that he would return most of the Abramoff-related money - 25 contributions totaling $146,700 given to three different Burns accounts - to its original donors and give a smaller amount to charity.
Burns did return some smaller contributions to the donors. But campaign officials said the senator could not use his re-election funds to refund money that the Indian tribes, all former Abramoff clients, had given to the “soft money” account that was closed when campaign finance reforms outlawed it.
Burns decided to give the $101,000 in question, plus another $10,000 he had received directly from Abramoff and an associate, to charity and chose the Montana-Wyoming Tribal Leaders Council.
Stan Ullman, who was Burns' legislative assistant and worked in his Washington office for four years, is registered as that group's only lobbyist.
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