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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Hoffa Wants Outside Probe Of Teamsters Opponent Carey Says He ‘Would Encourage’ Special Prosecutor For Election Financing

Washington Post

James P. Hoffa Sunday called for an independent special prosecutor to investigate the financial dealings of the Teamsters union in support of president Ron Carey’s re-election last year.

“Today I’m calling for a special prosecutor, an independent prosecutor,” said Hoffa, who was narrowly defeated by Carey last year in government-supervised elections.

Carey quickly agreed to Hoffa’s proposal. “I have absolutely no problem. I would encourage it,” said Carey, who appeared with Hoffa on NBC-TV’s “Meet the Press.”

Hoffa first issued the call for an independent prosecutor on “Fox Sunday News” and then repeated it on “Meet the Press” and ABC-TV’s “This Week.” At each stop on the television dial Hoffa essentially delivered the same message.

The federal government on Friday ordered a new election for Carey and all the national union officers elected on his slate, citing “a complex network of schemes” used to finance their elections. The report by Barbara Zack Quindel, the court-appointed officer overseeing the elections, outlined a series of schemes involving both money from the union’s general treasury and money from its political action fund that was used to help finance the Carey campaign.

The new election will again pit the one-time reform candidate Carey and Hoffa, son of the late Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa, against each other for control of the 1.3 million member union. Carey narrowly defeated Hoffa last November in a secret-ballot mail election.

Five victorious Hoffa candidates from the union’s central states region and a Canadian vice president who ran unopposed in the election will not be required to seek re-election.

The union has been operating under a federal consent decree signed by the Teamsters in 1989 to settle a massive civil racketeering suit brought by the Justice Department, which has accused the union of becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of organized crime.

Carey was first elected president in 1991 in an upset over the Teamsters’ old guard leadership on a pledge to clean up the union. His entire slate of candidates was swept into office with him.

Hoffa said a special prosecutor was needed because “the impartiality of the Justice Department is somewhat questionable.” He cited allegations that the Teamsters laundered money from their political action fund through the Democratic National Committee as a need for an independent outsider.