It’s Perfectly Legal To Sell Political Access

Attorney General Janet Reno bluntly has outlined a dirty little secret of American politics: It’s legal for politicians to sell access for contributions.

That’s a fact virtually every politician knows and no politician wants to talk about. It underlies the furor over President Clinton entertaining fatcat contributors in the Lincoln Bedroom and at White House coffees.

As Reno explained in a letter to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill., U.S. law and courts do not regard access - the chance to see and talk to a politician - the same way they do a job offer, a government contract or a policy decision.

And legal experts have a grim legal assessment for those who might wish to outlaw access-for-donations: Such a law would violate the Constitution.

“Reno’s absolutely right on the law,” said Joseph DiGenova, a Republican and former U.S. attorney here. “You can’t prohibit linking money and access without running afoul of the First Amendment. People have a right to petition government. But given the Supreme Court’s ruling on the lobbying act, you could require public disclosure of such meetings.”

Hyde and 19 Republican colleagues on the House Judiciary Committee wrote Reno on Sept. 3 about newspaper accounts of 103 White House coffees during 1995 and 1996 and Clinton’s 938 overnight guests in the White House.

Hyde noted that many guests were large contributors and that newspapers reported some had benefited from government action. Hyde suggested there may have been bribery, extortion or election law violations “if the president knew about a quid pro quo.”

But Reno replied Friday that Justice Department investigators “are aware of no evidence whatsoever indicating that the president may have demanded, sought, received or accepted … these donations or contributions in quid pro quo exchange for official action.”

The GOP letter “cites no more than speculation in newspaper articles,” Reno wrote. And in the absence of actual evidence, she added, “it would be inappropriate to commence a criminal investigation every time an elected official took action that benefited any contributor.”

Given the reach of modern government and the number of contributors, every governmental act benefits some contributor. Unless evidence of a deal is required, every government move would have to be investigated.

Moreover, Reno said, no one has provided evidence to “to suggest that the president requested or received a contribution” during the coffees or visits.

U.S. courts have held that “mere access to the president or the White House, purportedly obtained by virtue of political donations, … is not an ‘official act’ that can provide a basis for a bribery or extortion prosecution,” she wrote. The same applies to senators and representatives who meet contributors.

In 1978, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that an official who makes introductions and gains a friendly ear for contributors does not commit extortion.

And election law, Reno said, “provides criminal penalties only for promising ‘any employment, position, compensation, contract, appointment or other benefit provided … by any act of Congress’ in exchange for political activity.”

“Visiting the president in the White House is not a federal program ‘benefit”’ under this law, she wrote.