1-17-06, 8:56 am

When Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX) threatened four Houston-area television stations that he'd sue them if they aired ads linking him with the Abramoff corruption scandal, they refused to air the ads or backed off, saying they wanted to check the facts.

DeLay's lawyers accused two groups, Campaign for America's Future and the Public Campaign Action Fund, of maliciously lying about the case to defame DeLay.

DeLay was indicted last September for illegally using corporate cash to finance the campaigns of several Republican Texas state legislators. DeLay has also been linked to the Jack Abramoff corruption scandal that threatens to bring down several Republican Party leaders in Congress. Recent analysis of the ads offered by the website , a non-partisan public interest project that monitors the statements of political players, shows, in fact, that DeLay's lawyers misrepresented the ads’ claims. The analysis also asserts the ads’ accuracy.

FactCheck.org ironically won notoriety during the 2004 presidential campaign, when Vice President Dick Cheney erroneously referred to the website as FactCheck.com, using their analysis to support his claim that his financial ties to Halliburton were not as strong as his critics had insinuated.

Regarding one of the controversial ads that were set to air in DeLay's home district, FactCheck.org wrote on its website that the ad 'contains nothing that is strictly false,' and Rep. DeLay's lawyer 'mischaracterized' what the ad said.

While FactCheck.org noted that the whole story is 'a bit much to summarize in the eleven words the ad devotes to it' and that there is indeed some ambiguity, it also suggests that DeLay's lawyers had no basis for their threats.

The dispute centers on the ad's suggestion that DeLay indirectly received $1 million from Russian oil executives in order to influence his vote on International Monetary Fund (IMF) aid for Russia.

According to both the ad’s makers and FactCheck.org, the ad cites a Washington Post story that quoted Christopher Geeslin, the former president of a right-wing advocacy group called the U.S. Family Network, which was founded by Ed Buckham, DeLay’s former chief of staff.

Buckham told Geeslin, according to the Post, that some Russian oil tycoons contributed $1 million to the group in 1998, specifically to influence DeLay's vote on the IMF matter. DeLay had multiple political connections to the advocacy group, and his wife later received a six-figure salary from the group's founder.

The Post story further states that the Russian executives who apparently gave the money were clients of Jack Abramoff, who recently pled guilty to charges of wire fraud, tax evasion, and bribery, and is expected to name many names as part of a plea deal.

Abramoff’s clients were the same executives DeLay met with during a trip that he reported to have been financed by a non-profit called the National Center for Public Policy Research, reports the Post. In reality, according to the Post’s sources who were close to the operation, the non-profit was a front for a company located in the Bahamas that funneled money from the Russians to DeLay’s coffers and was a client of Jack Abramoff.

DeLay’s lawyer also complained that the ad refers to a list of flights and trips DeLay took, citing a recent Associated Press article. FactCheck.org said 'the AP story is accurately quoted, and not disputed.'

'Rep. DeLay can't change the facts against him. We're determined to shed light on his dark links to corruption. Rep. DeLay can't be saved by the Jack Abramoff wing of the Republican Party,' said Toby Chaudhuri, communications director for Campaign for America's Future.

In a press statement earlier last week, the Public Campaign Action Fund national campaigns’ director, David Donnelly, noted that DeLay is using the threat of baseless lawsuits to suppress information his constituents should know about.

'Rep. DeLay doesn't want the people of Houston to know that Russian interests allegedly gave $1 million to influence his vote. In fact, he doesn't want anyone back home to know anything he's up to with corrupt lobbyists in Washington,' said Donnelly.

'When powerful lawmakers corrupt the political process and get caught,' Donnelly added, 'they often try to bully the media to try to prevent them from doing their job. We can't let him win.'

The two public interest groups, that joined forces this week to run this and other ads, are vigorously fighting back after Houston television stations pulled the ad under pressure from DeLay and his Washington lawyers.

Last week the Campaign for America’s Future and the Public Campaign Action Fund, unveiled $115,000 in new television, radio and billboard ads targeting DeLay and Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH), for their ties to corruption, kicking off a yearlong campaign to clean up Congress.



--Joel Wendland can be reached at jwendland@politicalaffairs.net.