Money Troubles Swell For Dems

WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, Oct. 30) -- The Clinton campaign's money headaches continue. John Huang, the man who raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal and questionable contributions for the Democrats, has testified that he knows Bill and Hillary Clinton quite well.

"I don't know the exact day, but quite a few times," Huang said, when asked about meeting with the Clintons. "I met with Clintons, both, many times."

Huang also admitted having some discussions about Indonesia while he was employed by the Commerce Department in 1994 and 1995.

"People might have come to me because of some issue about Indonesia, so I would have to give my knowledge about Indonesia," he said. "But I did not handle the portfolio... I did not have responsibility for Indonesia, period."

Huang had been employed by the Lippo Group, an Indonesian banking conglomerate. His testimony, in a lawsuit seeking Commerce Department documents, may resume later this week.

Attention is being focused on Huang's fund-raising activities in Taiwan. Former U.S. official Nat Bellocchi says he heard repeated rumors in Taiwan that Democrats were seeking campaign contributions from Taiwanese businessmen.

"After one or two visits, it seemed to be so prevalent in conversations that I had that I thought I should turn it over to government here in Washington and say this seems to be of concern to a considerable number of people in Taiwan for different reasons and they ought to look into it," said Bellocchi, former chairman of the American Institute in Taiwan.

Bellocchi says he met with representatives of the Justice Department today.

A top Taiwan official is denying reports that he offered $15 million to the Democrats through former Clinton White House aide Mark Middleton.

"I did meet Middleton," said Liu Tai-Ying, the Taiwan official. "He said he could arrange for me to meet President Clinton. So I went to San Francisco and met Clinton. The meeting was very short. There was no question of discussing political contributions."

A White House spokesman says the president only shook hands with Liu briefly in a receiving line, and insists there was no private meeting. There was no comment from Middleton.

Another denial from Taiwan came from the Buddhist leader whose group hosted Vice President Al Gore in Los Angeles.

"On that day, nobody talked about money," said Master Hsing Yun, a Taiwan Buddhist leader. "No one talked about raising funds. These things just didn't happen, so please don't spread these rumors. They are really hurtful."

But the Democratic party paid the Buddhist group $15,000, admitting the event was a fund-raiser. Democrats also returned one of the contributions raised there because of indications it was illegal.

Meanwhile, Bill Clinton, the Democratic Party's fundraiser-in-chief, presided at yet another money-raising event Tuesday night, taking in another $500,000. And the Federal Election Commission (FEC) reported a record explosion of unregulated "soft money" to both parties from business corporations, unions and wealthy givers.

Democratic committees raised $102 million in soft money through Oct. 16, the FEC said. That was an increase of 255 percent over four years earlier.

Republican committees raised even more soft money: $121 million, an increase of 166 percent.

With such huge amounts of money, and so many legal and ethical questions, major investigations are now considered all but certain after the election.

In a related development, a federal judge is reviewing Huang's videotaped testimony. There is no indication how long that will take, but Larry Klayman of Judicial Watch, which filed the Commerce Department lawsuit, said he expects the judge to review as much as possible, and decide whether the deposition needs to continue.

Klayman argued in court he believes there may be a potential case of perjury involved in Huang's Tuesday testimony that he had no knowledge of Freedom Of Information Act requests by Judicial Watch. Klayman produced a document with Huang's signature relating to such a request.

Huang attorney Ty Cobb argued Klayman should have produced the document on Tuesday, and asserted that Huang never said he did not participate in a Freedom of Information Act document search, just that he did not recall having participated. He said further Huang could have signed the document routinely without looking closely at it.

This story originally appeared on CNN's "Inside Politics."

Money Troubles Swell For Dems

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