Tim Mahoney

Details on Mahoney Affair Get Seedier

Kate Klonick | October 24, 2008, 11:20AM

The Tim Mahoney story just keeps getting worse and worse.

First it was a settlement over an alleged affair; then it was a second alleged affair; then it was admitting to multiple affairs and now it's seedy details behind the settlement with Mahoney's former mistress.

ABCNews.com reports that documents show Mahoney asked Patricia Allen, his former mistress and staffer to engage in phone sex and perform as a "tease c-ck" for big donors.

From ABCNews.com:

The settlement was reached after Allen hired a lawyer who sent the Congressman a "demand" letter, listing specific examples of Mahoney's alleged "gross misconduct" and "stalking" including:

a) Calling Allen late in the evenings and demanding "phone sex;"
b) Demanding that Allen answer his calls or face termination;
c) Demanding that Allen attend fundraisers and "tease c-ck" to bring in more donations from the male members of the public;
d) Demanding that Allen engage in sexual conduct with another woman for his enjoyment.

Current and former staffers told ABC News the allegations contained in the "demand letter" sent to Mahoney were backed up by tape recordings of phone calls between the Congressman and Allen.

Alaska

Stevens' Jury Gets Friday Off For Juror's Family Emergency

Kate Klonick | October 24, 2008, 10:16AM

The deliberations in the trial of Sen. Ted Stevens have been suspended for Friday after a juror had a family emergency, the AP reports.

Jurors will be excused from deliberations today and possibly Monday, so that Juror No. 4 can travel home to attend to the death of her father in California.

Today would be the third day of deliberations for the jury, which has already experienced a number of issues. On Wednesday, jurors asked to be excused early after things became "stressful." Yesterday, the foreman wrote a note to the judge requesting the removal of a juror who had become 'rude, disrespectful and unreasonable" and had "violent outbursts."

Scott Bloch

Congress Daily: White House Fires Scott Bloch

Kate Klonick | October 23, 2008, 4:18PM

Apparently there's more to Scott Bloch's resignation as head of U.S. Special Counsel that meets the eye. According to the National Journal's Congress Daily, Bloch was fired today in a meeting with White House officials.

From Congress Daily:

Scott Bloch, the embattled head of the U.S. Special Counsel, was fired today in a meeting with White House officials, according to several sources. Bloch is under federal investigation for possible obstruction of justice for destroying computer files sought by investigators in prior probe into whether he retaliated illegally against whistleblowers in his office. On Monday Bloch announced plans to resign on Jan. 5. OSC employees said Federal Protective Service employees barred Bloch from his office today. The agency has an all-hands meeting at 4 p.m.

Election 2008

FEC Complaint Filed Against Palin and RNC's Shopping Spree

Kate Klonick | October 23, 2008, 3:20PM

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington filed an FEC complaint today against Sarah Palin and the Republican National Committee for violating federal election law in spending $150,000 outfitting the Alaska governor.

The group claims the excessive spending is a violation of campaign finance law which specifically prohibits candidates from using campaign funds for personal use.

"It is ridiculous that RNC would spend $150,000 to outfit a vice presidential nominee and her family at any time, but it is more outrageous given the dire financial straights of so many Americans and the state of our economy," CREW director Melanie Sloan said in a statement. "If the RNC had an extra $150,000 to throw around, there were better alternatives than pricey designer clothes."

Earlier this week, the RNC responded to possible violations of the Federal Election Campaign Act by stating that all of Palin's clothes would be donated to charity after the election.

Alaska

Attorneys in Stevens' Trial Called Back to Court Over Jury Questions

Kate Klonick | October 23, 2008, 1:32PM

The jury in the trial of Sen. Ted Stevens sent three more notes to Judge Emmet Sullivan today, one of which specifically asked the judge to "please clarify the liability cost as it is not readily clear in Senate regulations," The Hill reports.

After receiving the notes, Sullivan sent the jurors to lunch early and asked attorneys from the case to return to court this afternoon for a bench conference to discuss how to instruct the jury.

From The Hill:

Sullivan proposed telling the jurors that the financial disclosure forms require "the filer to disclose the amount of liabilities in excess of $10,000 that were owed by the filer in any point in time during the calendar year." But Robert Cary, Stevens's defense lawyer, called the statement an "oversimplification" and asked to give the jurors a more elaborate explanation.

Today is only the first full day of deliberations for the jury, who were given instructions yesterday morning.

Late update: It looks like one of the jurors may be dismissed for "disruptive, rude and violent" behavior, the AP reports. We'll keep you updated as we hear more.

Late update. . . 2:33 pm: More details are emerging on the "violent" juror. The Hill describes her as a "middle-aged. . bookkeeper for the D.C. National Guard." According to Politico, one of the jury's notes to Sullivan says the woman "has had violent outbursts with other jurors and that's not helping anyone. She is not following the laws and rules that were stipulated."

Late update. . . 2:56pm: After discussing with attorneys from both sides, it doesn't look like the "violent" juror won't be going anywhere.

From the AP:

Worried about disrupting the process, Sullivan opted not to remove the woman. He spoke with jurors, told them how important their job was, urged them to be civil and sent them back to continue deliberating.

Late update. . .6:29pm: The Washington Post has a copy of the note sent from the jury to Sullivan requestion that juror #9 be removed. Read it here.

Voting

Court Throws Out WI AG Voting Suit

Kate Klonick | October 23, 2008, 12:30PM

It looks like some of the state and local efforts led by Republicans to stymie voters, aren't panning out.

The latest loss for the GOP comes in Wisconsin. Where the suit filed by Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen requesting confirmation on thousands of voter registrations, has been thrown out by a county circuit judge.

From Wisconisn State Journal:

Judge Maryann Sumi said Van Hollen failed to state an adequate claim for bringing the lawsuit and noted that state law has consistently favored protecting citizens' right to vote. Sumi also said that Van Hollen did not have standing to bring the lawsuit.

. . .DOJ spokesman Kevin St. John said the Department of Justice plans to appeal, possibly directly to the state Supreme Court.

Just yesterday, the Nevada Secretary of State rejected a GOP argument that people who corrected incomplete registration information at the polls should be forced to cast provisional ballots. And in Indiana, a judge ruled against Republican efforts to shut down early polling places in Democratic-heavy areas of a key county.

Last week, the Supreme Court sided with Ohio's Democratic Secretary of State, ruling against ruling against a Republican effort to require her to provide infomration on voters with mismatched registration information to county election officials, which could have led to GOP challenges.

Late update: TPMmuckraker caught up with Joe Wineke, chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, who called the ruling "very strongly worded."

"It's great to know that the circuit court in Wisconsin understood that the rule of law is more important than partisan political campaigns," Wineke told us. "The really amazing thing to me right now is that the attorney general plans to appeal with 12 day to go till the election."

We should have a copy of the court's decision shortly, so check back soon.

Alaska

Stressed Out Stevens' Jury Heads Home Early

Kate Klonick | October 22, 2008, 5:05PM

The jurors in the trial of Sen. Ted Stevens have just sent a note to the judge asking to go home early, after just four hours of deliberations.

"It's kind of stressful right now, can we leave a little early? We need a moment of clarity," the juror's note read according to MSNBC.

As we reported earlier, today is the first day of deliberations in the historic trial of Stevens, who is the first sitting senator to ever be indicted.

Judge Emmet Sullivan acquiesced, letting the jurors leave early, the AP reports.

Ted Stevens

Stevens' Fight For Political Life Rests in Hands of Jury

Kate Klonick | October 22, 2008, 11:42AM

With closing arguments finished, all that's left in the trial of Sen. Ted Stevens, is jury instructions and deliberation. Those will start this morning, and depending on how long the jury deliberates, we could have a decision in the historic trial of the only sitting senator ever indicted as early as this afternoon.

So let's take this time to look back at some of the highs and lows from the four week long trial.

One of the biggest lows, for the prosecution anyway, was Judge Emmet Sullivan's exclusion of key evidence after the government failed to provide the defense with copies of evidence and never provided promised testimony.

The prosecution semi-recovered from the ruling, calling a late witness, Dave Anderson -- who worked for VECO and on Stevens' renovations -- to testify in order to compensate for some of the excluded evidence.

While it looked like this blow against the government's case seemed devastating, that was before Stevens took the stand. The seven-term senator's two days of testimony (which we blogged here and here) added a new variable to the trial and it's difficult to tell if Stevens' curmudgeonly answers on cross-examination helped or hindered his cause.

An un-related moment in the trial, but a favorite at TPM, was the possibility of Martha Stewart's attorney being called as a witness. The judge excluded his testimony, but gave this wonderful quote, captured by the Blog of Legal Times:

"The words 'Martha Stewart' mean different things to different people," Judge Sullivan said. "There is no universal meaning of 'Martha Stewart.'"

Yesterday's closing arguments, were predictably theatrical especially from the defense -- sometimes too theatrical. Stevens' attorney Brendan Sullivan was apparently modulating his voice so widely between shouts and whispers that the jury had to stop Sullivan's closing to ask him to repeat words he intimately breathed to the jurors, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

The prosecution spent much of the time incredulously recalling Stevens' testimony and "growling" answers on cross-examination.

"Maybe since the defendant lives so close to the North Pole, maybe Santa and his elves came down and did this work and completed it. He had no idea," said prosecutor Brenda Morris.

And with that, we wait -- like expectant children on Christmas Eve -- for the jury to reach a decision on the fate of Sen. Stevens

Election 2008

Women's Voices Women Vote Fined for Robocalls in North Carolina

Kate Klonick | October 22, 2008, 10:36AM

You might remember the puzzling robo-calls coming from a group called Women's Voices Women Vote, earlier this year during the Democratic primary. Back then, our conclusion was, they were more incompetent than malicious -- breaking the laws on robo-calls because of ignorance rather than dirty tricks.

Well, as lawyers are fond of saying, ignorance of the law is no excuse. The AP reports that Women's Voices Women Vote was forced to pay a $100,000 fine in North Carolina for breaking the state law in May that says robocall groups must provide information on the group or a way to contact the organization.

The group also was ordered to stay out of politics until after Election Day.

"It was not our intention that the robocalls or our mailings cause any confusion as to whether any individual was already registered to vote,'' Page Gardner, the group's president said in a statement. "To the contrary, our effort was squarely aimed at encouraging registration of underrepresented voters in North Carolina for the upcoming general election.''

Senate Judiciary Committee

SJC Subpoenas Mukasey for Testimony and OLC Docs

Kate Klonick | October 21, 2008, 3:11PM

After the Washington Post beat the Senate Judiciary Committee to memos from the White House to the CIA endorsing interrogation practices, Chairman Patrick Leahy hasn't been pulling punches.

Today, Leahy issued a subpoena to Attorney Gen. Michael Mukasey demanding that he provide testimony and related documents to the committee about "legal analysis and advice from the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) related to the Bush administration's terrorism policies, including detention and interrogation policies and practices." The deadline for the testimony and documents is November 18. The committee voted on issuing the subpoena in a September 25 business meeting.

"This administration's stonewalling leaves this Committee without basic facts that are essential to carrying out its oversight responsibilities," Leahy said in his letter to Mukasey.

"There is no legitimate argument for withholding the requested materials from this Committee. The Executive Branch should not obstruct Congress from conducting its constitutional oversight and lawmaking duties by making sweeping assertions of secrecy and privilege."

Leahy and the Bush administration have been embroiled in an ongoing tussle over access to administration documents. As Leahy explains in today's letter, in August he wrote to White House counsel Fred Fielding requesting the documents, and was rebuffed. Fielding referred Leahy to DOJ, which continued to stonewall. As a result, the committee voted to authorize the subpoena, which was issued to Mukasey today.

Tim Mahoney

Mahoney's Wife Files for Divorce

Kate Klonick | October 20, 2008, 6:37PM

The admissions of "multiple affairs" by Congressman Tim Mahoney, must have been an affair or two too many for his wife who filed for divorce today. The two had been married for almost 24 years.

From the the Palm Beach Post:

Terry Mahoney filed papers at the North County Courthouse in Palm Beach Gardens, which said the marriage is "irretrievably broken".

She appeared with her husband, but did not speak last Tuesday when Mahoney made a 2-minute appearance before reporters. In that appearance, the congressman acknowledged causing "pain" in his marriage.

Voting

MI GOP and Obama Camp. Settle Lawsuit

Kate Klonick | October 20, 2008, 1:40PM

The Michigan Messenger, whose article on the Michigan GOP's plans to challenge voters on foreclosure lists sparked a lawsuit from Democrats, reports that the two parties have now reached a settlement.

A judge was supposed to hear arguments from the Obama campaign's lawsuit against the RNC, MI GOP and Macomb County Republican party. At the last minute, parties settled the lawsuit and issued the following statement:

"Obama for America, the Democratic National Committee and individual Macomb County residents have alleged that the Republican National Committee, the Michigan Republican Party and the Macomb County Republican Party were planning to use foreclosure lists to challenge certain voters on Election Day. The Republicans have denied the allegations and have stated that they never intended to challenge voters based on any such list. To clarify the matter for all voters, all parties are pleased that they agree that the existence of a person's address on a foreclosure list does not provide a reasonable basis for challenging the person's eligibility to vote and that none of these parties will challenge any voter's eligibility on that basis."

We'll have more on this as it develops.

Alaska

Blogging Sen. Stevens Testimony: Part II

Kate Klonick | October 20, 2008, 10:31AM

Picking up from where we left off on Friday, Sen. Ted Stevens is back on the stand this morning, in the midst of cross-examination.

The AP reports that Stevens is "dour" and "sparring curtly" with the prosecutor, in what is expected to be the last day of testimony in the historic trial.

We'll be bringing you more throughout the day, so stayed tuned as we continue our round up.

Trying to fire up the Senator Edition . . . 11:30am: The AP expands their story with some direct quotes from the cross. Perhaps most notably, he's outright denied that VECO had any involvement at all in the renovation of his house.

Morris pressed Stevens to acknowledge that he knew the foreman and other workers were VECO employees. But Stevens said that's not how he viewed it.

"He did work for VECO, yes, but when working at my house, he's working for me," Stevens said. "VECO was not involved in renovating my house."

The Politico reports that Stevens is less "combative" than he was on Friday, though the prosecutor keeps trying to bring out the Senator's famed temper.

Re-Gifting Edition. . . 12:23pm: We wonder what exactly Sen. Ted Stevens thinks he's on trial for, if it's not for his failure to disclose things on his financial disclosure forms. Roll Call has the exchange:

[Stevens] argued that there is a distinction between Allen as the personal friend who provided laborers for the house and Allen as the CEO of VECO.

That led Morris to ask, "You don't have to disclose gifts from a human?"

Stevens replied, "This has nothing to do with disclosure."

And back when Stevens' wife, Catherine, was on the stand, she spent a great deal of time lamenting the $250,00 worth of free upgrades that Bill Allen made to the house, especially furniture that he replaced. The prosecution brought the furniture back up, reading from an e-mail that Stevens had sent to Allen, saying that he was planning to re-gift the furniture to his son, The Hill reports. Stevens didn't respond well to this line of questioning:

Morris questioned why the senator kept that leather furniture set for more than seven years. She pulled out a Sept. 2005 e-mail where Stevens indicated to Allen that he would give the gift to his son.

Stevens grew agitated and tried to dodge the question.

"Just answer her question, sir," directed Judge Emmet G. Sullivan of the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia.

"You are actually trying to re-gift the furniture that is so hideous to your son. Is that correct?" Morris asked.

"No," Stevens shot back.

There's no universal meaning of gift Edition . . . 1:07pm: Was it a gift? Was it a loan? In the Stevens' trial, it all depends on who you talk to.

Stevens talked his way around the fancy massage chair he received from Allen, reported the AP:

He said he considered that chair a loan.

"And the chair is still at your house?" prosecutor Brenda Morris asked.

"Yes," Stevens said.

"How is that not a gift?"

"He bought that chair as a gift, but I refused it as a gift," Stevens said. "He put it there and said it was my chair. I told him I would not accept it as a gift. We have lots of things in our house that don't belong to us."

Playing to the jury, Morris appeared confused.

"So, if you say it's not a gift, it's not a gift?" she said.

"I refused it as a gift," Stevens replied. "I let him put it in our basement at his request."

And that was it for the Stevens' testimony. The defense rested and closing arguments are scheduled for tomorrow.

Food for thought Edition . . . 4:15pm: TPM Reader BK points out that under the Senate Disclosure Rules, claiming something was just "a loan" isn't much of an excuse:

Uh, someone should remind Senator Stevens that the Senate Rules define the term "gift" to mean "any gratuity, favor, discount, entertainment, hospitality, loan, forbearance or other item having monetary value."

Senate Rule 35, Paragraph 2(b)(1).
Or, to put it another way, Senator Stevens just incriminated himself.