THE NUNS September 4, 1997 Transcript

The Online Explainers take your question on the investigation. The NewsHour's coverage of the Congressional Investigation. The inside stories on the political fight behind the public investigation. The investigation is big news in Washington, but how's it playing around the country. A closer look at the issues really under scrutiny by the Congress.

A RealAudio version of this report is available. JIM LEHRER: Vice President Gore's campaign fund-raising activities. Tom Bearden begins our coverage with what happened today at the Senate hearings. TOM BEARDEN: As far as anyone could remember, this was the first time Buddhist nuns had ever testified on Capitol Hill. SPOKESMAN: Venerable Man Ho, Venerable Yi Chu, Venerable Man Yan, good morning. TOM BEARDEN: The three nuns appeared before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee to tell of their participation in an April 1996 event at their temple near Los Angeles. The main attraction was Vice President Al Gore. His appearance raised $100,000 for the Democratic National Committee. Committee Chairman Fred Thompson called it a possible of federal law. SEN. FRED THOMPSON, Chairman, Governmental Affairs Committee: Cannot hold fund-raising events at their churches or temples or other tax-exempt organizations. Those organizations cannot contribute either directly or indirectly to the political campaign. And, in fact, if they're tax-exempt organizations, they cannot engage in any political activity at all. There's another law that will come into play here, and that has to do with the law that prohibits one from making a contribution in the name of another. TOM BEARDEN: The men testified that that's what happened at the Buddhist temple event. Several members of the sect were asked to contribute $5,000 and were reimbursed by the temple the very next day. The nuns testified today under a grant of immunity. At the beginning of the hearing they asked that a statement be read on their behalf. BRIAN SUN, Witness Counsel: The members of the Fo Guang Shung Order and the Hsi Lai Temple have always wanted to respect the laws and customs of the United States. In connection with the April 29, 1996 event at the temple it has been suggested that perhaps some laws and customs relating to campaign finance donations were violated. It is our view that if such laws were violated, they were not done so intentionally by any of the Monastics or lay devotees of the temple. As members of the Fo Guang Shung Order, we urge this committee to understand that our outreach to prominent leaders of this country is part of our goal of expanding and propagating Buddhist ideals. This extension of our friendship has been misperceived and is not designed in any way to foster any political agenda or to subvert the American political process. TOM BEARDEN: Under questioning from Republican Counsel Sandy Mattice, Temple Administrator Man Ho testified she met and coordinated arrangements for the event with John Huang, the former top Democratic fund-raiser who so far has refused to cooperate with the committee's investigation. SANDY MATTICE, Republican Counsel: You gave John Huang a list, and the list indicated the names of individuals who had been invited and who would attend the luncheon with Vice President Gore, right? VENERABLE MAN HO, Hsi Lai Temple: Right. SANDY MATTICE: And that list also contained on a separate line an indication of how much money some of these individuals had contributed prior to the event, right? VENERABLE MAN HO: Right. SANDY MATTICE: Okay. Do you remember how much money--when you gave this list to John Huang, do you remember how much the total amount of money was that had been collected prior to the event? VENERABLE MAN HO: $45,000. SANDY MATTICE: Okay. Now, in your deposition, Man Ho, you told me you no longer have a copy of that list that you gave to John Huang, right? VENERABLE MAN HO: Right. SANDY MATTICE: But there was a copy of the list that you kept at the time you gave it to John Huang, right? VENERABLE MAN HO: Right. SANDY MATTICE: Well, what happened to your copy thereafter? VENERABLE MAN HO: I threw the copy away. SANDY MATTICE: You threw the copy of that list away? VENERABLE MAN HO: Yes. SANDY MATTICE: Why did you do that? VENERABLE MAN HO: After controversies last October, I'm afraid that the document might cause embarrassment to the temple. SANDY MATTICE: And so you destroyed it? VENERABLE MAN HO: Yes. SANDY MATTICE: And, in fact, you destroyed a number of other documents that had been created at the temple in connection with the event, did you not? VENERABLE MAN HO: Yes. SANDY MATTICE: Now, some of the individuals that had their photographs taken with the Vice President had contributed money in advance of the event, is that right? VENERABLE MAN HO: Right. SANDY MATTICE: Okay. Did John Huang serve as the master of ceremonies? VENERABLE MAN HO: I think so. TOM BEARDEN: The witness went on to testify that the day after the event, she received a call from Mary Shaw, who assisted John Huang in coordinating the event. SANDY MATTICE: What did Maria Shaw tell you in that phone conversation? VENERABLE MAN HO: She say something like, John Huang heard that the temple could contribute more money. She mentioned total amount was $100,000, and John Huang was going back to Washington, D.C., on that date. SANDY MATTICE: Okay. So she told you that John Huang had hoped to have more money. She needed a total of $100,000 to take back to Washington with him that day, right? VENERABLE MAN HO: Right. SANDY MATTICE: All right. TOM BEARDEN: The temple's treasurer testified through the use of an interpreter. SANDY MATTICE: Since you knew that you needed $100,000 and $45,000 had already been given, you knew that you needed to collect an additional $55,000, correct? VENERABLE YI CHU, Hsi Lai Temple: (speaking through interpreter) Yes. SANDY MATTICE: And since there are monks and nuns at the temple from around the country there that day, you simply approached the first monks and nuns that you saw and asked them if they'd be willing to contribute $5,000 to make up the $55,000 that you needed, is that right? VENERABLE YI CHU: (speaking through interpreter) Yes. SANDY MATTICE: Now, at the time that you asked these monks and nuns for these $5,000 checks you knew or at least were pretty sure that most of them--most of the people or at least some of the people that you asked for didn't have $5,000 in their checking account, right? VENERABLE YI CHU: (speaking through interpreter) Yes. SANDY MATTICE: And so in some cases at least you told them that you were going to immediately thereafter reimburse them with a check from the temple, right? VENERABLE YI CHU: (speaking through interpreter) Well, I didn't tell them that it was going to happen immediately, but I determined that for those people who were willing to contribute, I would reimburse them later on. TOM BEARDEN: But under the helpful questioning of Democratic Counsel Alan Baron, the three nuns stood by their assertion that the Buddhist temple event was not a fund-raiser. ALAN BARON, Democratic Counsel: Were you at the luncheon, itself, on April 29th? VENERABLE MAN HO: I was in the dining hall. ALAN BARON: And was there any table set up at the fund-raiser, where people were accepting checks? VENERABLE MAN HO: No. No table was set up. ALAN BARON: Did you see anyone during this event handling or passing checks from one to another? VENERABLE MAN HO: No. No. ALAN BARON: Did you hear anybody solicit money from anyone at the luncheon? VENERABLE MAN HO: No. ALAN BARON: Did any of the speakers at the luncheon ask the people at the luncheon to give money? VENERABLE MAN HO: No. TOM BEARDEN: The Buddhist nuns spent almost six hours answering questions. Before the committee before releasing the witnesses, Chairman Thompson said he, for one, was troubled with what he had heard. SEN. FRED THOMPSON: I think the best indicator of wrongdoing in this matter has to do with the actions that you took yourself. Mr. Sun is a very good lawyer and made a very eloquent statement on behalf of his clients, but it can't go without being said that you made some very sophisticated moves after the fact in terms of destroying documents and especially in terms of the alteration of documents. So you can understand while some of us might conclude that you either are a little more sophisticated than what we might have thought, or you had some help. TOM BEARDEN: David Strauss, the Vice President's former deputy chief of staff, will testify when the hearings on campaign fund-raising abuses resume tomorrow. JIM LEHRER: Two other views from the committee now, those of Sen. Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, and Sen. Robert Torricelli, Democrat of New Jersey. Sen. Specter, how serious a matter is this Buddhist temple episode to you? SEN. ARLEN SPECTER, (R) Pennsylvania: I think it is serious in that it represents a pattern as to what has been done on many, many cases. The idea of laundering where the money belongs to one person and it's represented to be given by another person is a serious matter, and it's part of an overall context, and especially when we have the testimony about records being destroyed and records being altered, and the question exists as to whether there is some overall plan to try to cover their tracks here. JIM LEHRER: Was it worth giving them immunity to hear their story today? SEN. ARLEN SPECTER: Oh, absolutely. The only limitation on immunity is that these individuals cannot be prosecuted. And they are not the kind of people who would be prosecuted in any event. The standard Department of Justice guidelines would not call for their prosecutions where they're conduits. And I think it is significant. It's really the totality as to what we are getting in part of an overall picture. JIM LEHRER: Sen. Torricelli, how would you rate the seriousness of what you heard today? SEN. ROBERT TORRICELLI, (D) New Jersey: Well, I think when we see people laundering money and this pattern of reimbursements is a serious problem, but to put into context, it's part of a similar serious problem we've seen before--John Huang. We have the same individual returning again, encouraging people, and participating in violating the law. So, we didn't learn anything new. We already knew that John Huang was violating the law, and we knew the extent of the problem. We just now have more evidence of it. JIM LEHRER: Sen. Torricelli, do you believe that Vice President Gore knew that this was--that this fund-raising, illegal fund-raising was going on? SEN. ROBERT TORRICELLI: I think clearly he did not. There's a sworn statement given to the committee by Vice President Gore's scheduler that she specifically asked whether or not this is a fund-raiser and was told it was not. I presented to the committee before we left in August a copy of the schedule that Vice President Gore actually had in his own possession on that day where it indicated that it was not a fund-raiser. The Vice President believed he was participating in a community outreach event, and interestingly, in his own remarks that he gave that day at the temple, he neither asked for money nor mentioned contributions. So I think clearly from the Vice President's perspective, he did not know what he was participating in was a fund-raiser and clearly did not know what John Huang was doing. JIM LEHRER: Do you view that the same way, Sen. Specter? SEN. ARLEN SPECTER: Well, I believe the question--Sen. Torricelli--was whether the Vice President knew about this laundering. And my judgment on that is that he did not know about it. I don't think that he would have known what was going on behind the scenes. I think it is a different question as to whether Vice President Gore knew that it was a fund-raiser. Tomorrow, when Mr. Strauss is questioned, we'll go through quite a number of documents which showed that this event was a fund-raiser. One of the documents was an E-mail from the Vice President which referred to a fund-raiser in Los Angeles, but I believe on this state of the record it would be premature and inappropriate to conclude that Vice President Gore knew that it was a fund-raiser. That is an open question, however, but the Vice President is entitled to the benefit of the presumption until there is evidence which shows the contrary. So I would not say that he knew it was a fund-raiser on this state of the record. JIM LEHRER: If he or anybody else working for him did know this was a fund-raiser, are they in trouble? SEN. ARLEN SPECTER: Yes. There is some doubt that people who worked for Vice President Gore knew that it was a fund-raiser. The documentary evidence is very strong that others knew that it was a fund-raiser. Not all of his staff knew, but quite a number knew that it was a fund-raiser. It is not lawful to have a fund-raiser at a temple. Are they in trouble? I don't think anybody is going to file a criminal charge against them, but there would be wrongful conduct in being an accessory before the fact or being possibly a co-conspirator. Those are tough words. I don't think that there's going to be a criminal prosecution against those individuals, but the overall point here I think most fundamentally is that we are seeing events here where there ought to be corrections, where we have to take all of this wash of money out of federal elections. That's really where we're heading on this inquiry, in my judgment. JIM LEHRER: Sen. Torricelli, what's your view? Sen. Specter made that same point at the beginning, that what this shows--no matter the seriousness of it as an individual event, it shows that this is the way things were done by others--I assume he believes too in the political process when it comes to raising money. Do you agree with that? SEN. ROBERT TORRICELLI: I think at this point, even for those of us who sit on the committee, the enormous amount of information about the Democratic National Committee and in previous testimony the Republican National Committee shows that good people are compromising good judgment because of the financial demands, which are so enormous in these campaigns. And in addition to good people compromising their judgment, bad people are being attracted into the process. To me-- JIM LEHRER: Explain that. What do you mean? SEN. ROBERT TORRICELLI: Well, John Huang did not belong in the Democratic National Committee and some of the other people who were involved in the campaign, who came into it either not understanding federal law, or clearly were inclined to disregard it, and I will say the same about activities we saw in the Republican National Committee. This is all part of what I think the committee is left with a judgment, which is unmistakable at this point that there is simply too much money in this process. The rising cost of television, which is at the core of this, is driving this--the consumption of this by the television networks--and this cannot be handled anecdotally. Revealing the facts in a committee is not enough. We need comprehensive campaign finance reform which dramatically restructures the system itself. JIM LEHRER: But back to the specific process that was employed in this Buddhist temple episode, do you know from either your own experience or your experience as a member of this committee and this investigation, what's come out, that this was a common process, in other words, whether it was a Buddhist temple or a labor union or whatever, to make these kinds of donations surreptitiously? SEN. ROBERT TORRICELLI: Well, I think we know from testimony from Democratic National Committee officials that this clearly not only was not sanctioned but that there would have been actions taken against any individual who did this by the leadership of the Democratic National Committee and certainly the White House. But we know now to a certainty that there were people at lower echelons, including John Huang, who were making it a practice, not on one instance but on several instances. And it would not surprise me if we did not learn of others, which leads us to the view they didn't belong there, and they were not adequately supervised. But clearly at the leadership of the committee and at the White House there is no evidence it was sanctioned and every evidence that had it been known, the people who were responsible for it would have been fired at a minimum. JIM LEHRER: Sen. Specter, what's your view of the widespread use of this particular process, as I said in my question to Sen. Torricelli, not Buddhist Temple, per se, but just other people who were interested in politics, as a way to get money into the system? SEN. ARLEN SPECTER: I think there is quite a lot of it on laundering where one person will put up the money and put it forward in the name of another person because there are campaign finance limitations. Where Sen. Torricelli talks about sanction, that is, knowingly setting this up, there's a lot of evidence here that they took no precautions against it. And that kind of an indifference really rises to the level of being reckless, so that there are people-- JIM LEHRER: You mean, they just kind of turned a blind eye to this sort of thing? SEN. ARLEN SPECTER: Well, that was what was done. There were a lot of danger signs about John Huang, and some people in the Democratic National Committee tried to take a stand against him, and he would go to the White House directly, or Johnny Chung would do that. So the whole process of having some rudimentary precautions were ignored, and again, this is not just the Democrats. I think t his is a general problem. JIM LEHRER: Well, the specific question that arises in the Buddhist nun situation is that would--would you not logically ask how would these individual nuns come up with $5,000 each? SEN. ARLEN SPECTER: Well, of course, you would have to ask that kind of a question. I think the issue of laundering, it's done a lot, and we have to stop it. When you go to a Buddhist temple and you involve nuns, it goes to show you to what extreme levels you would do it. Who would pick on these nuns as conduits in a political campaign? Only somebody very, very desperate. JIM LEHRER: All right, Senators, thank you very much. We will be back to you all in just a moment because we want to go now to another part of the Vice President Gore fund-raising story, which has prompted a Justice Department investigation. Margaret Warner has that.

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