White House Releases Record of Abramoff Associate Visits

While Jack Abramoff himself only scored seven visits to the White House — at least, according to released records — his friends and associates were more frequent guests. That’s according to a payload of Secret Service records released last night by the White House.

Chief among those visitors were Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed, both of whom worked with Abramoff to get him and his clients access to the administration.

Norquist got “was cleared for 97 visits to the White House complex between 2001 and 2006, including a half-dozen with the president,” according to the records. Norquist’s access was sure enough that he charged big money for meetings with Bush — the price of admission was a hefty contribution to Norquist’s nonprofit Americans for Tax Reform. Two of Abramoff’s tribal clients coughed up $25,000 each for a meeting with Bush in May of 2001. In July of 2002, Norquist asked Abramoff for $100,000 to set up a meeting.

Reed, who lost his bid for Lt. Governor of Georgia due in large part to his work for Abramoff, got 18 White House meetings, including two with Bush, according to the records. And he agreed to help Abramoff secure a White House meeting at least once; when Abramoff was paid $1.2 million by the Malaysian government to bring Bush and Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad together. According to emails obtained by The National Journal, Reed agreed to help Abramoff set up the meeting. Mahathir ultimately met with Bush in May of 2002.

The newly released documents also show that Abramoff’s other pals also were not strangers to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Former Team Abramoff members, now admitted felons Neil Volz and Tony Rudy had 18 and 13 scheduled visits, respectively; their colleagues Sean Vassell and Kevin Ring both had about 20 visits. And two of Abramoff’s former colleagues who went on to work in the administration — Patrick Pizella (an assistant secretary of labor) and David Safavian both visited “countless times,” according to the AP. Safavian, of course, was convicted in June on charges that he lied to ethics officials about his relationship with Abramoff.

The document release — which, as the DNC points out, is an incomplete accounting of the visits — settled a lawsuit by the nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and the Democratic Party stemming from their FOIA requests for the records. The White House had fought release of the documents tooth and nail, claiming that the documents were privileged.