April 17, 2008 04:40 PM UTC

Schaffer/Abramoff: When the Cat's Away...

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• by: Colorado Pols

A few of you may know that Michael Riley, the author of last week’s hard-hitting series of articles detailing Colorado Senate candidate Bob Schaffer’s relationship to disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff and labor policies in the Northern Marianas, left on a two-week vacation to South Asia over the weekend. Most of you probably didn’t know that, but Riley had planned the trip for months before this story broke.

Schaffer manager Dick Wadhams, however, was keenly aware of Riley’s absence, and used the time when the reporter doing his homework was away to attack Riley’s story with reporters who haven’t. Result? As the Denver Post’s Joey Bunch uncritically reports today:

U.S. Senate candidate Mark Udall accepted $1,500 in campaign donations from political action committees connected to jailed lobbyist Jack Abramoff, his campaign said Wednesday night after it was contacted by a conservative website.

Lobbying firm Preston Gates gave $500 to Udall’s congressional campaign in 2000, and Greenberg Traurig donated $1,000 two years later.

The lobbying work of the disgraced lobbyist has emerged as an issue in the race between Udall and Republican Bob Schaffer.

“We know of absolutely no connection between the contributions and Abramoff’s operations,” said Taylor West, a Udall campaign spokeswoman.

She said Udall would give the money to a Saipan-based organization that helps victims of human trafficking. The campaign had been contacted about the donations by Facethestate.com.

Schaffer’s campaign manager, Dick Wadhams, called Udall’s decision “insincere” because “he held that money for six and eight years.”

Wadhams provided a document titled “Mark Udall & Jack Abramoff” that showed two votes in which Udall opposed anti-gambling legislation that Abramoff was angling to defeat. In July 2000, Udall was among 245 House members to vote against the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act, the first vote Wadhams noted. House records show Schaffer voted the same way as Udall.

Wadhams said he knew of no Abramoff-connected campaign donations to Schaffer.

“There’s only one candidate in the Colorado Senate race that has received money from Jack Abramoff, and that’s liberal Democrat Mark Udall,” he said.

Anyone even casually following the Schaffer/Abramoff story knows that last statement is patently ridiculous. Schaffer has received thousands of dollars in donations from Abramoff clients in the Northern Marianas; Udall has taken none. If all we were talking about here was Preston Gates money, scores of Congressmen would be “guilty,” and Schaffer would have a valid counterargument. But he doesn’t, and we see the potential for backfire on the other side of this, as the Post refocuses on the real issue at the end of today’s story despite Wadhams’ best efforts:

Udall co-sponsored three bills aimed at addressing labor practices in the Northern Mariana Islands during his time in Congress, according to documents provided by his campaign.

Those would be the reforms Schaffer opposed, right? The ones that Schaffer battled against in congressional hearings, denied the need for after his return from Saipan, and rejected out of hand when he endorsed the territory’s status quo as a model, right? In perfect harmony with the strategy to stall reform there, masterminded by Abramoff and Schaffer’s campaign donors from the Northern Marianas like Gov. Benigno Fitial, right?

Right back where Michael Riley left off, folks.