This week's proposed US Senate-Jesse Helms confirmation hearing over the appointment of Carol Moseley-Braun as New
Zealand Ambassador, is likely to bring information on her background sharply back into focus. John Howard reports.
According to Jane Chastain, whom Jesse Helms helped get a TV sportscaster job when women weren't considered for sports
casting, Moseley-Braun's campaign for US Senator in 1992 has been under as big a cloud as Bill Clinton's 1996
presidential campaign, but thanks to some handiwork at the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) and the Justice Department
neither has been successfully resolved.
"By giving Moseley-Braun a hearing, Helms may succeed in uncovering at least one scandal buried by Clinton
administration funeral director, Janet Reno," Chastain said.
"The nomination of Moseley-Braun is now seen by many as simply the latest act of recklessness by an unrepentant
president besieged by a campaign finance scandal, which was swept under a rug at the Justice Department, she said
"The Moseley-Braun cloud involved some $280,000 in political donations that may have been diverted to pay for designer
clothes, jewellery, cars and luxury vacations for her and her campaign manager and former boyfriend, Kgosie Matthews."
"The FEC did not clear Moseley-Braun of wrongdoing, but merely closed the books on the investigation with the five-year
statute of limitations running out. The FEC stated it did not have time to conclude its investigation."
"The IRS Criminal Investigative Division initiated a probe into whether Moseley-Braun used this money for personal use
without reporting the income and paying taxes. The IRS twice asked the Justice Department to open a grand jury
investigation of Moseley-Braun and was denied," Chastain said
"Questions are now being asked how Moseley-Braun, a $45,000-a-year Cook County recorder of deeds, managed to afford such
a lavish lifestyle in the months immediately after her election to the US Senate that included expensive vacations,
travel by private jet and the Concorde and a $950-a-night suite in Maui? How did she manage to come up with the cash for
a Jeep Cherokee or $10,000 for jewellery in Aspen?"
"And who authorised Matthews to charge thousands of dollars in designer clothes in Beverly Hills on his campaign-issued
MasterCard? These are just some of the issues that the FEC and the Justice Department chose to ignore," said Chastain.
Moseley-Braun answered the criticisms about the expenses by saying she had earned extra cash doing legal work on the
side and making paid speeches. Matthews says he was owed an equivalent amount of out-of-pocket expenses he had incurred
on the campaign's behalf.
Chastain says, "The FEC processes have now been examined and it has been discovered that auditors did raise questions
but the questions never made it onto the public record."
Republican Trevor Potter, a former FEC chairman said, "Had I been aware that evidence existed, it would have been a
serious matter, and I would have exepcted the commission to pursue it."
"As these facts are explored in her confirmation hearing for ambassador to New Zealand, hopefuly the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee will decide to keep her home. Rest assured this decision will supported by the real women of
America, from all ethnic persuasions, who agree with Senator Helms that our highest-ranking diplomatic officials should
be above reproach," Chastain concluded.
ends