The Players - PAC's, Lobby's and Finances

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Lobbyists, PAC's, and Financial Backing

Ralph Reed

Former Executive director of the Christian Coalition;

GOP

operative and

Grassroots Lobbyist

; Founder and President of Century Strategies; Close

associate of Jack Abramoff

Ralph Reed is the P

ied Piper of the Religious Right

ne of

Abramoff's oldest friends and closest business associates

since

College Republican National Committee in the early 1980s.

A report by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, which spent

two years probing Abramoff's lobbying activities,

disclosed that

Reed's consulting firm, Century Strategies in Duluth, Ga.,

received a total of $5.3 million from the Choctaws and the

Louisiana Coushattas tribe. The payments came from Preston

Gates & Ellis, where Abramoff worked in the late 1990s, and

from two Scanlon-run entities, the American International Center

and the consulting firm Capitol Campaign Strategies.

But the committee's report didn't include another $1 million that

was funneled to Century Strategies through anti-tax activist

Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform. The Mississippi

Choctaws provided that money in 1999 for a successful drive in

Alabama spearheaded by Reed and other religious

conservatives against a proposed state lottery and a video-

poker bill in the state Legislature that threatened Choctaw

revenues.

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ack Abramoff

Lobbyist and Republican politic

an activist ; a

protégé

of Tom DeLay and

Karl Rove.

Jack Abramoff is a former American political lobbyist, a

Republican

political activist and businessman who was a central

figure in a series

of high-profile political scandals. Jack Abramoff

was named in the

McCain Congressional investigations of Indian

Affairs as the recipient

of 13 million dollars to funnel from the

Mississippi Choctaw Indian Tribe

to Alabaman politicians to

defeat Don S

gelman and the lottery in

Alabama.

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Edwin A. Buckham - The U.S. Family Network

DeLay's former chief of staff and the organizer of the U.S. Family Network

The U.S. Family Network, a public advocacy group that operated

in the

1990s with close ties to Rep. Tom DeLay and claimed to

be a

nationwide grass-roots organization, was funded almost

entirely by

corporations linked to embattled lobbyist Jack

Abramoff, according to

tax records and former associates of the

group.

During its five-year existence, the U.S. Family Network raised $2.5

million

but kept its donor list secret. The list, obtained by The

Washington Post,

shows that $1 million of its revenue came in a single

1998 check from a

now-defunct London law firm whose former

partners would not identify the

money's origins.

Two former associates of Edwin A. Buckham said Buckham told them

the

funds came from Russian oil and gas executives. Abramoff had

been

working closely with two such Russian energy executives on their

Washington agenda, and the lobbyist and Buckham had helped

organize a

1997 Moscow visit by DeLay (R-Tex.).

In March 1999, after the [Choctaws] had paid a substantial sum directly

the U.S. Family Network, Buckham expressed his general gratitude

Abramoff in an e-mail. "I really appreciate you going to bat for us.

Remember it is the first bit of money that is always the hardest, but

means

the most," Buckham said, according to a copy. He added: "Pray

for God's

wisdom. I really believe this is supposed to be what we are

doing to

save

our team

During this period, a fundraising letter on the U.S. Family Network

stationery was sent to residents of Alabama, announcing a petition

drive to

promote a cause of interest to Abramoff's Indian gambling

clients in

Mississippi and Louisiana, including the Choctaw casino that

drew many

customers from Alabama: the blocking of a rival casino

proposed by the

Poarch Creek Indians on their land in Alabama.

"The American family is under attack from all sides: crime, drugs,

pornography, and one of the least talked about but equally as

destructive --

gambling," said the group's letter, which was signed by

then-Rep. Bob

Riley (R), now the Alabama governor. "We need your

help today . . . to

prevent the Poarch Creek Indians from building

casinos in Alabama."

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Sponsored by Friends of Don Siegelman 2007
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Who are the Players?
FINANCING