Hillary’s China Connection
by Paul R.
Hollrah
The Los Angeles Times disclosed in an
October 19 investigative report that Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign has
been the beneficiary of hundreds of thousands of dollars in suspicious
contributions from donors in New York’s Chinatown. According to the Times, “Dishwashers,
waiters, and others whose jobs and dilapidated home addresses seem to make them
unpromising targets for political fundraisers are pouring $1,000 and $2,000
contributions into Clinton’s campaign treasury. In April, a single fundraiser in an area
long noted for its gritty urban poverty yielded a whopping
$380,000…”
The Times examined the cases of more than
150 donors who wrote checks to Clinton after fundraising events geared to the
Chinese community. One-third of
those donors could not be found… And several dozen were described in FEC reports
as holding jobs… that would normally make it difficult to donate amounts ranging
from $500 to the legal maximum of $2,300.”
A tenement at 44 Henry Street was
listed in Clinton’s FEC filings as the home of Shu Fang Li, a $1,000
contributor. A woman living in the
apartment said that she had never heard of Shu, although she has lived there for
ten years.
A building in East Broadway, beneath
the Manhattan Bridge, was listed as the address of $1,000 contributor Sang
Cheung Lee. Neighbors said they
knew of no one by that name at that address.
Clerks at a store on Canal Street,
listed as the place of employment of $1,000 contributor Shih Kan Chang, were
equally mystified. Employees said
they had never heard of Chang.
Another listed donor, Yi Min Liu,
admitted to having attended a banquet for Clinton but denied having made the
$1,000 contribution that was reported in his
name.
Of course, none of this is new to the
Clintons. They may be convinced
that those of us who have followed their criminal careers for the past two
decades have either forgotten their past sins or disposed of our voluminous
files. They would be badly
mistaken.
A short stroll down memory lane
reminds us that, in 1993, under Hillary Clinton’s sponsorship, John Huang,
president of an Arkansas subsidiary of Indonesia’s Lippo Group, left Arkansas to
accept a senior policy position in the U.S. Department of Commerce. On June 30, 1994, after obtaining top
security clearances and receiving all of the necessary intelligence briefings,
Huang was named Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for International Trade
Policy.
Then, in a September 13, 1995 Oval
Office meeting, which included the president, Huang, and Huang’s former
employer, Indonesian billionaire James Riady, it was decided that Huang would
leave the Commerce Department to become a fulltime fundraiser for the Democratic
National Committee.
During his tenure at the DNC, Huang
had little difficulty raising money.
For example, on August 1, 1996, Hillary’s protégé sold $122,000 worth of
tickets for a single event, Bill Clinton’s 50th birthday party, to
yet another Clinton friend, Charlie Yah Lin Trie, a man with a lot of Chinese
cash to spend. It was a hard sell…
about as tough as selling a poker chip to a
gambler.
The source of Trie’s money? In its June 7, 1998 edition, the Washington Times reported that House
investigators had pieced together an elaborate network showing how Trie and his
associates funneled Chinese money into Democratic Party coffers. According to House investigators, the
money trail led from mainland China to Macao businessman Ng Lap Seng, from Ng to
Charlie Trie, from Trie to a nationwide network of “straw” donors, and from the
“straw” donors to the Democrats.
In just one major transaction, Trie
donated more than $600,000 to the Clinton Legal Defense Fund. Much of the money was contributed… get
this… via consecutively-numbered
money orders, mailed from cities across
the country, with different
contributor names affixed… but all
signed by the same person and each containing the same misspelled word. (Don’t you just hate it when that
happens?)
Clearly, the Clinton’s have mastered
the technique of “reverse bundling,” where a single contributor, say the Chinese
Peoples Liberation Army, wishes to enhance the political prospects of a favored
American candidate. During the Bill
Clinton era, one of their principal conduits was Charlie Yah Lin Trie. Now, in the Hillary Clinton era, we have
imprisoned Chinese businessman Norman Hsu.
Doubtless there are others.
As might be expected, the New York Times appeared only slightly
interested in the story. In an
October 19 editorial they wrote, “Corruption already is licking at various
candidates’ treasuries as unscrupulous bundlers turn out to be faking claims of
small donations, writing big-number checks to buy
access.”
Have they forgotten how to spell
“Clinton” and “Edwards?”
Democrat stalwart Chris Matthews,
host of MSNBC’s Hardball, is no fan
of the Clinton’s. In a March 11,
2001 op-ed column describing the Clintons, he wrote, “Before this, we laughed at
poor little countries that drug dealers and international crooks could buy. We mocked the Third World capitals where
a little money on the fingers of a certain family member could open doors or
close eyes.
“Thanks to Bill and Hillary Clinton,
we have now forfeited that small national vanity. The next movie about international
drug-dealing… may well feature not a Mexican police chief but an American
president as the bag man.”
