Dole Campaign Press Release - Answers to the Clinton Campaign's Questions

Dole for President Campaign Manager Scott Reed released the following statement today:

"Earlier this afternoon, your campaign provided a list of questions, following are our prompt and full answers to them, Along with the American people, we continue to await your responses to the very straightforward questions we sent to you earlier this week and last week, Apparently there's only one campaign that's willing to tell the American people the truth.'

1) Why did your running-mate Jack Kemp mislead the American people by claiming on national television that you fired your Vice Chairman after his illegal actions on behalf of your campaign were discovered, when, in fact, you never fired or even suspended Fireman?

Mr. Fireman's role in the Dole campaign had ended well before the campaign learned of his violations. But as Bob Dole made clear when Fireman's actions came to light, there is no room in the Dole for President campaign for anyone who engages in illegal or unethical fundraising techniques. Following our request for an immediate investigation into the Fireman case, the U.S. Attorney's office in Boston exonerated the campaign completely. Bill Clinton's Democratic National Committee, on the other hand, continues to pay top fundraiser John Huang and refuses to disown him, despite the clear and overwhelming evidence of massive campaign violations on his watch.

2) Why haven't you made Simon Fireman available to the press to answer questions about his illegal fundraising scheme on your behalf?

We would be delighted to arrange an on-camera roundtable with American entrepreneur Simon Fireman and your rogues' gallery of Indonesian billionaire Mochtar Riady, San Francisco scam artist Yogesh Gandhi, green cud gardener Arief Wiriandinata, and South Korean business executive John Lee. Special guests could be the Buddhist monks who took vows of poverty yet were given thousands of dollars to funnel to the DNC. The difficulty on your side will clearly come from the fact that most of the participants have fled to foreign countries, taken vows of humility, or disappeared entirely. We look forward to your attempt to find all of your foreign donors, though.

3) Why won't you make your staff fundraisers who raised the money from Simon Fireman, Empire Landfill and DeLuca Liquor available to the press to answer questions about these illegal schemes to raise funds for your Presidential campaign?

We will gladly make our staff fundraisers available to answer any questions provided you make John Huang available as well. We would be happy to schedule interviews tomorrow afternoon with CNN's Brooks Jackson, the Washington Post's Ruth Marcus, the New York Times' Stephen Labaton, the Wall Street Journal's Phil Kuntz, the Associated Press' Marcy Gordon, and representatives of the three major television networks. Let us know what time tomorrow would be convenient for Mr. Huang.

4) Have you returned the nearly $50,000 that your campaign received from Empire Landfill and the over $10,000 that your campaign received from DeLuca Liquor and Wine?

The Dole for President campaign returned not only the contributions from Simon Fireman but also the matching funds. If any additional contributions should be determined to be illegal, the Dole campaign will promptly return them as well. The Clinton campaign and the DNC, however, have refused to refund even the most egregiously illegal contributions: the $450,000 from the Indonesian gardener -- $300,000 of which was made from Indonesia -- and the $140,000 raised illegally at a Buddhist temple in California. We can only hope that the DNC will now do so without delay.

5) Do you expect Haley Barber and Newt Gingrich to resign from their jobs? Each said that they would stake their jobs on the fact that the RNC had not accepted money from foreign nationals or a foreign company. Yet yesterday's Roll Call reported that the RNC just returned an illegal $15,000 check from a Canadian company.

There's an obvious difference between the multi-million dollar mountain of illegal Clinton and DNC foreign contributions and a $15,000 Canadian molehill.

The tiny contribution from the Canadian company to the Republican Governors' Association is dwarfed by even the smallest of the Clinton campaign's infractions -- the illegal $250,000 contribution from a since-vanished South Korean company. The only person who should be resigning in shame is our feckless Fundraiser-in-Chief himself, Bill Clinton. On the honesty front, we also would remind you that it was DNC Chairman Chris Dodd who promised a national television audience last weekend that he would make John Huang available for media interviews. Has anyone seen Mr. Huang since then?

Scott Reed

Campaign Manager