Clinton, Inc.: The Audacious Rebuilding of a Political Machine

by Daniel Halper

  Like many Senate offices, where staff changes are common as people move up and onward to other Senate offices, committees, or the private sector, Senator Clinton’s office saw significant staff turnover. During her eight years in office, she had almost two hundred paid employees. She also put together what biographers Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta Jr. described as a “shadow staff” of a “few dozen” congressional fellows, whose hiring appeared to violate Senate ethics rules.15 These “fellows” would perform work for Clinton’s Senate offices without costing her a dime, and served to significantly expand the size of her staff. “[Hillary’s] practices in running her Senate office have sometimes demonstrated a cavalier attitude toward the rules and a proclivity toward secrecy,” the authors wrote in 2007. “[I]n the case of some of her shadow employees, she has failed to ensure that they agree, in writing, to abide by the same Senate rules that apply to permanent staff.”

  Senator Clinton also permitted some staff members to work several jobs. Abedin, for one, at one point received a $27,000 salary in the Senate. Senator Clinton, however, also allowed her to join the payroll of her campaign reelection committee and her political action committee simultaneously. Such activities, which Clinton permitted for dozens of aides, blurred the lines between government work and political work. Though this was permissible under ethics guidelines, and other senators have performed similar feats, the authors noted that Hillary’s use of multiple salaries from multiple organizations for her staffs was exceptional and might well have skirted the spirit, if not the letter, of ethics requirements.

  In addition to official and unofficial staff, Senator Clinton maintained close friendships with people who would prove influential to her when she chose to seek the presidency. These included the journalist Sidney Blumenthal, who found work as Washington bureau chief of the influential Salon online magazine and wrote fawning books about the Clintons. A New York Times review of his book The Clinton Wars was scathing: “Barely mentioning others close to the Clintons, and illustrating this memoir with smiling, convivial photographs of himself in their company (though much of the book is about others, like the less lovable Kenneth W. Starr), Mr. Blumenthal sends a clear message to his administration colleagues: Mom liked me best.”16 He proved a tireless defender and promoter of the Clintons’ interests, which all but certainly influenced his journalistic integrity. “His most often repeated assertion, throughout an 800-plus-page memoir and political treatise,” the Times noted in its book review, “is this: ‘The charge was, of course, completely false.’ ”

  Exhibiting her paranoid tendencies, Senator Clinton focused quickly on the need to counter what she infamously called “the vast right-wing conspiracy.”17 “We do have to do a better job to compete in the arena with the ideas we already have,” Clinton told the New York Times in 2003. “But it’s also clear to me that we need some new intellectual capital. There has to be some thought given as to how we build the 21st-century policies that reflect the Democratic Party’s values.”18 So Clinton would also lend a hand to forming two organizations that would serve as liberal policy advocates and, not incidentally, sharp defenders of the Clintons. One of them was the Center for American Progress. “CAP was founded,” one founder would later say, “on the idea that, when you fight on equal footing, progressive ideas come out on top.”19

  The organization would be staffed by loyalists like former aide Neera Tanden, who would later become CAP’s president, and who would keep Hillary’s aspirations in mind. It also would include as members John Podesta, a chief of staff in the Clinton White House, along with Gene Sperling, Clinton’s former economic advisor, and Robert Rubin, Clinton’s Treasury secretary.

  “There’s no escaping the imprint of the Clintons. It’s not completely wrong to see it as a shadow government, a kind of Clinton White-House-in-exile—or a White House staff in readiness for President Hillary Clinton,” wrote Robert Dreyfuss, a writer for the liberal Nation magazine.20 It was all part of the shadow organization meant in part to serve as a sort of holding ground for policy makers to rethink liberal policy, reframe that policy, fight against conservatives who might see the world differently, and ultimately be ready for when (they hoped) Hillary would retake the White House.

  There’s another element of CAP, however. It’s a Clinton legacy organization. It’s founded by Clintonites, for Clintonites. It’s this sort of organization that in part helps define the time between President Bill Clinton’s time in office and the expected entrance of Hillary Rodham Clinton into office.

  Of course, other former presidents in the modern era have presidential libraries—and foundations and other organizations established to preserve and in some way shape the legacy of the president they are named after. No other former president, though, has established organizations such as CAP that take such an active role in current politics and policy debates. And no other president has created such a legacy organization that is always present in Washington—and always doing what it can to help prepare for the return of the Family back to town—just blocks away from the White House.

  Of equal import was another Clinton-backed creation, Media Matters for America, which bills itself as “a Web-based, not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.”21 The organization was founded by journalist David Brock, a former Hillary Clinton critic who once wrote for the conservative American Spectator. It was Brock who first reported that state troopers assigned to Governor Clinton in Arkansas had arranged trysts for the philandering politician and helped cover his tracks. In that article a woman named “Paula” was identified by first name only—and would later be fully identified as Paula Jones.22 Jones would later allege that she had been sexually harassed by Bill Clinton—and the whole thing would lead to the Monica Lewinsky scandal and of course the president’s impeachment.

  Brock would famously break with conservatives a couple of years later and eventually become close to Hillary Clinton. As the head of Media Matters, he had helped it become an influential left-wing hit group that focuses on going after the conservative media and receives enormous credibility and attention. Brock’s goal is to keep the media in line for Democrats, a generally easy task made simpler by his hard-hitting maneuvers, which cast all who see the world differently from him as dishonest and evil.

  As Hillary Clinton once noted to a liberal audience of activist bloggers, “We are righting that balance—or left-ing that balance—not sure which, and we are certainly better prepared and more focused on taking our arguments and making them effective and disseminating them widely and really putting together a network in the blogosphere in a lot of the new progressive infrastructure—institutions that I helped to start and support like Media Matters and Center for American Progress. We’re beginning to match what I had said for years was the advantage of the other side. You know, when I made that comment about the vast right wing conspiracy, I wasn’t kidding. What I never could’ve predicted is that it wasn’t a conspiracy—it was wide open for everybody to see and unfortunately they elected a president and a vice president with whom we’ve had to contend for the last six and a half years. But the fact is, they were better organized, more mission driven, and better prepared to take on the political balance of the last part of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century.”23

  An important aspect of her time as U.S. senator was her learning the ability to fund-raise—and to reward friends. She had played a supporting role for years, helping her husband raise money—and helping pay back the donors. But now it was her turn—and within years she earned the nickname, from the media outlet Bloomberg, the “Queen of Federal Pork.”24

  According to documents obtained from an organization that has been doing opposition research on Hillary Clinton and that is combing through her full record, between 2001 to 2007 Mrs. Clinton was able to secure earmarks totaling $536 million for companies that combined to cont
ribute $514,700 to her various campaign organizations. For these companies, for every thousand dollars given to Mrs. Clinton, a million dollars was returned in the form of a federal earmark. BAE Systems got earmarks totaling $9,700,000 in defense appropriations; PACs and individuals associated with the company gave Hillary $10,000. Likewise, Corning, Inc. got $6,700,000 and contributed $95,850 to Hillary; DayStar Technologies got $1,000,000 and gave $1,000; Delphi Corporation got $3,000,000 and gave $2,000; DRS Technologies got $16,500,000 and gave $14,600; EDO Corporation got $1,800,000 and gave $4,500; General Motors got $10,550,000 and gave $206,000. The list goes on.

  In one four-year stretch, from 2002 to 2006, Hillary Clinton was able to secure more than $2 billion in earmarks—an eye-popping sum. The Associated Press reported, “The beneficiaries have ranged from defense giant Northrop Grumman Corp. to New York–based Telephonics, which won $5 million for helicopter equipment.”25

  Just as the Clintons’ alleged involvement with crooked donors was the subject of congressional inquiries while they were in the White House, the same allegation was made once Hillary began her own political career. She allegedly deployed a fugitive, Norman Hsu, as a fund-raiser, and there were reports that a New York developer named Robert Congel had made a $100,000 donation to Bill Clinton’s foundation in exchange for millions of dollars in federal assistance for a mall project by Congel. The New York Times reported that around the time of the donation, “Mrs. Clinton helped enact legislation allowing the developer, Robert J. Congel, to use tax-exempt bonds to help finance the construction of the Destiny USA entertainment and shopping complex,” and nine months after the donation, Clinton “also helped secure a provision in a highway bill that set aside $5 million for Destiny USA roadway construction.”26

  Of course, the Clinton camp—and for that matter the Congel camp—denied any quid pro quo. “Mr. Congel and Philippe Reines, a spokesman for Mrs. Clinton, both said there was no connection between his donation and her legislative work on his project’s behalf. Mr. Reines said Mrs. Clinton supported the expansion of Carousel mall ‘purely as part of her unwavering commitment to improving upstate New York’s struggling economy, and nothing more.’ ”27

  Taking on the right—via CAP and Media Matters—and finding future money streams to help achieve future political aspirations was only part of Hillary’s planned offensive. She would also spend a considerable amount of time trying to seduce people on the right. In that, she took lessons from the master charmer himself, her husband, Bill Clinton, who in the first years after his presidency was building his own entourage and set of institutions.

  As he worked to establish his postpresidential gravitas, Clinton could count on the usual hangers-on. One was longtime advisor Paul Begala, who would use his perch on various cable news channels to defend his former boss. And of course James Carville, the bald, serpent-eyed Cajun with a reputation for acidic barbs against Clinton enemies. A man who, like Clinton, was born poor and has used his political connections to become a multimillionaire.

  Carville’s memoir about Clinton’s 1992 election victory, called All’s Fair, was coauthored with his wife, Mary Matalin, who was the political director for the George Bush reelection campaign. The book came with a $700,000–800,000 advance, and along with Carville’s $15,000 speaking fee—today it’s at least twice that amount—it was an early indication after the 1992 election that Carville would never need to run another political campaign. He could instead become a millionaire by, in his words, “being me.”28 With a net worth now estimated at around $5 million, Carville has been known to give more than a hundred speeches a year, has published ten books (most of them bestsellers), appeared in more than a dozen movies, sitcoms, and TV dramas (often playing himself), and made a host of commercials with Matalin for everything from Maker’s Mark to Alka-Seltzer. He was a cohost of CNN’s Crossfire, is now a cohost with Tim Russert’s son Luke of a sports show on XM satellite radio called 60/20 (a reference to the hosts’ respective ages), and is a Fox News contributor. He also, having once flunked fifty-six hours’ worth of college classes, teaches political science at Tulane. As the New York Times put it, “Carville, largely by dint of energy and personality, has blended politics, entertainment and celebrity into a lucrative empire with a single product to sell: James Carville.”29 Carville had also benefited handsomely from Bill Clinton’s financial largesse—Clinton has, according to someone knowledgeable of both Clinton’s and Carville’s dealings and of the field, helped Carville secure lucrative contracts to serve as a “political consultant” to foreign political leaders who Clinton warns really could use Carville’s help.

  The Clinton entourage also included various Hollywood celebrities, with the assorted rumors and gossip that seemed to follow him. It wasn’t exactly new—and almost everyone who had any real access to Bill Clinton knew about his reckless, Kennedyesque attachments to women. Even in the White House he all but flaunted his assignations in front of Hillary and everyone else around him, seeming to get a thrill by what would be forgiven or excused.

  Then, of course, there was Lencola Sullivan, the first African American Miss Arkansas, whose name first arose during the Lewinsky investigation as another alleged Clinton mistress.30 The relationship began in 1978, when Clinton was attorney general of Arkansas, and Sullivan’s job, as the beauty pageant winner, was to take dignitaries around.

  In a recent phone call, Sullivan tells me she’s still good friends with Bill Clinton and the rest of his family. “My friendship with the entire family extends over thirty years and I don’t have any desire whatsoever to be a part of any publication—because there’s been so many negative things that have been talked about and written about the entire family, specifically both Hillary and Bill, that I wouldn’t want to be a part and drag them through something more negative because that doesn’t serve anybody.”

  When I make the point to Sullivan that President Clinton is an historical figure—and that, therefore, his relationships with anyone are worth exploring, she responds with snark. “I’m keenly aware of how my name has kind of been dragged around with this historical figure.”

  And when I remind Sullivan that there have been previous reports linking her “romantically” with Clinton, she says, “You read the papers,” and laughs heartily. “That’s what they say. No one has talked to me. I have not talked to anyone.”

  “Right,” I say, “so I’m talking to you now.”

  Sullivan declines numerous attempts to confirm or deny a “romantic” relationship, often objecting to the line of questioning. (Yet she confirms to me another previously reported on fact: that she dated singer Stevie Wonder. “We’re very good friends,” she says of that former boyfriend.)31

  “I’m not going to be involved in any kind of negative press regarding [the Clintons]—because I don’t see where this is relevant. The line of questioning where you’re going—I don’t see how that is relevant to what’s going on today. Right now. I mean, because this whole interview is supposedly based on the fact that Mrs. Clinton may possibly run for president. Is that correct or not?”

  It’s not, and after explaining my idea for this book, Sullivan says she likes that it’s about how the Clintons came back and overcame “adversity.” But dredging up the past is not something she wants to be a part of. They’ve come back, she maintains, because “they’re sincere people. I mean, they’re honest and sincere. They care about their relationships.” That’s how they went from the low of leaving the White House to the relative high where they are today.

  “I think it’s more important to talk about where they’re going,” rather than talk about the scandals or relationships of the past, Sullivan maintains. She refers me to Bill’s and Hillary’s memoirs for “powerful” accounts of their history. (For the record: she’s not mentioned in them.)

  In 2002, Clinton held an engagement party for her at his Harlem office. Her future husband, Roel P. Verseveldt, was a Danish citizen, a former actor and model, and had a degree in business economic
s, as well as being a graduate of the Special Branch of the Danish Police Academy. The prospective groom was also co-owner of a security agency and risk management firm.32

  The party was attended by friends from Arkansas, New York City, and, perhaps most pleasing to the former president, by other former Miss America contestants. Of course, the question on everyone’s mind, according to attendees, was an obvious one: Did the man she was about to marry know about her purported relationship with Bill Clinton? No one knew the answer.

  But Sullivan answered it in her phone call with me. “I keep no secrets from my husband at all,” she insists.

  And even today, Lencola Sullivan makes an effort to see her dear friend President Clinton.

  “If he’s anywhere around where I am, of course, I do my best to try to see him. Of course he has an extremely busy schedule. So that can be very challenging, of course.” Sullivan says she’s “very self-sufficient” in contacting organizers of European conferences or meetings where the former president will be speaking—and that’s how she gets in touch with him these days.

  Clinton’s involvement with various celebrities also had long been rumored—Eleanor Mondale, daughter of the former vice president; actresses Gina Gershon and Elizabeth Hurley; and even the singer Barbra Streisand.

  A close Clinton friend, who’s hit the links with him and worked for him, met me in a low-key and secluded Washington, D.C., eatery and spoke only on background. He offers a sympathetic defense. I rattle off names and ask about the various stories, from the more outlandish rumors that almost certainly have been exaggerated to the multiple affairs confirmed to me by those in the Clinton inner circle. “Everybody you think he fucked, he did—and the more dangerous the better,” he says, mentioning various celebrities. “All genius is flawed. The great artists are addicted, whether to alcohol or they’re drug addicts or whatever. His addiction is pussy.”