Truth - Al Franken [69]
When that e-mail hit the papers, even some Republicans were embarrassed. But amid the kerfuffle, or maybe because of the kerfuffle, “Abraham Jackoff” (as he was known in high school)4 was impressed. He talked the young, not-fully-formed Scanlon into joining his lobbying and law firm, Preston Gates. Besides nabbing a rising star, the hire helped cement Abramoff’s extremely profitable relationship with Tom DeLay.
As Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff would report: “For years, nobody on Washington’s K-Street corridor was closer to DeLay than Abramoff.” Michael Scanlon wasn’t the first DeLay aide to enjoy the fruits of that friendship, but he was almost certainly the one who got the most fruit. As Abramoff put it in yet another e-mail to Scanlon, an uncharacteristically nonracist one:
You are a great partner. What I love about our partnership is that when one of us is down, the other is there. We’re going to make $ for years together.
And Scanlon felt the same way:
You got it, boss.
It almost makes you like them. If only they weren’t making all of that $ by ripping people off.
And no one got ripped off worse than the Tigua.
In 1993, the tiny and impoverished Tigua tribe opened the Speaking Rock Casino on the dusty east side of El Paso, Texas. Interestingly, the rest of El Paso was built on land that had been taken from the Tigua, which is one reason why they became so tiny and impoverished.
Now, you might be opposed to Indian gaming. Perhaps you object to all gambling on religious grounds or for sociological reasons. Or maybe you’ve lost a lot of money at a blackjack table. Or maybe you’re an Italian casino owner with ties to organized crime, and you don’t like the competition. Or maybe you just don’t like Indians. People oppose Indian gaming for all kinds of reasons, some good, some bad.
But it’s worth pointing out that the Tigua used their casino money to create jobs with good wages and health insurance, build decent housing, and provide college scholarships for their children. As Lori Rivera, a former supervisor in the casino cashier’s office, who grew up in a one-room mud shack without running water or electricity, told a New York Times reporter: “Before the casino, most Tigua kids didn’t stay in school because they were so poor they couldn’t afford shoes, and they were embarrassed.” Once the casino opened, “Everything was going really well.”
That is, until Texas Governor George W. Bush entered the picture. One of the planks of his 1998 reelection campaign was opposition to casino gambling generally, and the Speaking Rock Casino specifically. When Bush won, he sent Attorney General John Cornyn, who later became a U.S. senator, to go after the Tigua’s casino.
But when Cornyn filed suit in 1999, he had more than Bush on his side. He also had the benefit of a statewide PR, lobbying, and grassroots campaign organized by Ralph Reed, the formidable former executive director of the Christian Coalition.
Reed wasn’t fighting the Tigua merely out of the goodness of his heart. He had lots of other reasons. Four point two million reasons. Each one, a crisp dollar bill.
The money came from the Louisiana Coushatta, who operated an extremely profitable tribal casino along the Texas border and wanted to shut down competition in neighboring states. Reed had hooked up with the Coushatta through his old friend Casino Jack. Abramoff and Scanlon were in charge of a whole range of operations for the Coushatta, who ultimately paid them a cool $32 million. So they could afford to throw a little money Reed’s way.
Besides, Reed had delivered for Casino Jack before. In 1999, Abramoff had arranged for Reed to help his pals in the Mississippi Choctaw, the richest and most successful gambling tribe in the country, to block a proposal for a state-sponsored lottery and video poker in nearby Alabama. In exchange for $1.3 million, Reed produced radio ads featuring James Dobson, organized phone banks, and printed church bulletin inserts.
Reed, Abramoff,