 Hillary Clinton greeted at August 2000 Hollywood gala and fund-raiser by Peter Paul and his wife Andrea (Courtesy Hillcap.org) |
A portion of a videotape alleged to be “smoking-gun evidence” of Sen. Hillary Clinton’s commission of a series of felonies has been released by a business mogul who says he was the New York Democrat’s biggest donor in her 2000 campaign.
As WND reported over the weekend, the five-minute videotape indicates Clinton – despite denials throughout six years of investigation – was directly involved with Peter Franklin Paul in producing a lavish Hollywood fund-raiser in August 2000 that eventually cost Paul nearly $2 million.
Paul told WND he is releasing a 40-second portion of the tape, covering the end of a July 2000 telephone conversation, to demonstrate the tape’s “bona fides.” He plans to release the full tape in a few weeks as the focal point of a documentary on Sen. Clinton.
“The three branches of government were thwarted, for lack of evidence, in their efforts to hold Hillary accountable,” Paul said. “The evidence, albeit belatedly, is now available for the public to be judge and jury.”
The excerpt can be viewed here: |
Clinton’s participation in the planning of the event would make Paul’s substantial contributions a direct donation to her Senate campaign rather than her joint fundraising committee, violating federal statutes that limit “hard money” contributions to a candidate to $2,000 per person. Furthermore, knowingly accepting or soliciting $25,000 or more in a calendar year is a felony carrying a prison sentence of up to five years.
In the 30-second excerpt – the end of the conversation – Clinton is heard via speakerphone thanking Paul, business partner Stan Lee and other colleagues for their efforts in putting together the fund-raiser.
She also describes the role of longtime aide Kelly Craighead as assisting in day-to-day involvement in preparation for the event as her liaison with Paul and his producers.
 Peter Paul and Sen. Hillary Clinton (Courtesy Hillcap.org) |
Craighead, Clinton says, “talks all the time” with Paul, “so she’ll be the person to convey whatever I need.”
The aide’s hands-on role is significant, because the law also implicates a candidate if any of his or her agents are involved in coordinating expenditures with a donor.
The conversation in the tape excerpt went as follows: (A reference is made by Clinton to a joke about Marvel Comics icon Lee securing the “mutant vote” for the then-senatorial candidate in New York state.)
STAN LEE: … just accept the thanks.
[snip]
HILLARY CLINTON: That’s fabulous; it’s going to be so terrific. Well, you just let me know if there is anything I need to do, and I know you and Kelly talk all the time, so she’ll be the person to convey whatever I need, but I just wanted to call and personally thank all of you
I’m glad you were all together so that I could tell you how much this means to me; and it’s going to mean a lot to the president too.
LEE: Well that is so nice. And believe me, your call means a lot to us.
PAUL: It does.
CLINTON: Well thank you, my friends, and … onward with the mutant vote! (Laughter)
LEE: Excelsior!
PAUL: Good luck in New York.
CLINTON: Take care, bye bye.
In another portion of the tape, Clinton is heard discussing her direct solicitation of a large contribution from a major Hollywood figure.
The tape was one of 90 Paul was ordered to turn over to the U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York in 2001 as part of the investigation in a related securities case against him. But it has never been used as evidence, despite its relevance to the key question of Sen. Clinton’s involvement in the Hollywood fund-raiser.
Paul’s legal team is preparing to use the full videotape as evidence in his civil fraud suit filed against Bill and Hillary Clinton, which claims the former president destroyed his entertainment company to get out of a $17 million deal in which Clinton promised to promote the firm in exchange for stock, cash options and massive contributions to his wife’s 2000 campaign. Paul contends he was directed by the Clintons and Democratic Party leaders to foot the bill for the Hollywood event.
Prior to Paul’s recovery of the tape in April, his attorney Colette Wilson of the U.S. Justice Foundation filed a brief in the civil lawsuit alleging Sen. Clinton’s violation of a federal code that carries a possible five-year prison sentence.
Sen. Clinton has claimed through her spokesman Howard Wolfson that Paul gave no money to her campaign, and her supporters have denied she had any anything to do with coordinating the fund-raiser or soliciting contributions directly from donors.
Clinton’s campaign has counted the more than $800,000 of in-kind contributions it reported in a 2006 amended FEC report for the Hollywood Gala as indirect, or “soft money,” given to the New York Senate 2000 Committee, a state account that was run jointly by Clinton, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and the New York State Democratic Party.
The Clintons’ longtime attorney David Kendall did not reply to WND’s request for comment on Paul’s videotape. Kendall previously has declined comment on the case, saying only to WND regarding the felony assertion, “Any such allegation is totally false and totally unsupported.”
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