Man who blew whistle on
Abramoff tells the story of how
he did it
By Susan Crabtree
http://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/77951-man-who-blew-the-whistle-on-abramoff-tells-his-story
Condensed by Native Village
Jack Abramoff
Tom Rodgers was instrumental in
exposing one of Washington’s
biggest scandals. His efforts
landed lobbyist Jack Abramoff
and Rep. Bob Ney (R-Ohio) in
prison, forced Tom DeLay
(R-Texas) from office, and
helped Democrats take control of
the House and Senate in 2006.
In the aftermath, Congress
passed the most sweeping new
ethics rules since Watergate.
But few knew of Rodgers
involvement until he went public
with his story in 2010.
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Tom Rodgers |
“We watched this all unfold and
we remained quiet,” Rodgers said
about his silence. “At
that time, we were stereotyped
as ignorant and greedy Indians.
But we knew different … we knew
the time to tell this story
wasn’t then.”
It began in January, 2003, when
Rodgers received a phone call
from Bernie Sprague, the
subchief of the Saginaw Chippewa
Tribe in Michigan.
“Tom, I was told I could trust
you,” Sprague said. “Tom, we’re
being threatened by our
lobbyist.”
Sprague said Abramoff planned to
sue him after Bernie questioned
invoices and million dollar fees
Abramoff charged to lobby for
tribes in Washington.
Rodgers, a former Democratic
staffer, then faced a difficult
choice: meddling in Abramoff's
business to help his friends, or
remain silent. Abramoff was
among the most powerful
Republican lobbyists in
Washington. Those who confronted
him risked paying a heavy
political and personal price
But after hearing details about
Abramoff’s schemes, threats and
deception, Rodgers couldn’t turn
away. He told a small group of
trusted friends who worked on
Capitol Hill what he was about
to do. They cautioned him to be
careful and warned him that he
could lose everything.
Soon, the very tribes Abramoff
lied to and stole from quietly
began efforts to destroy him --
with the help of Rodgers, a
trusted fellow Native American
of mixed Blackfoot and Irish
heritage. “We
wanted
to do something that would
better our democracy and help
Native Americans,” Rodgers
stated.
In the meantime, Abramoff was
familiar with Rodgers’s
reputation for honesty and
following the rules. He even called
Rodgers a “moron” for doing so.
With the warnings in mind,
Rodgers hired a respected
lawyer, Philip Hilder.
Hilder
had represented Sharon Watkins,
the whistleblower in the Enron
case. He cautioned Rodgers to
lay low -- or face the
consequences.
“I judged him to be quite
credible, but I also know the
realities of Washington -- that
if he would have reared his
head, it would have been
decapitated,” Hilder says.
Before Sprague had contacted
him, Rodgers was already
tracking Abramoff’s colorful
exploits: his work for Angolan
rebel leader Jonas Savimbi; his
work with an anti-communist film
"Red Scorpion;" and his purchase
of a fleet of casino boats and
the death of the fleet's former
Mafia owner. (Abramoff was
convicted in 2006 for fraud and
conspiracy in the purchase of
the SunCruz fleet.)
Rodgers also received critical
information from Monica Quigley.
Quigley was a longtime friend
and former attorney for the
Saginaw Chippewa tribe. She had
been fired after questioning
Abramoff’s invoices and
activities. She said the Saginaw
Chippewa had been sending
$2,000,000 checks to
Abramoff to lobby for their
tribe. The funds had been sent
to Capitol
Campaign Strategies, a
public-relations group run by
Michael Scanlon, Abramoff’s
right-hand man.
When
Sprague told him Capitol
Campaign's address, Rodgers was
immediately suspicious. He drove
to the address. What he found
was a Mailboxes Etc.
“[Capital Campaign's] Suite 375
was seven inches high and 11
inches deep,” he said.
In the following months and
years, Rodgers worked with the
Saginaw Chippewa tribe, the
Alabama Coushatta and the
Coushatta tribe of Louisiana to
gather internal invoices and
documents. Then they contacted
the BIA.
“We were told [by the BIA] that
it was an internal affair,”
Rodgers recalled. “I turned to
[Vice Chairman of the Louisiana
Coushatta tribe David Sickey and
Sprague] on a conference call
one night and said, ‘Now we need
to go another way. We’ve
accumulated the data; we have
all the information we need. We
need to leak it.’
So, slowly and strategically,
they leaked the information to
the media, beginning with the
tribes' local media sources.
After the first local articles
appeared, Rodgers sent manila
folders with a packet of the
articles, invoices and other
documents to good-government
groups well as the National
Journal and The Washington Post.
(The Post's Susan Schmidt
eventually won a Pulitzer Prize
for her series on the Abramoff
scandal. )
Shortly after the first Post
stories appeared, Philip Hilder
provided the Justice Department
with the same packet/
Sen. John McCain, the
chairman of the Indian Affairs
Committee, quickly called for hearings to investigate
Abramoff’s activities.
Rodgers then called up Pablo Carillo,
the lead staffer on the
committee’s investigation.
“How can I help you?” Carillo
asked Rodgers when he picked up
the phone.
“Actually, I believe I can help
you,” Rodgers responded, telling
him about the invoices and
documents he had amassed.
“How soon can you be here?”
Carillo responded.
The
rest is history...
Following his years of silence,
Rodgers is finally getting the
experience off his chest. He
decided to reveal his role
because the Abramoff scandal may
be coming to a close. Abramoff
has served nearly four years in
prison, with two more to go.
Rodgers
also knows that critics might
accuse him of destroying
Abramoff in order to steal his
clients or benefit Democrats.
Rodgers insists that he would
have spoken up no matter what
party the players belonged to.
He never received a cent
from the tribes, nor has he
taken them on as clients. For Tom, it was a labor
of love in protecting his
people. He was simply outraged
over the abuse of Native
Americans whose heritage he
shares.
“We did it when it mattered and
we didn’t do it for money or for
fame, and the records bear that
out,” he said. “What’s important
is that the tribes that were
defrauded and cheated and abused
did something about it,” he
said.
Rodgers’s role was featured in a
new documentary, “Casino Jack
and the United States of Money,”
which premiered at Sundance. The
film will be shown in
Washington, D.C. later this
year.
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