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HenchPAC NewsFormer DNC fund-raiser Johnny Chung, the only witness to fully cooperate with the Justice Department's campaign finance probe, said late Monday that Vice President Al Gore solicited him and other key Asian-American businessmen inside the White House in 1995, confirming information first reported by NewsMax.com Monday morning.
Chung made the startling admission to a national television audience on Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" less than twelve hours after the NewsMax.com report first appeared.
The Vice President's solicitation included requests for both hard and soft money, said Chung, making Gore's White House fund-raising potentially illegal -- even under the strict interpretation of campaign finance law offered by Attorney General Janet Reno.
"The Vice President, after we were there at the Hayes-Adams hotel in 1995 with members of the DNC's Business Leadership Forum, we were taken to the White House," said Chung. "The Vice President said that it was important to bring out political ads, issue ads, to the American public."
When asked by FNC's Sean Hannity whether Gore wanted only soft money for DNC issue ads or hard money for Clinton-Gore re-election ads, Chung said, "My recollection is, both."
Reno declined to appoint an independent counsel for Gore in 1998 because, she explained, Gore's fund-raising on federal property was limited to soft money solicitations, which she insisted was still legal under current law.
But if Justice Department probers were able to corroborate Chung's account, the Attorney General would have had little choice but to accept recommendations for the appointment of an independent counsel by both FBI Director Louis Freeh and the man she handpicked to head up her campaign finance probe, Charles LaBella.
Chung says he described Gore's White House solicitation in detail during a 1998 meeting with LaBella in Los Angeles.
In a development that may spell further trouble for the Vice President, Chung revealed that Clinton money-man Charlie Trie was present at both the Hayes-Adams fund-raiser and the later meeting in Gore's White House office.
Trie's involvement in fund-raising for Gore only became known in February, when The Los Angeles Times revealed portions of the Chinagate figure's account to the FBI. Trie told the FBI that it was his idea for Gore to attend the controversial fund-raiser at the Hsi Lai Buddhist Temple in 1996, an invitation that Gore now says was a "mistake" for him to accept.
Trie later handed off responsibility for organizing the temple fund-raiser to longtime Gore finance figure Maria Hsia, who was convicted on five felony counts earlier this month on the basis of her involvement in the event.
If still sealed LaBella Memo testimony by Trie corroborates Chung's account of Gore's White House fund-raising, the Vice President could be in serious legal jeopardy -- which could explain why Attorney General Reno still refuses to release LaBella's full report.
Read Carl Limbacher's Exclusive from Yesterday's NewsMax.com RIGHT BELOW THIS ARTICLE!
Chinagate whistleblower Johnny Chung is ready to go public with what he told Justice Department campaign finance task force chief Charles LaBella: Vice President Al Gore discussed campaign contributions with him and several other potential donors inside the White House.
NewsMax.com has learned exclusively that Chung revealed he attended a luncheon fund raiser at Washington's Hayes-Adams Hotel in 1995 where Vice President Gore met with Chung and twenty to thirty members of the Democratic National Committee's Business Leadership Forum.
After the fund-raising event Gore invited Chung and his group to the White House and where Gore openly sought campaign contributions.
Though excerpts of the LaBella Report were leaked to the Los Angeles Times ten days ago, it is believed the most damaging information remains under seal in the still top-secret document.
One portion of the LaBella memo, which recommended that Attorney General Janet Reno appoint an independent counsel to investigate Al Gore, suggested that Vice President Gore may have committed perjury. LaBella stated in his memo that the Vice President "may have provided false testimony."
Vice President Gore has heatedly denied he improperly raised funds. LaBella, however, may have been referencing more than Chung's account to make his claim that the Vice President may have lied.
Chung's politically explosive account to LaBella could be one of the key reasons Attorney General Janet Reno insists on keeping his report under lock and key.
Though Gore narrowly missed the appointment of an independent counsel in 1998 for making illegal fund-raising phone calls from federal property, Chung's account is the first to implicate the Vice President in face-to-face fund-raising inside his White House office.
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