FORMER US HOUSE SPEAKER DENNIS HASTERT SPENDING TAXPAYER’S MONEY WHILE LOBBYING FOR TURKEY
PanARMENIAN.Net
22.12.2009 14:37 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, serves
as a foreign agent for the Turkish government to lobby against the
Armenian Genocide Resolution while spending over $40,000 a month of
U.S. taxpayers money on office space, staff, cell phones and a leased
SUV, as reported by Politico; a political journalism organization
based in Arlington, Virginia, and highlighted by the Armenian Council
of America.
The ethics and transparency on the issue has been called into question,
since Under Federal law the utilization of such a salary paid for
by US taxpayers is provided to former Speakers of the House for
up to five years as long as the funds are not used in the course
of lobbying. However, as Politico quotes Kenneth Gross, a former
Federal Election Commission general counsel and congressional ethics
authority, that sort of separation is hard to maintain. Hastert "has
to be meticulous in his schedule to make sure there is no bleed from
his publicly subsidized office into his private practice."
Having no other office set aside for lobbying, at present, the
federal government pays $6,300 per month to rent Hastert’s office
in Yorkville, Illinois. Furthermore, the U.S. government pays the
salaries of three of Hastert’s assistants in his Illinois office –
each more than $100,000 in 2008, and an additional $2,000 per month
in taxpayer money on a consulting firm, Burnham Strategies, that is
run by several of Hastert’s former congressional staffers.
In 2000, citing claims by then President Clinton that the consideration
of the Armenian Genocide Resolution (H.R.596) would have endanger
American lives, Hastert; as Speaker of the House, broke his pledge to
bring the measure to the House floor moments before the resolution
was to come for a vote. In 2005, allegations arose that Hastert may
have been previously the recipient of tens of thousands of dollars
of secret payments from Turkish officials in exchange for political
favors and information.
"As an American tax payer and descendent of Armenian Genocide survivors
and victims I find it highly repugnant and despicable on many levels
that my tax dollars are possibly funding a Turkish lobbyist who works
feverishly to deny the historical tragedy of my ancestors," stated
Vasken Khodanian, Chairman of Armenian Council of America. "Hastert,
through his past record, has clearly shown that he is easily bought
by denialists of history and anti human rights proponents and this is
just another example of the type of unprincipled person he has proven
to be; taking money from hard working Americans during a time when
the nation is in financial crisis to pay for historical revisionism,"
continued Mr. Khodanian.