[A-List] US congressional election fiasco

["Keaney Michael" <Michael.Keaney@xxxxxx>]

Sleaze fallout threatens Democrat majority

US senator's resignation after corruption claims leaves Republicans
ready to take his seat and control of Congress

Oliver Burkeman in New York
Wednesday October 2, 2002
The Guardian

The Democratic party in the US was scrambling to avoid losing its
wafer-thin majority in the Senate yesterday after accusations of sleaze
forced a high-profile New Jersey senator to abandon his re-election
campaign at the last minute.

The downfall of Robert Torricelli - who was one of Bill Clinton's
closest confidants - left Democrats facing the prospect of their 50-49
majority being reversed in November's mid-term elections. They began a
court battle yesterday to replace Mr Torricelli on the New Jersey
ballot, even though state law sets the deadline for changes at 48 days
before an election. Only 35 days remain.

The 51-year-old senator, nicknamed "the Torch", was admonished by the
Senate's ethics committee after allegations that he accepted gifts
including a Rolex watch worth $8,100, (£5,400), expensive Italian
suits and a discount on a 132cm (52in) television from David Chang, a
Korean businessman who wanted his help in recovering money the North
Korean government owed him.

Mr Torricelli denied the allegations, and prosecutors decided not to
file criminal charges. But the last straw was a memo from the
investigation which surfaced last week referring to "substantial
corroborating evidence" for criminal charges against him.

Until then the evidence had come mainly from Chang, described in the
memo as "deeply disturbed". Chang, who once claimed Mr Torricelli had
threatened to kill him, is serving a prison sentence for illegally
funnelling $53,700 in contributions to the senator's 1996 campaign.

Mr Torricelli had apologised, denied breaking the law and embarked on a
damage-limitation exercise, running TV advertisements apologising for
"lapses of judgment". In a press conference on Monday that blended
contrition and self-pity in equal measure, Mr Torricelli said that
resigning was "the most painful thing" that he had ever done.

"I am a human being," he told reporters in Trenton, the state capital.
"And while I have not done the things I have been accused of doing, I
most certainly have made mistakes... There is a point at which every man
reaches his limit. I've reached mine."

He said that Bill Clinton had phoned several times to commiserate him.
"The phone connection wasn't the best, but I could hear his voice
crack... When did we become such an unforgiving people?"

Mr Torricelli said he was pulling out because he refused to be
"responsible for the loss of the Democratic majority of the United
States senate". "I will not allow it to happen," he said.

That will be cold comfort to the party's leaders; if they lose in court
Mr Torricelli will be left on the ballot and the election of the first
Republican senator from New Jersey in three decades will be inevitable.

Depending on the outcomes of the other 33 polls in November, the
Republican party may assume control of the Senate. With the party
already controlling the presidency and the House of Representatives,
that would potentially reduce the volume of congressional objections to
developments in George Bush's war on terrorism and a planned military
assault on Iraq.

Even if they are permitted to replace him, the Democrats must find
someone with a high-profile name and an estimated $8m (£5m) to pay for
the appropriate television advertising, a task they ambitiously promised
to complete by today.

The name of the former senator and basketball star Bill Bradley, who
lost the presidential nomination to Al Gore in 2000, surfaced on Monday
night, but by yesterday morning he had signalled his lack of interest,
apparently failing to return a telephone message left by the Senate
majority leader, Tom Daschle.

The Republican candidate, Douglas Forrester, said: "The laws of the
state of New Jersey do not contain a 'We think we are going to lose so
we get to pick someone new' clause." He has turned Mr Torricelli's
14-point lead into a 13-point lead of his own in three months by
presenting himself as an ethically upstanding "anti-Torch".