The Travel Office

Travelgate is a story about the failure of the Clinton White House to live up to the ethical standards expected of the highest office in the land. The wrongdoing of this administration lies not in the firings of the seven Travel Office employees. They served at the pleasure of the President. If the President chose to fire them to reward political cronies, that was his prerogative.

Rather, the wrongdoing occurred after the firings. It resulted from a desire to hide the truth about who actually fired them and why. The committee spent 3 1/2 years investigating not just who fired them and why, but the wrongdoing that followed. The resulting mosaic pieced together from the facts uncovered reveals the answers the White House refused to disclose. In the end, the actions of the Clinton administration following the firings may have a lasting and damaging impact on the Office of the Presidency.

The committee has found that the motive for the firings was political cronyism: the President sought to reward his friend, Harry Thomason, with the spoils of the White House travel business. A pretext for the firings was created, and the trigger was pulled.

When the public reacted to the firing with outrage, the roles of the President, First Lady and Thomason were minimized as the White House staff engaged in a colossal damage-control effort. First, it had to portray the victims of the firings as the wrongdoers. This was achieved by White House officials unleashing the full powers of the Federal Government against the seven former workers. The extraordinary might of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Justice- not to mention the prestige of the White House itself -all were brought to bear. These actions constitute a gross abuse of the rights of seven American citizens and their families.

Second, an enormous and elaborate cover-up operation, housed in the White House Counsel's Office, sought to prevent numerous investigations from discovering not only the roles of who fired the workers and why, but also their efforts to persecute the victims. In the process…it obstructed and frustrated all investigations; it turned the Office of the White House Counsel into a political damage-control operation; it made frivolous claims of executive privilege; it abused its powers to smear innocent citizens; and most important, it failed to level with the American people.

… a long-hidden memo by a key figure in the Travel Office affair, David Watkins, disclosed that Hillary Clinton, based upon information provided by Harry Thomason, pressured senior White House aides for the firings. Despite President Clinton's misleading press accounts that he knew little about the firings, …Bill Clinton actually was briefed on the firings 2 days before they occurred. And then-Assistant to President Clinton for Management and Administration, David Watkins reluctantly became the designated fall guy for the firings in order to protect the higher-ups who had directed his actions.

…the long-hidden notebook kept by Vincent Foster had been in the office of White House Counsel Bernard Nussbaum following Mr. Foster's death. The notebook chronicled Mr. Foster's anguish over Hillary Clinton's role in the firings, Harry Thomason's potential criminal liability, and whether the White House scandal containment strategy could be maintained to stop at the level of David Watkins.

… Mrs. Clinton directed President Clinton's Chief of Staff, Mack McLarty not to tell President Clinton about the torn up "suicide" note found in Vincent Foster's briefcase on July 26th, 6 days after his death. Mrs. Clinton instructed the President's senior aides to wait until a "coherent position" was developed before informing the President. The note was essentially an outline of a defense of the Travel Office firings. When it took more than a day to turn the note over to the proper law enforcement authorities, both the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General were so concerned that the Deputy Attorney General immediately initiated an FBI investigation into the delay in turning over the note. In the investigation of the delay, no one mentioned Mrs. Clinton's involvement in reviewing the note or recommending a delay in turning it over.

…a letter long withheld from all investigators which David Watkins wrote to "Hillary." In that letter, Watkins lamented that the GAO revealed conversations that Watkins had with Mrs. Clinton. Mr. Watkins assured Mrs. Clinton that he knew who his "client" was and regretted revealing that Mrs. Clinton told him she wanted "those people out" and "our people in."

…the lives of seven innocent long-time career Government employees were shattered, their reputations smeared, to make way for the ambitions and arrogance of the President's friends and family. We learned that the FBI and IRS became involved in this matter because of Harry Thomason's false allegations that Travel Office Director Billy Dale received illegal "kickbacks" from a charter airline company. The White House knew very quickly that the alleged source of the kickback charges denied ever making them. But upon learning this fact, the White House did nothing to correct the public record it had created through misinformation.

In fact, long after President Clinton's White House staff knew the allegations were false, they continued in their efforts to make a case against the beleaguered and increasingly impoverished Billy Dale. The Department of Justice (``DOJ'') case, U.S. v. Billy Ray Dale, was sorely lacking in evidence. It was compromised by missing records that had not been secured by the Clinton White House or the Justice Department.

It was obvious, even to Justice Department prosecutors, that they had no witnesses who could provide any derogatory information about Billy Dale. Finally, they were left only with the dubious claim that the notoriously frugal Mr. Dale lived a ``lavish lifestyle.'' The prosecution revealed to the jury the ``scandalous'' evidence that Mrs. Dale went to a hairdresser and purchased large quantities of groceries for the Lake Anne vacation home the two-career Dales saved many years to build and enjoy. Predictably, Dale was acquitted in less than 2 hours by a jury of his peers.

Unfortunately, Mr. Dale's speedy acquittal did not put an end to his 3-year ordeal. The IRS pursued Dale, threatening income tax audits. The IRS also was busy in Smyrna, TN auditing the company that did business with Mr. Dale at the Travel Office, UltrAir.

Only recently was Mr. Dale given a clean bill of health by the Internal Revenue Service after 3 years of intense scrutiny. UltrAir had no tax liability and an owner of UltrAir received a $5,000 refund before the IRS gave up its search for any shred of evidence to justify its harassment of this small struggling business.