One would think after Jack Abramoff's former firm, the Alexander Strategy Group, shuttered its doors that the Spinning Sinning Senator David Vitter would stop hanging out with the principals and employees of that disgraced firm. But then again, the Spinning Sinning Senator thinks that such common sense rules don't apply to him:
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Sen. David Vitter (R-La.)
Fundraising Dinner at 6:30 p.m.
Location: 330 Maryland Avenue, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002
Hosted by: AT&T Federal PAC and Dan Gans Cost: $1,000 per person/PAC
Another couple of refugees from the defunct Republican Alexander Strategy Group have turned up as the Polaris Government Relations lobby shop.
Daniel Gans , who was chief of staff to then-Rep. Bob Riley (R-Ala.), and Amelia Blackwood recently registered to lobby on behalf of the Association of Kentucky Fried Chicken Franchisees on such issues as estate taxes, "frivolous obesity suits," the minimum wage and avian flu. The association was a Gans client at ASG.
ASG closed in January because of its ties to disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff and to former House majority leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.). DeLay is under scrutiny in the Abramoff case and faces Texas charges of campaign-money laundering
So he's still hanging out with folks that did business with Abramoff. And lest we forget, the Spinning Sinning Senator did quite a bit of business with Abramoff himself, who was a principal of the Alexander Strategy Group, according to Roll Call:
Former GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff hosted a September 2003 fundraiser for now-Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) just two months before Vitter inserted a provision in an Interior spending bill helping one of Abramoff's tribal clients.
Vitter has stated repeatedly that he only met Abramoff once and had no idea that Abramoff's client, the Coushatta Indians of Louisiana, were funding an anti-gambling group with which Vitter had repeated dealings.
But Abramoff hosted a Sept. 9, 2003, fundraiser for Vitter at the restaurant Signatures in Washington, D.C., a popular GOP eatery that Abramoff has a financial stake in.
Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) wrote to the Federal Election Commission on April 15 to report that he had discovered that the Washington restaurant Signatures had not charged his credit card -- as he said he had directed -- for a 2003 fundraiser for 16 people that cost $1,846. The event was hosted by Jack Abramoff, a lobbyist and part-owner of the restaurant who is now under congressional and criminal investigation for his handling of millions of dollars in fees from Indian tribes.
