Bill Clinton

Impeached for grand jury perjury and obstruction of justice; acquitted by the Senate

On December 19, 1998 the House adopted two articles of impeachment: that Clinton gave “perjurious, false and misleading testimony” to a federal grand jury (228 to 206) and that he “prevented, obstructed, and impeded the administration of justice” in a civil rights suit against him (221 to 212). On February 12, 1999 the Senate voted 45 to 55 on the first and 50 to 50 on the second, short of the two-thirds needed to convict, so he was acquitted on both.

Sources: House Resolution 611, articles of impeachment (govinfo) · House Clerk, roll call 543 · House Clerk, roll call 545 · Senate roll call 17 · Senate roll call 18

Last-day pardons for financier Marc Rich and for his own half-brother

$450,000 to his library from Rich's former wife (House report)

On January 20, 2001, his last day in office, Clinton pardoned Marc Rich, whose listed offenses were wire fraud, racketeering, income tax evasion, and trading with Iran and who had never been sentenced, and his own half-brother Roger Clinton, convicted of a cocaine conspiracy in 1985. A House committee report found that Rich's former wife, Denise Rich, “contributed $450,000 to the Clinton Library” and lobbied the president for the pardon. The report was issued by the committee's Republican majority and is printed with minority views from its Democrats. The FBI says its investigation of the pardon “was closed in 2005.”

Sources: Justice Department pardons list · House Government Reform Committee report 107-454 (Republican majority) · FBI Records: The Vault, William J. Clinton Foundation release note (archived copy)

First former president compelled to testify to Congress, over Epstein: “I saw nothing”

The House Oversight Committee subpoenaed Bill and Hillary Clinton on Aug. 5, 2025 in its Jeffrey Epstein inquiry. Both refused, calling the subpoenas legally invalid; Bill Clinton did not appear for a Jan. 13, 2026 deposition, and on Jan. 21 the committee voted to recommend holding both in contempt, with nine of its 21 Democrats joining Republicans in his case. As the full House prepared to vote, the Clintons agreed to testify, and he was questioned under oath for about six hours in Chappaqua, N.Y., on Feb. 27, 2026; the committee released the video on March 2. He has not been charged with any crime in connection with Epstein, and AP reported there is no evidence of wrongdoing by either Clinton. AP said after the depositions that Republicans seemed to be moving on, and NBC News said the status of a Justice Department inquiry that Trump ordered in November 2025 into Epstein’s ties to Clinton and other Democrats was unclear.

Their response: Clinton, opening statement, Feb. 27, 2026: “I saw nothing, and I did nothing wrong.” He also said: “not only would I not have flown on his plane if I had any inkling of what he was doing” and “I would have turned him in myself and led the call for justice for his crimes.” The Clintons had called the subpoenas “nothing more than a ploy to attempt to embarrass political rivals, as President Trump has directed.” Committee chairman James Comer, before the deposition: “No one is accusing anyone of any wrongdoing, but I think the American people have a lot of questions.”

Sources: House Oversight Committee release on the contempt vote (Jan. 21, 2026) · House Oversight Committee release on the deposition dates (February 2026) · AP via PBS News (Feb. 3, 2026) · NBC News (Feb. 27, 2026) · AP via PBS News (March 3, 2026) · PBS News: Clinton’s opening statement (Feb. 27, 2026) · AP via PBS News (Feb. 25, 2026) · The National News Desk via NewsChannel 9 (Jan. 13, 2026)

Flew on Jeffrey Epstein’s jet on four trips in 2002 and 2003; Epstein had visited the Clinton White House

Flight logs made public in civil litigation show Clinton and his entourage took four international trips on Epstein’s Boeing 727 in 2002 and 2003, 26 flight legs by ABC News’s count, with Ghislaine Maxwell listed as a passenger on each trip. The last was in November 2003; ABC says the first reports that Epstein was under investigation surfaced in 2005. While Clinton was president, Epstein gave $10,000 to the White House Historical Association and attended a 1993 donors’ reception with Maxwell, and AP reports that visitor logs show him at the White House multiple times in the 1990s. Epstein’s lawyers wrote in 2007 that he was “part of the original group that conceived of the Clinton Global Initiative,” and Maxwell’s lawyers cited her help developing it at her sentencing. None of the flight records that have surfaced show Clinton traveling to Epstein’s island, and in a 2015 email released by Congress in 2025 Epstein wrote: “Clinton was NEVER EVER there, never.”

Their response: Clinton spokesman Angel Urena, July 8, 2019: “President Clinton knows nothing about the terrible crimes Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to in Florida some years ago, or those with which he has been recently charged in New York.” The statement said he “took a total of four trips on Jeffrey Epstein’s airplane” with staff and his Secret Service detail, and “has never been to Little St. James Island, Epstein’s ranch in New Mexico, or his residence in Florida.” In his 2024 memoir Clinton wrote: “I wish I had never met him.”

Sources: ABC News (Nov. 18, 2025) · CNN (July 8, 2019) · AP via PBS News (Feb. 25, 2026) · The Daily Beast (July 24, 2019) · NBC News (Nov. 12, 2025)

Epstein files show Clinton in undated photos and a 2003 birthday note; no survivor had publicly accused him as of Nov. 2025

Justice Department files released from December 2025 under the Epstein Files Transparency Act include undated photos of Clinton in a hot tub, in a pool with Ghislaine Maxwell, and beside women whose faces are redacted; NBC News said none suggests any wrongdoing. A note from Clinton appears in the album Maxwell compiled for Epstein’s 50th birthday in 2003, and the January 2026 release included an FBI list of tips from the public, which CNN said appeared to be unverified, that made allegations against him, as well as a 2016 deposition in which Epstein took the Fifth on every question about Clinton. Virginia Giuffre told a British newspaper in 2011 that she dined with Clinton on Epstein’s island, but said she was not “lent out” to him and saw no interaction between him and other women there; she later testified that her account of how he arrived was secondhand, and Maxwell, Epstein and Clinton all say he was never on the island. ABC News reported in November 2025, before that release, that no Epstein survivor or associate had ever publicly alleged wrongdoing by Clinton.

Their response: Clinton, in his Feb. 27, 2026 deposition, as reported by AP: “There’s nothing that I saw when I was around him that made me realize he was trafficking women.” He said of Epstein: “We were friendly, but I didn’t know him well enough to say we were friends.” Asked about a pool photo with a woman whose face was redacted, he said he did not know her and did not engage in sexual activity with her, and that it was taken on a charity trip to Brunei. A Clinton Foundation spokesperson told ABC News of the emails released in 2025: “These emails prove Bill Clinton did nothing and knew nothing.”

Sources: NBC News (Feb. 27, 2026) · ABC News (Nov. 18, 2025) · The Guardian (July 24, 2025) · CNN (Jan. 31, 2026) · AP via PBS News (March 3, 2026)

Federal judge held him in civil contempt for false testimony, a first for a sitting president

$90,686 in court-ordered contempt payments

On April 12, 1999, U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright held Clinton in civil contempt over his January 1998 deposition in Paula Jones’s lawsuit, finding he gave “false, misleading and evasive answers that were designed to obstruct the judicial process.” The Washington Post and the independent counsel’s final report both describe it as the first contempt finding against a president. On July 29, 1999 she ordered him to pay $79,999.12 and $9,484.93 to two sets of Jones’s lawyers and $1,202 to the court, $90,686.05 in all, and she referred him to Arkansas bar authorities. Wright also said her earlier dismissal of Jones’s case would not have changed had he told the truth.

Their response: The court’s July 1999 order records that Clinton told it “he disputes allegations that he knowingly and intentionally gave false testimony under oath” but would not ask for a hearing or appeal. His lawyer Robert Bennett objected to the lawyers’ fee claims as “excessive”; they had asked for about $496,000 and the judge awarded about $89,500.

Sources: Jones v. Clinton, 57 F. Supp. 2d 719 (E.D. Ark., July 29, 1999), order setting contempt sanctions · Washington Post (April 13, 1999) · Final Report of the Independent Counsel regarding Monica Lewinsky, Part V, Conclusion (filed May 18, 2001)

Admitted giving false testimony under oath in a deal to avoid indictment; law license suspended

$25,000 fine and a five-year law license suspension

On January 19, 2001, his last full day in office, Clinton reached an agreement with Independent Counsel Robert Ray. He acknowledged in writing that some of his sworn answers about Monica Lewinsky in the Paula Jones lawsuit were false, accepted a five-year suspension of his Arkansas law license and a $25,000 fine, and agreed not to seek repayment of his legal fees; Ray in turn declined to prosecute. Ray’s final report says he had concluded that “sufficient evidence existed to prosecute” and that it would probably have been enough to convict. The U.S. Supreme Court suspended Clinton from its bar on October 1, 2001 and on November 13, 2001 struck his name from its roll after he asked to resign.

Their response: Clinton, written statement of Jan. 19, 2001: “I tried to walk a fine line between acting lawfully and testifying falsely, but I now recognize that I did not fully accomplish this goal and am certain my responses to questions about Ms. Lewinsky were false.” His lawyer David Kendall said the statement was not an admission of lying: “it’s not obstruction of justice. It’s not intentional falsification.”

Sources: Independent Counsel Robert Ray, televised statement, in his Final Report regarding Monica Lewinsky (Jan. 19, 2001) · Final Report of the Independent Counsel regarding Monica Lewinsky, Part IV (filed May 18, 2001) · Journal of the Supreme Court of the United States, October Term 2001 (entries of Oct. 1 and Nov. 13, 2001) · CNN (Jan. 19, 2001), archived copy

Denied, then admitted, a sexual relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky

On January 26, 1998, Clinton said at a White House event: “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie.” On August 17, 1998, after testifying to a federal grand jury, he told the nation he had had a relationship with Lewinsky “that was not appropriate. In fact, it was wrong,” and that he had “misled people, including even my wife.” His sworn denials in the Jones case led to his impeachment and acquittal (covered in a separate entry), a contempt finding and the suspension of his law license.

Their response: Clinton, Aug. 17, 1998: “While my answers were legally accurate, I did not volunteer information.” He also said: “at no time did I ask anyone to lie, to hide or destroy evidence, or to take any other unlawful action.”

Sources: Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents: remarks of Jan. 26, 1998 · Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents: address to the nation, Aug. 17, 1998

Paid Paula Jones $850,000 to end her sexual harassment suit, with no apology or admission

$850,000 settlement

Paula Jones, a former Arkansas state worker, sued Clinton in 1994, alleging he propositioned her in a Little Rock hotel on May 8, 1991, when he was governor. The Supreme Court ruled unanimously on May 27, 1997 that a sitting president is not immune from a civil suit over private conduct. A federal judge dismissed the case in April 1998; while Jones’s appeal was pending, Clinton agreed on November 13, 1998 to pay her $850,000, acknowledging no wrongdoing and offering no apology. Her amended complaint had asked for $525,000.

Their response: Clinton’s lawyer Robert Bennett said the president still insisted Jones’s allegations “are baseless” and added: “The president has decided he is not prepared to spend one more hour on this matter.” Jones’s husband said: “Paying a substantial amount of money makes a statement on its own.”

Sources: Washington Post (Nov. 14, 1998) · Clinton v. Jones, 520 U.S. 681 (May 27, 1997), syllabus, Cornell Legal Information Institute · Jones v. Clinton, 57 F. Supp. 2d 719 (E.D. Ark., July 29, 1999), order setting contempt sanctions · Final Report of the Independent Counsel regarding Monica Lewinsky, Part III, Findings (filed May 18, 2001) · Washington Post (Jan. 20, 1999)

Hillary Clinton’s brother was paid about $400,000 to seek last-day clemency for two men

$434,200 paid to Hugh Rodham; about $154,000 not returned as of June 2001 (House Republican report)

Hugh Rodham, Hillary Clinton’s brother, was paid to seek clemency for two men who received it on January 20, 2001: Carlos Vignali, a convicted cocaine trafficker whose sentence was commuted and whose father paid the fee, and Almon Glenn Braswell, pardoned for 1983 convictions for mail fraud, perjury and filing a false tax return. The House Government Reform Committee’s Republican majority put the payments at $204,200 and $230,000 and found Rodham gave the White House false information about Vignali. It also found that her other brother, Tony Rodham, received $244,769 from a couple pardoned in March 2000, and that Roger Clinton took $50,000 from the family of an imprisoned heroin trafficker whose release he lobbied for without success. Hugh Rodham said in February 2001 that he had repaid all of the fees after the Clintons, who said they had not known of them, told him to. The committee found that he refunded Braswell’s $230,000 but that, as of June 2001, he had returned only about $50,000 of the Vignali money, and that his lawyer said he had no plans to return the remaining $154,000; it concluded that he had “apparently misled the public” about returning the money.

Their response: Bill Clinton’s statement: “Neither Hillary nor I had any knowledge of such payments. We are deeply disturbed by these reports and have insisted that Hugh return any moneys received.” Hillary Clinton: “I knew nothing about my brother’s involvement in these pardons.” Rodham’s lawyer said he did nothing wrong. The committee’s Democrats criticized the Marc Rich pardon but said the chairman chose partisanship over “a focused and bipartisan inquiry.”

Sources: House Report 107-454, Government Reform Committee, Republican majority report, vol. 1 (May 14, 2002) · House Report 107-454, vol. 3: minority views of the committee’s Democrats (May 14, 2002) · CNN (Feb. 24, 2001), archived copy · Justice Department, Office of the Pardon Attorney: commutations granted by President Clinton · Justice Department, Office of the Pardon Attorney: pardons granted by President Clinton

Commuted sentences of four men from a village that voted 1,400 to 12 for Hillary Clinton; no charges

On January 20, 2001, Clinton shortened the prison terms of four men from the Hasidic village of New Square, N.Y., convicted in 1999 of defrauding federal programs of more than $30 million. Hillary Clinton had carried the village 1,400 votes to 12 in her November 2000 Senate race, and six weeks later she sat in on a White House meeting at which the village’s grand rabbi asked the president for clemency. Federal prosecutors in Manhattan investigated whether clemency was traded for votes and on June 20, 2002 declined to file charges. The FBI says its separate investigation of the Marc Rich pardon “was closed in 2005.”

Their response: Clinton’s lawyer David Kendall on the closing of the New Square inquiry: “This is a welcome, albeit completely predictable development.” The Washington Post reported that Hillary Clinton “has said she played no role in her husband’s New Square decision.”

Sources: Washington Post (June 21, 2002) · Justice Department, Office of the Pardon Attorney: commutations granted by President Clinton · FBI Records: The Vault, “William J. Clinton Foundation” release note

Kosovo 1999: air war ran past the War Powers 60-day limit after the House tied 213-213 on authorizing it

Clinton sent U.S. forces into NATO’s air campaign against Yugoslavia on March 24, 1999 and reported to Congress two days later. On April 28 the House voted 427 to 2 against declaring war and tied 213 to 213 on authorizing the air strikes, so the authorization failed; it also voted 290 to 139 against ordering a withdrawal, and Congress funded the operation. The campaign lasted 79 days, past the War Powers Resolution’s 60-day limit on hostilities Congress has not authorized. Thirty-one members of Congress sued; a federal appeals court dismissed the case in February 2000 because the lawmakers lacked standing, without deciding whether he broke the law.

Their response: Clinton told Congress he had acted “pursuant to [his] authority ... as Commander in Chief and Chief Executive,” as quoted in the appeals court’s opinion. The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel concluded in an opinion dated Dec. 19, 2000 that the emergency appropriation for Kosovo “constituted authorization for continuing hostilities after the expiration of sixty days.” The court noted that Congress “could have cut off funds” and did not.

Sources: Campbell v. Clinton, 203 F.3d 19 (D.C. Cir., Feb. 18, 2000) · Clerk of the U.S. House, Roll Call 103 (April 28, 1999) · Justice Department, Office of Legal Counsel: Authorization for Continuing Hostilities in Kosovo (Dec. 19, 2000)

Missiles destroyed a Sudanese medicine factory on nerve-gas evidence that was never corroborated

On Aug. 20, 1998, three days after he first admitted an inappropriate relationship with Monica Lewinsky, Clinton ordered cruise missile strikes on al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan and on the al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum, which the CIA tied to a nerve-gas ingredient and to Osama bin Laden. A National Security Council intelligence official had cautioned beforehand that the link between bin Laden and the plant was “rather uncertain at this point,” and Attorney General Janet Reno later said she felt the “premise kept shifting.” The 9/11 Commission concluded in 2004: “No independent evidence has emerged to corroborate the CIA’s assessment.” It also noted that the Treasury later unfroze the accounts of the plant’s owner after he sued. Some Republicans suggested the strikes were timed to distract from the scandal, a charge raised again during the December 1998 air strikes on Iraq; the commission said of his aides’ testimony that they weighed only national security: “We have found no reason to question their statements.”

Their response: The 9/11 Commission wrote that Clinton, Gore and their senior aides “insisted to us that their judgment was right, pointing to the soil sample evidence.” National security adviser Sandy Berger recalled Clinton saying “that they were going to get crap either way, so they should do the right thing.” A State Department official said in September 1998: “only the sample from the Shifa facility tested positively for chemical weapons precursors.” Sudan denied the plant produced nerve gas.

Sources: The 9/11 Commission Report, chapter 4, pp. 116-118 and notes (July 22, 2004) · CNN (Sept. 1, 1998) · CNN AllPolitics (Aug. 21, 1998)

Long-sought Rose Law Firm billing records turned up in the White House residence; no charges

On Jan. 4, 1996 an aide found Hillary Clinton’s Rose Law Firm billing records for the failed Madison Guaranty savings and loan in the book room of the White House residence, after two years, by the Washington Post’s timeline. The independent counsel wrote that the records had been “sought for many years” and that her fingerprints were on them; they gave more detail of her legal work for Madison than was previously known. He concluded that “some of Mrs. Clinton’s statements had been factually inaccurate” but that the evidence did not establish beyond a reasonable doubt that she knew they were inaccurate when she made them. He separately examined the handling of deputy counsel Vincent Foster’s office after Foster’s suicide in July 1993, where White House counsel Bernard Nussbaum limited Justice Department lawyers’ access and files were moved to the residence with no inventory, and concluded the search “had the effect of frustrating a legitimate law enforcement inquiry.” On both matters he found the evidence insufficient to prove a crime, and no one was charged.

Their response: The independent counsel’s report says Hillary Clinton explained her fingerprints by testifying that she may have looked at the records during the 1992 campaign, “but not later when they had been subpoenaed.” Of the Foster office calls and searches it says: “All people involved in those conversations denied such actions.” The aide, Carolyn Huber, said she first came across the bills in August 1995 without realizing what they were.

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Madison Guaranty (Whitewater), vol. II, Part B, ch. 3: Mrs. Clinton’s Madison Guaranty Representation · Same report, vol. III, Part E: The Discovery and Removal of Documents from Vincent W. Foster Jr.’s Office · Washington Post Whitewater timeline

Server error left two years of White House email unsearched under subpoena; no intent to withhold found

A configuration error kept incoming email to 526 White House users, from August 1996 to November 1998, out of the archive that was searched in response to subpoenas. The error was first discovered in January 1998 and its full extent determined in June 1998, but the independent counsel wrote that the White House “failed to disclose the e-mail problem” to investigators, who learned of it from a newspaper in February 2000; one contractor said she was told that anyone who discussed it would “lose their job, be arrested and thrown in jail.” The counsel listed seven categories of records that had never been searched, including more than 600 backup tapes of former employees’ hard drives, and said he could not confirm the White House had complied with his subpoenas. His later final report called the threat allegations “unsubstantiated” and found “no substantial evidence that electronic records had been intentionally withheld”; the restored email produced nothing that changed his conclusions.

Their response: The White House told the independent counsel that two configuration errors, not a decision, kept the email out of its archive, and it restored backup tapes and ran new searches. The counsel’s final report: “No witness reported that they were told to lie to investigators or felt they were prevented from reporting matters to the appropriate law enforcement officials.”

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Madison Guaranty (Whitewater), vol. III, Appendix 3: non-compliance with subpoenas for electronic documents · Final Report of the Independent Counsel regarding Monica Lewinsky, Appendix D: electronic records

Last-day pardons for his own former officials and for four people convicted in the Whitewater inquiry

Clinton’s January 20, 2001 pardons included his former housing secretary Henry Cisneros, who had pleaded guilty in 1999 to lying to the FBI, and his former CIA director John Deutch, pardoned for offenses charged only the day before over classified material kept on unsecured home computers. He also pardoned four people prosecuted by the Whitewater independent counsel, among them his former business partner Susan McDougal. CIA officials told CNN the agency was not consulted about Deutch, and the independent counsel reported that he heard nothing from the Justice Department about the Whitewater pardons after asking in December 2000 to be told of any requests.

Sources: Justice Department, Office of the Pardon Attorney: pardons granted by President Clinton · Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Madison Guaranty (Whitewater), vol. I, Appendix 5: Prosecutions (Jan. 5, 2001) · CNN (Feb. 16, 2001), archived copy · CNN (Sept. 7, 1999), archived copy

Clemency for 16 Puerto Rican militants; the Senate voted 95-2 against it

On August 11, 1999, Clinton offered to commute the sentences of 16 members of the Puerto Rican nationalist groups FALN and Macheteros, convicted of offenses including seditious conspiracy and weapons charges, on condition that each renounce violence in writing. The House voted 311-41 and the Senate 95-2 to disapprove; Hillary Clinton, then expected to run for the Senate in New York, opposed the offer. The House Government Reform Committee’s Republican majority reported that White House aides wrote of a political benefit among Puerto Rican voters and that the U.S. Sentencing Commission contradicted Clinton’s claim about the length of the sentences. The committee’s Democrats, many of whom had voted against the clemency, said the report “reaches unsubstantiated conclusions.”

Their response: Clinton wrote to Rep. Henry Waxman on Sept. 21, 1999 that the prisoners were serving “extremely lengthy sentences” that were “out of proportion to their crimes.” The White House said the offer went only to members “not associated with the more violent acts that led to injuries.”

Sources: Justice Department news advisory 99-352 (Aug. 11, 1999) · House Report 106-488, Government Reform Committee, Republican majority report with Democrats’ dissenting views (Dec. 10, 1999) · CNN (Sept. 14, 1999), archived copy · CNN (Sept. 2, 1999), archived copy

His party returned $2.8 million in suspect 1996 donations; fundraisers and a foreign donor pleaded guilty

$2.8M in donations returned by his party

After the 1996 election the Democratic National Committee returned $2.8 million in donations it judged illegal, inappropriate or unverifiable; by its own figures three fundraisers, John Huang, Charlie Trie and Johnny Chung, had raised $2.2 million of it. A Justice Department task force charged 26 people and two corporations (some in cases unrelated to Clinton). Huang, Trie and Chung were all convicted, and in January 2001 Indonesian businessman James Riady agreed to plead guilty and pay a record $8.6 million fine for reimbursing donors with foreign corporate money, including after he pledged $1 million to support Clinton’s 1992 campaign. Neither Clinton nor any senior White House or party official was charged, and the Washington Post reported that Huang did not implicate Clinton, Gore or senior party officials.

Their response: The Senate committee’s Democrats wrote that the Republican majority “aggressively pursued allegations of wrongdoing involving Democrats, but largely ignored allegations of wrongdoing involving Republicans” and that “Both parties have been lax in screening out illegal and improper contributions.” In announcing the refunds, the DNC challenged the Republican National Committee to return what it said were more than $2 million in illegal funds given to a Republican-linked think tank.

Sources: Justice Department press release 01-017 on James Riady’s plea (Jan. 11, 2001) · Senate Report 105-167, Governmental Affairs Committee, Republican majority report, part 1 (March 10, 1998) · Senate Report 105-167, part 4: minority views of the committee’s Democrats (March 10, 1998) · Washington Post (June 28, 1997) · Washington Post (May 26, 1999)

White House coffees and Lincoln Bedroom stays for big donors; he approved the plan in writing

$26.4M given in the 1996 cycle by coffee guests (Senate Republican count)

Records the White House released in February 1997 showed 938 overnight guests in Clinton’s first term. The Senate Governmental Affairs Committee’s Republican majority counted 103 White House coffees between January 1995 and August 1996, about 60 of them sponsored by the Democratic National Committee, whose guests gave $26.4 million in the 1996 election cycle. The documents showed Clinton wrote on a fundraiser’s memo proposing such contacts: “Yes, pursue all 3 and promptly” and asked for more names. The same majority report concedes about 760 of the 938 guests were family, friends or officials, and Attorney General Janet Reno found no criminal violation in the coffees.

Their response: Clinton, Feb. 25, 1997: “I did not have any strangers here. The Lincoln Bedroom was never sold.” At a news conference the next day he said of the coffees: “there was no solicitation during the events.” The committee’s Democrats wrote: “Both parties have openly offered access in exchange for contributions.”

Sources: Senate Report 105-167, Governmental Affairs Committee, Republican majority report, part 1 (March 10, 1998) · Senate Report 105-167, part 4: minority views of the committee’s Democrats (March 10, 1998) · Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents: news conference of Feb. 26, 1997 · CNN AllPolitics (Feb. 25, 1997), archived copy · Washington Post (Dec. 3, 1997)

Attorney general refused an outside counsel on 1996 fundraising despite the FBI director’s advice

On December 2, 1997, Attorney General Janet Reno announced she would not seek an independent counsel to investigate fundraising phone calls by Clinton and Vice President Gore, finding no reasonable basis to believe either broke the law. The Washington Post reported that FBI Director Louis Freeh had argued in a memo that the allegations about the 1996 Clinton-Gore campaign could be resolved only by an independent counsel; in July 1998 the head of Reno’s own campaign finance task force, Charles La Bella, made the same recommendation in a written report, and she again declined. The decision was Reno’s by law, and we found nothing showing Clinton directed it; the task force stayed in the Justice Department and had charged 26 people by January 2001.

Their response: Reno: “Any decision not to ask for an independent counsel does not mean that a person has been exonerated or that the work of the campaign finance task force has ended.” Clinton: “The attorney general made her decision based on a careful review of the law and the facts and that’s as it should be.” Freeh: “I and all of my colleagues in the FBI respect her decision and understand fully that it is the Attorney General’s by law to make.”

Sources: Washington Post (Dec. 3, 1997) · Washington Post (July 24, 1998) · CNN (May 2, 2000), archived copy · CNN (March 10, 2000), archived copy · Justice Department press release 01-017 on James Riady’s plea (Jan. 11, 2001)

Cleared a China satellite launch for a big Democratic donor’s firm while it was under investigation

$1M+ to Democrats from the firm’s chairman since 1995 (Washington Post)

In February 1998 Clinton approved a waiver letting Loral Space and Communications launch a satellite on a Chinese rocket, although the Justice Department was investigating whether Loral had given China unauthorized help after a failed 1996 launch and his staff warned the approval might be seen as letting the company “off the hook.” Loral’s chairman, Bernard Schwartz, had given more than $1 million to the Democratic Party since 1995, and congressional Republicans suggested the money influenced the decision. White House documents showed the State Department and other agencies had recommended approval as in the national interest. A House select committee voted 9 to 0 in December 1998 that Loral and Hughes had harmed national security; the Justice Department later closed its criminal investigation of both without charges, and the companies paid civil penalties.

Their response: White House spokesman Michael McCurry: “These documents reflect the serious policymaking on national-interests grounds that goes into satellite waivers.” The Washington Post reported that Loral and Hughes “have consistently denied they harmed American security in doing business in China.”

Sources: Washington Post (May 23, 1998) · Washington Post (Dec. 31, 1998) · New York Times (March 6, 2003)

Whitewater: 14 people convicted, a governor among them; too little evidence to charge the Clintons

The independent counsel investigation that began with the Clintons’ Whitewater land venture in Arkansas ended with 16 successful prosecutions of 14 people, by the final report’s own table. Those convicted included the Clintons’ partners Jim and Susan McDougal, Arkansas Gov. Jim Guy Tucker, and Webster Hubbell, the No. 3 official at Clinton’s Justice Department. On September 20, 2000, Independent Counsel Robert Ray closed the Whitewater phase without charging either Clinton, saying “the evidence was insufficient to prove to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that either President or Mrs. Clinton knowingly participated in any criminal conduct.” Ray also said White House delays in producing evidence and “unmeritorious litigation” had impeded the investigation.

Their response: White House statement: “Robert Ray is now the latest investigator to complete an examination into the transactions related to the Whitewater Development Co., and conclude that there are no grounds for legal action.”

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Madison Guaranty (Whitewater), vol. I, Appendix 5: Prosecutions (Jan. 5, 2001) · CNN (Sept. 20, 2000), archived copy

No. 3 Justice official pleaded guilty to fraud; Clinton allies steered him $500,000 in consulting fees

$500,000+ in consulting fees after he resigned (independent counsel)

Webster Hubbell, a former Rose Law Firm colleague of Hillary Clinton whom Clinton made associate attorney general, announced his resignation in March 1994 and pleaded guilty that December to mail fraud and tax evasion; the independent counsel found he had defrauded his law firm and its clients of about $487,000. After he resigned, the counsel found, White House chief of staff Mack McLarty and other Clinton allies helped him get 17 consulting contracts from supporters of the president that paid more than $500,000, including $100,000 from Indonesia’s Lippo Group, for which he “did little or no work.” The counsel investigated whether this was meant to buy his silence and concluded: “The evidence was insufficient to prove these payments were intended to affect Hubbell’s cooperation with this Office.”

Their response: Clinton, asked under oath in 2000 whether he discussed paying Hubbell to keep him from becoming a witness: “Absolutely not. I never talked to anybody about that.” He added: “I believe the people that helped Webb Hubbell did it because, like me, they believed he was innocent.”

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Madison Guaranty (Whitewater), vol. III, Part C: Webster Hubbell (Jan. 5, 2001) · Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Madison Guaranty (Whitewater), vol. I, Appendix 5: Prosecutions (Jan. 5, 2001)

Housing secretary Henry Cisneros pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI; Clinton later pardoned him

$10,000 fine

Henry Cisneros, Clinton’s former secretary of housing and urban development, pleaded guilty on September 7, 1999 to a misdemeanor count of lying to the FBI during the background check for his Cabinet post. He admitted falsely telling agents he had paid a former mistress no more than $2,500 a month; the indictment, brought by Independent Counsel David Barrett on 18 counts, put the payments at more than $250,000. Under the plea he paid a $10,000 fine with no prison or probation. Clinton pardoned him on January 20, 2001.

Their response: Cisneros in court: “I accept responsibility for the conduct as outlined.” Judge Stanley Sporkin, accepting the plea: “We cannot permit an individual to lie his way into public office.”

Sources: CNN (Sept. 7, 1999), archived copy · Justice Department, Office of the Pardon Attorney: pardons granted by President Clinton

Four more Cabinet members drew independent counsels: one acquitted, two not charged, one died first

15 convictions of others; $10M+ in fines to the Treasury

Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy was tried for accepting gifts from companies his department regulated and was acquitted on all counts on December 3, 1998; the independent counsel’s wider case still produced 15 convictions of other people and companies and more than $10 million in fines and recoveries, paid to the Treasury. Independent counsels declined to charge Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt over an Indian casino decision, finding “no evidence that there was a quid pro quo,” and declined in April 2000 to charge Labor Secretary Alexis Herman. The investigation of Commerce Secretary Ron Brown’s finances, its counsel reported, “ended unfinished with his death” in an April 1996 plane crash and drew no conclusions.

Their response: Clinton on Herman: “I am proud to call her my friend, and am honored that she is the one to work in this administration on behalf of working people everywhere.” Espy’s defense at trial, as the counsel’s report summarizes it, was that the gifts came from friends and that he did no favors for the companies.

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Alphonso Michael (Mike) Espy (Oct. 25, 2001) · Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Bruce Edward Babbitt (Aug. 22, 2000) · AP via CNN (Aug. 23, 2000), archived copy · CNN (April 5, 2000), archived copy · CNN (Nov. 14, 1996), archived copy

Travel Office firings: counsel found Hillary Clinton’s sworn denial “factually false” but did not charge

On May 19, 1993, the White House fired the seven employees of its Travel Office; an FBI investigation was opened, and the office’s director, Billy Dale, was tried for embezzlement and acquitted in November 1995. Independent Counsel Robert Ray concluded in June 2000 that the firings were lawful, but that Hillary Clinton “played a role in the decision” and that her sworn statement to the contrary “was factually false.” He declined to prosecute, finding the evidence insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that her statements were knowingly false. Ray wrote that accusations circulated inside the White House against the staff were “to a large degree, utterly without factual foundation,” though an audit had found evidence of financial mismanagement.

Their response: White House statement issued by press secretary Joe Lockhart: “After seven years and the expense of tens of millions of taxpayer dollars, the Independent Counsel confirms what we have said all along: There is no evidence that the First Lady did anything wrong.”

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re William David Watkins and In re Hillary Rodham Clinton (Travel Office), Summary Conclusion (June 22, 2000) · Same report, Part V.F: other investigations and the acquittal of Billy Dale · CNN (June 22, 2000), archived copy

White House obtained FBI files on hundreds of former Republican staff; counsel found no plot

The Clinton White House’s personnel security office obtained from the FBI the confidential background reports of hundreds of former White House staff, including officials of the Reagan and Bush administrations; CNN put the number at about 900. The office’s director, Craig Livingstone, resigned after the matter became public. Independent Counsel Robert Ray reported in March 2000 that there was “no evidence of the involvement of any senior White House official or First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton” and that suspicions of “intentional criminal misconduct rather than bureaucratic ineptitude” had “proved to be unfounded”; he traced the requests to a Secret Service list that did not separate current from former passholders. No one was indicted, though Ray found parts of the aide Anthony Marceca’s testimony to Congress “false and misleading.”

Their response: CNN reported that Hillary Clinton said in a sworn statement in July 1999 that she never ordered anyone to request any files from the FBI. Ray’s report: “The FBI Files matter represented a failure of process at many levels.”

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel, In re Anthony Marceca (FBI files), Part III: Findings (March 16, 2000) · Same report, Part VIII: Summary Conclusion · CNN (March 16, 2000), archived copy

Pentagon officials broke the Privacy Act releasing Linda Tripp’s file; government paid $595,000

$595,000 paid by the government to settle

In March 1998, Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon and a deputy, Cliff Bernath, gave a New Yorker reporter information from the security file of Linda Tripp, the Defense Department employee whose tapes exposed Clinton’s relationship with Monica Lewinsky. The Pentagon’s inspector general concluded in 2000 that the two violated the Privacy Act; investigators also found that neither was influenced by anyone on the White House staff, and no prosecution followed. Defense Secretary William Cohen reprimanded both in writing. In November 2003 the government paid Tripp and her lawyers $595,000 to settle her Privacy Act suit.

Their response: Bacon: “I believe that ultimately my conduct will be found lawful.” Tripp, on the settlement: “The government should never be permitted to use Privacy Act protected information to discredit political opponents.”

Sources: CNN (May 25, 2000), archived copy · CNN (Nov. 3, 2003), archived copy

Courts rejected White House privilege claims that blocked testimony in the Lewinsky investigation

In May 1998 Chief Judge Norma Holloway Johnson ruled that Clinton could invoke executive privilege over aides’ conversations but that prosecutors’ need for the testimony outweighed it. In July 1998 the D.C. Circuit refused to create a “protective function privilege” for Secret Service officers, a claim pressed by the Secret Service and Justice Department rather than by Clinton personally, and ruled 2 to 1 that deputy White House counsel Bruce Lindsey could not use a government attorney-client privilege to withhold information about possible crimes from a grand jury. A year earlier another appeals court had reached the same conclusion about White House lawyers’ notes of meetings with Hillary Clinton.

Their response: White House counsel Charles Ruff said the White House was “disappointed that the court of appeals has decided that, unlike every other attorney and client in this country, government attorneys and their clients do not enjoy the right to have confidential communications.”

Sources: In re Sealed Case, 148 F.3d 1073 (D.C. Cir., July 7, 1998) · In re Lindsey, 158 F.3d 1263 (D.C. Cir., July 27, 1998) · Washington Post (July 28, 1998) · Washington Post (May 28, 1998) · Final Report of the Independent Counsel regarding Monica Lewinsky, Appendix D: electronic records (filed May 18, 2001)

Took $190,000 in gifts on leaving office; repaid $86,000 and returned $28,000 in furniture

$190,027 in gifts kept; $86,000 repaid

Clinton’s last financial disclosure, filed January 20, 2001, listed $190,027 in gifts the family kept from his final year in office. After criticism, the Clintons said on February 2 they would pay for nearly $86,000 of gifts received in 2000, and on February 7 they sent back more than $28,000 in furnishings that officials confirmed had been accepted as government property in 1993. The House Government Reform Committee’s Republican majority later found that some gifts had been solicited; the committee’s Democrats called the report partisan and said the first President Bush had accepted more per year, $39,614 against Clinton’s $28,093, adjusted for inflation.

Their response: Hillary Clinton: “All of these items were considered gifts to us. That’s what the permanent record of the White House showed. . . . But if there is a different intent, we will certainly honor the intention of the donor.” The Clintons’ transition office said: “gifts did not leave the White House without the approval of the White House Usher’s and Curator’s Offices.”

Sources: House Report 107-768, Government Reform Committee, Republican majority report with Democrats’ views (Oct. 28, 2002) · Washington Post (Feb. 5, 2001) · Washington Post (Feb. 6, 2001) · Washington Post (Feb. 8, 2001)

Claims that the IRS audited his critics: a three-year congressional inquiry found no credible evidence

Press reports alleged that the IRS under Clinton picked tax-exempt groups and people tied to them for audit because of their politics. Four senior members of Congress’s Joint Committee on Taxation, Bill Archer, William Roth, Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Charles Rangel, ordered a staff investigation in March 1997. Its March 2000 report “found no credible evidence that tax-exempt organizations were selected for examination” on the basis of their views, and “no credible evidence of intervention by Clinton Administration officials (including Treasury Department and White House officials)” in choosing whom to audit. The staff did find that some high-profile cases got intense internal scrutiny, with no credible evidence it was politically motivated, and that many IRS offices had destroyed their records of tips before mid-1998, which limited what could be checked.

Sources: Joint Committee on Taxation staff, report JCS-3-00 (March 6, 2000)

Juanita Broaddrick said Clinton raped her in 1978; he denies it and no charge was ever brought

Juanita Broaddrick, an Arkansas nursing home operator, said in interviews published and broadcast in February 1999 that Clinton raped her in a Little Rock hotel room in 1978, when he was the state’s attorney general. No charge was filed and the allegation has never been tested in court. In the Paula Jones case she had signed an affidavit calling the assault allegation “untrue”; she recanted it when questioned by FBI agents working for Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr, who, the Washington Post reported, “found her account inconclusive.” NBC interviewed four friends who said she told them of the alleged assault soon afterward; the man she was married to then said he did not remember her injury.

Their response: Clinton’s lawyer David Kendall called the charge “absolutely false.” Asked about it on Feb. 24, 1999, Clinton said: “Well, my counsel has made a statement about the . . . issue, and I have nothing to add to it.”

Sources: Washington Post (Feb. 25, 1999)

Kathleen Willey said he groped her at the White House; counsel could not prove his denial false

Kathleen Willey, a White House volunteer, alleged that Clinton fondled her on November 29, 1993, when she met him to ask for a paid job. Clinton denied it under oath. Independent Counsel Robert Ray investigated whether that denial was false and concluded that “the evidence was insufficient to prove to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that the President’s deposition testimony about his conduct with Willey was false.” Ray noted that Willey’s own sworn accounts differed and that she had admitted giving the FBI false information on another matter. He wrote that he “is not offering, and cannot offer, any opinion as to whose version of events is right.”

Their response: Ray’s report says Clinton, under oath, “emphatically” denied making any sexual advance and “agreed they had physical contact, but not of a sexual nature.”

Sources: Final Report of the Independent Counsel regarding Monica Lewinsky, Appendix B: Kathleen Willey (filed May 18, 2001)

Hillary Clinton made nearly $100,000 from $1,000 in cattle futures in 1978-79; broker skipped margin calls

Nearly $100,000 profit from $1,000 (White House-released records)

Records the White House released in 1994 show Hillary Clinton turned a $1,000 stake into nearly $100,000 in about 10 months of commodities trading in 1978 and 1979; Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas during many of the trades. Most were placed by James Blair, a friend who was outside counsel to Tyson Foods, and the broker let her hold positions she lacked the cash to cover: her first trade was 10 contracts, normally a $12,000 investment, and her account was under-margined for nearly all of July 1979 with no margin call. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange suspended the broker for three years and fined his firm $250,000 over margin and record-keeping violations. Leo Melamed, a former exchange chairman who reviewed the records for the White House, said as much as $40,000 of her profit might reflect trades shifted to her account, or clerical error. The trades and the lenient treatment are documented; that they amounted to a favor is an inference no official body has made.

Their response: Melamed: “I have no reason to change my original assessment. Mrs. Clinton violated no rules in the course of her transactions.” A senior White House official said Blair offered “advice but no guarantees” and “wasn’t backing her trades and he wasn’t custodian of her account.” Blair said he advised her out of friendship, not to seek political gain for his client.

Sources: Washington Post (May 27, 1994) · Los Angeles Times (March 31, 1994)

Vice President Gore’s Buddhist temple fundraiser: the organizer was convicted; Gore called it a “mistake”

$140,000 collected at the temple event (CNN)

On April 29, 1996 Gore attended a Democratic National Committee luncheon at the Hsi Lai Buddhist Temple in California, organized by fundraisers John Huang and Maria Hsia; $140,000 was collected, and the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee found the tax-exempt temple had illegally reimbursed donors. Gore first said the event was not billed as a fundraiser. A party memo sent to his staff three days beforehand said he would “inspire political and fund-raising efforts,” and the committee’s Republican majority cited an April 10 memo to Gore from White House aide Harold Ickes saying the event would raise $250,000. A jury convicted Hsia on five counts in March 2000. Gore also made fundraising calls from his office, which he stopped in March 1997; in 2000 the head of the Justice Department’s campaign finance task force recommended a special counsel to examine whether Gore’s statements about his fundraising were truthful. Attorney General Janet Reno declined on Aug. 23, 2000, saying “a special counsel is not warranted” and that the transcript of Gore’s interview with the task force chief “reflects neither false statements nor perjury”; no special counsel was appointed. Prosecutors in the Hsia case argued she acted without his knowledge.

Their response: Gore, Jan. 24, 1997: “I knew it was a political event and I knew there were finance people who were going to be present. And so that alone should have told me this was inappropriate, this was a mistake, don’t do this. And I take responsibility for that.” On the calls, March 3, 1997: “Everything that I did I understood to be lawful. My counsel tells me there is no controlling legal authority that says that there was any violation of any law.”

Sources: CNN AllPolitics (Jan. 24, 1997) · CNN AllPolitics (March 3, 1997) · Senate Report 105-167, Governmental Affairs Committee, ch. 17: The Hsi Lai Temple Fundraiser and Maria Hsia (March 10, 1998), FAS copy · CNN / Time (March 3, 2000), archived copy · PBS NewsHour (June 23, 2000), archived copy · CNN transcript of Reno’s announcement (Aug. 23, 2000)

Donors described buying access: “The White House is like a subway: You have to put in coins”

$300,000 from Tamraz to Democrats (his Senate testimony)

Johnny Chung, a California businessman who gave the Democratic National Committee $366,000, got into the White House at least 49 times from 1994 to 1996, by the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee’s count. In March 1995 he handed Hillary Clinton’s chief of staff, Maggie Williams, a $50,000 check for the party in the first lady’s office, and his delegation of Chinese executives then attended Clinton’s weekly radio address, according to depositions cited by the committee’s Republican majority; the party later returned all his money. Oil financier Roger Tamraz testified in September 1997 that access was the “only reason” he gave Democrats $300,000; he got into the White House six times and pitched Clinton on a Caspian pipeline that administration foreign policy experts had rejected, after National Security Council staff tried to keep him away from the president. His project never won White House backing, and the committee’s Democrats noted that Tamraz had earlier given to Republicans and been recommended by their party chairman for a Reagan administration post.

Their response: Tamraz, asked whether he regretted giving $300,000 when the pipeline never won backing: “Next time I’ll give $600,000.” He also said: “If they keep me out of the door, I’ll come through the window.” The committee report says Williams testified she did not recall arranging the radio address visit.

Sources: Senate Report 105-167, Governmental Affairs Committee, ch. 10: Johnny Chung and the White House “Subway” (March 10, 1998), FAS copy · Los Angeles Times (Sept. 19, 1997) · Senate Report 105-167, ch. 21: The Saga of Roger Tamraz, FAS copy · Senate Report 105-167, minority views of the committee’s Democrats on Tamraz, FAS copy

Election-year citizenship drive: a million naturalized, 18% without full criminal checks; no plot found

The Immigration and Naturalization Service’s “Citizenship USA” program naturalized 1,049,867 people between Aug. 31, 1995 and Sept. 30, 1996. For 18 percent of them the FBI had either returned unusable fingerprint cards (124,111 people) or had no record of a check (61,366), and the Justice Department inspector general found that “the integrity of naturalization adjudications, already vulnerable before CUSA, suffered badly” from the rush. On the charge that the drive was meant to create Democratic voters for November 1996, the inspector general wrote: “We did not find that CUSA was developed, implemented, or otherwise directed to further inappropriate political ends.” The report did say the motives of Vice President Gore’s government-reinvention office, which got involved in early 1996, “were mixed”: one staff member tied the deadline to the election, Gore declined an interview and answered in writing, and presidential aides Harold Ickes and Rahm Emanuel declined to be interviewed.

Their response: The inspector general’s report says INS Commissioner Doris Meissner asserted that political motives had not influenced the program, and that Gore and his aides said “good government” was the reason for their office’s involvement. The report found the five target cities were chosen for the size of their backlogs: “we found no evidence to support” the claim that they were picked for how new citizens might vote.

Sources: Justice Department Office of the Inspector General, An Investigation of the INS’s Citizenship USA Initiative: Executive Summary (2000) · Same report, table of contents

Clinton’s national security adviser pleaded guilty to taking classified papers from the National Archives

Samuel “Sandy” Berger, national security adviser through Clinton’s second term, reviewed Clinton-era files at the National Archives in 2003 at Clinton’s request, to decide what to give the 9/11 Commission. On Sept. 2 and Oct. 2, 2003 he concealed and removed five copies of a classified document, destroyed three of them at his office, and at first did not tell Archives staff he had taken them, according to facts he admitted. He pleaded guilty on April 1, 2005 to a misdemeanor, agreed to give up his security clearance, and was fined and put on probation that September. The Justice Department said the five were versions of a single document and that each “was produced to the 9-11 Commission in due course.”

Their response: Berger, July 2004: “I made an honest mistake. It’s one that I deeply regret.” He added: “Everything that I have done all along in this process has been for the purpose of aiding and supporting the work of the 9-11 commission.” Clinton said of him: “I know him. He’s a good man. He worked his heart out for this country.”

Sources: Justice Department press release 05-155 (April 1, 2005) · CNN (April 1, 2005) · CBS News (July 2004) · Washington Post (Feb. 21, 2007)

Fired the FBI director over an ethics report; all 93 U.S. attorneys were told to resign

On July 19, 1993 Clinton dismissed FBI Director William Sessions, who had refused to resign; it was the first time a president fired an FBI director. The stated ground was a Justice Department ethics report, completed under President Bush’s attorney general William Barr, that found Sessions used a “sham” to avoid taxes on his limousine, took trips at public expense for personal reasons and billed the government for a home fence that met no security need. On March 23, 1993 Attorney General Janet Reno had demanded the prompt resignation of all 93 U.S. attorneys, all Republican holdovers; replacing them after a change of party is routine, but the New York Times reported that the order sped up a normally gradual changeover. The U.S. attorney in Washington suggested it could disrupt his investigation of Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, a Clinton ally; Reno denied any link, and Rostenkowski was indicted on 17 charges in May 1994, during Clinton’s presidency.

Their response: Clinton on Sessions: “We cannot have a leadership vacuum at an agency as important to the United States as the FBI.” Sessions: “It is because I believe in the principle of an independent FBI that I have refused to voluntarily resign.” Senate Republican leader Bob Dole called the dismissal “a potentially worrisome precedent.” Reno called the request a “joint decision” with the White House and said she wanted the resignations “so that the U.S. Attorneys presently in position will know where they stand and that we can begin to build a team.”

Sources: Los Angeles Times (July 20, 1993) · New York Times (March 24, 1993) · New York Times (June 2, 1994) · Justice Department inspector general and ethics office, report on the removal of nine U.S. attorneys (September 2008)

Waco: FBI denied for six years that it used pyrotechnic tear gas; counsel found it did not start the fire

About 80 Branch Davidians died when their compound near Waco, Texas burned on April 19, 1993, at the end of a 51-day FBI siege. In 1999 the FBI admitted, after six years of denials, that agents had fired pyrotechnic tear-gas canisters that morning; Attorney General Janet Reno and the FBI director had told Congress in 1993 that none were used. Reno named former Republican Sen. John Danforth as outside counsel, and he reported in July 2000 that government agents did not start or spread the fire, did not shoot at the Davidians and did not improperly use the armed forces, and that there was no “massive conspiracy and cover-up.” He found no wrongdoing by Reno or other senior officials, but faulted FBI personnel who stayed silent, writing that their failure to disclose “undermined public confidence in government and caused real damage to our country.” No finding concerned Clinton personally.

Their response: Danforth: “The responsibility for the tragedy at Waco rests with certain of the Branch Davidians and their leader, David Koresh.” He added: “There is no evidence of any wrongdoing on the part of Atty. Gen. Reno, the present and former director of the FBI, other high officials of the United States.” Ramsey Clark, a lawyer for survivors, said Danforth “failed to look at what really happened.”

Sources: Los Angeles Times (July 22, 2000) · CNN (July 21, 2000)

Courts struck down his striker-replacement order, his line-item vetoes and his FDA tobacco rules

On Feb. 2, 1996 a federal appeals court threw out Clinton’s Executive Order 12954, which barred federal contracts with employers that permanently replace lawful strikers, ruling that it conflicted with the National Labor Relations Act. On June 25, 1998 the Supreme Court ruled 6 to 3 in Clinton v. City of New York that his cancellations of a New York Medicaid provision and a farm tax break under the Line Item Veto Act violated the Constitution’s Presentment Clause; Congress had given him that power in the act, so the ruling voided the law rather than finding he had exceeded it. On March 21, 2000 the court held in FDA v. Brown and Williamson that Congress had not given his Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate tobacco products. The court’s 1997 ruling in Clinton v. Jones is covered in a separate entry.

Sources: Chamber of Commerce v. Reich, 74 F.3d 1322 (D.C. Cir., Feb. 2, 1996) · Clinton v. City of New York, 524 U.S. 417 (June 25, 1998), syllabus, Cornell Legal Information Institute · FDA v. Brown and Williamson Tobacco Corp., 529 U.S. 120 (March 21, 2000), syllabus, Cornell Legal Information Institute

Speech fees hit $500,000 and $750,000 while Hillary Clinton ran the State Department; no charges followed

$105M+ in speech fees, 2001 to 2014 (ABC News count)

An ABC News review of financial disclosures found that after Hillary Clinton became secretary of state, Bill Clinton’s speaking fees often doubled or tripled, including $500,000 from a Russian investment bank and $750,000 for a telecom conference in China, and that several payers had interests pending before the State Department. ABC counted more than $105 million in speech fees from 2001 through 2014. The Clinton Foundation acknowledged in 2015 that it “made mistakes” in failing to disclose some donations. FactCheck.org wrote that the book and newspaper report raising the issue “presented no evidence that the donations influenced Clinton’s official actions.” A federal corruption inquiry into the foundation was reported in January 2018, and the Washington Post reported in January 2020 that a Justice Department review ordered under Trump had effectively ended with no criminal charges.

Their response: Clinton Foundation spokesman Craig Minassian, 2018: “Time after time, the Clinton Foundation has been subjected to politically motivated allegations, and time after time these allegations have been proven false.” Richard Painter, chief White House ethics lawyer under George W. Bush, on the fees: “There’s no prohibition on his raising it. But it does create some appearance problems if he raises his fee after she becomes Secretary of State.”

Sources: ABC News (April 23, 2015) · FactCheck.org (April 28, 2015) · CNN (Jan. 5, 2018) · Washington Post (Jan. 9, 2020)

Health care task force secrecy: a judge’s $285,864 sanction over an aide’s sworn statement was reversed

$285,864 in legal fees awarded in 1997; reversed in 1999

A doctors’ group sued on Feb. 24, 1993 under the open-meetings law for federal advisory committees, seeking access to Hillary Clinton’s health care task force and its working group. The government filed a sworn declaration by White House aide Ira Magaziner that “[o]nly federal government employees serve as members of the interdepartmental working group.” An appeals court ruled in 1993 that the task force itself was not covered merely because the first lady was a member. In December 1997 Judge Royce Lamberth found the government’s conduct “sanctionable” over that declaration and awarded $285,864.78 in legal fees. On Aug. 24, 1999 the appeals court reversed, holding that “the district court’s bad faith findings are clearly erroneous.”

Their response: Clinton said after the 1997 ruling that he was “quite confident Mr. Magaziner acted appropriately.” Deputy chief of staff John Podesta said Magaziner acted “upon the advice and guidance of government lawyers.” House Ways and Means chairman Bill Archer, a Republican, called on Clinton to fire him.

Sources: Association of American Physicians and Surgeons v. Clinton, 187 F.3d 655 (D.C. Cir., Aug. 24, 1999) · CNN AllPolitics (Dec. 29, 1997), archived copy

Confirmed under oath a sexual encounter with Gennifer Flowers, six years after denying an affair on TV

During the 1992 primaries Clinton appeared on CBS’s “60 Minutes” and, in the New York Times’s words, “categorically denied an affair with Ms. Flowers,” a former Arkansas state employee. In his Jan. 17, 1998 deposition in the Paula Jones lawsuit, made public that March, he gave what the Times called “confirmation, after years of denial, that he had had sex with Gennifer Flowers.” In the same deposition he was asked about the state job Flowers obtained and said he had passed her letter to an aide who handled job requests. No legal finding concerns the relationship itself; it is listed as a public denial that he later contradicted under oath.

Their response: Clinton, in the deposition, on Flowers’s request for a state job: “I have no recollection of doing anything except giving it to Judy Gaddy to see if she could do something to help Gennifer Flowers.” He testified that he did not believe he had spoken to officials of the agency that hired her.

Sources: New York Times (March 14, 1998) · Washington Post: text of Clinton’s Jan. 17, 1998 deposition (published March 13, 1998)