Fiedler Says Davis ‘Went Shopping’ to Prompt Inquiry

Rep. Bobbi Fiedler, in her first extensive public comments about the events surrounding her indictment, said Saturday night she got involved in discussions about helping state Sen. Ed Davis pay his U.S. Senate primary debt because she felt sorry for him and because her campaign was interested in Davis’ endorsement.

In a taping of KNBC’s “News Conference” that will air at 8:30 this morning, Fiedler also charged that Davis “went shopping through the legal process” to get an investigation of her under way.

Fiedler, 48, and her friend and top adviser, Paul Clarke, 39, were indicted Jan. 23 for allegedly offering Davis a $100,000 campaign contribution to get him to drop out of the Republican U.S. Senate primary.

According to Davis, his campaign manager, Martha Zilm, was told last November that the Fiedler campaign would help Davis with his debt if he got out of the race. Davis says that Republican lawyer Dana Reed told Zilm that was a felony under state law and that from there Davis turned the matter over to Ventura County Dist. Atty. Michael Bradbury, who submitted it to Los Angeles County prosecutors.

But Saturday night Fiedler contended that Reed, who has also done work for her, “told Martha Zilm there was nothing there. What I personally believe is that he (Davis) went shopping through the legal process to try to find someone who would actually be required to conduct the investigation (after a complaint was filed).”

Reed, who was a witness before the grand jury that brought the indictments, will not discuss the case.

Early in the KNBC show, Fiedler was asked the question that has puzzled political professionals ever since the indictment was announced: Why would Fiedler bother trying to help rival Davis, a man her campaign had consistently ridiculed?

“Because it was the right thing to do,” Fiedler responded, “and also because he was interested in considering an endorsement and obviously that was something we were interested in having.”

But later in the interview Fiedler contradicted herself and said she did not think the Davis endorsement was worth very much.

“I have to say I didn’t think his endorsement would mean much,” Fiedler said in response to a question. “Part of his problem in terms of raising money came from the fact that he had not been successful as a candidate.”

Sources close to the investigation have said that Fiedler’s one face-to-face meeting with Zilm came on Jan. 12 at Fiedler’s Northridge home. Fiedler says Davis was supposed to show up for that meeting, not Zilm.

What, she was asked Saturday night, did she intend to talk to Davis about?

“I thought we would be talking about what he planned to do in terms of leaving the campaign . . . what we might be able to do to help him raise some additional funds to reduce his debt. You know, here I saw . . . a man I have worked with for a very long time on the verge of a stage of his life when he maybe wasn’t going to be able to do something that was very important to him. My understanding was he was $100,000 in debt, and after all he had been a public official for a very long time and people in public life are not wealthy people. I felt sorry for him.” But Fiedler reiterated what she and aides have contended during the last week:

“There was never any offer made to Ed Davis regarding a transfer of funds. . . .”

Fiedler supporters have told reporters that one of their legal arguments will be that they could not have tried to lure Davis out of the race because they were under the impression that he was already getting out.

Although Davis calls that notion “preposterous,” Fiedler revealed Saturday night the thought process that led her campaign to make that assumption.

“Paul Clarke talked with Joe Scott (publisher of a widely read political newsletter) last November and he said that Ed Davis was $100,000 in debt,” Fiedler said. “In order to be involved in a campaign of this type you need a lot of money. After they (Davis campaign) contacted us there was this interest on both sides (in Davis getting out).” It went from there, she said.

However, Davis and Zilm contend that it was the Fiedler campaign that raised the idea of Davis dropping out of the race.

Davis was asked recently why he did not just pick up the phone and call Fiedler and discuss the whole matter. Saturday night Fiedler was asked by KNBC reporter Linda Douglass why she had not picked up the phone and called Davis at some point?

“The contacts had been made by his campaign. So there was no question in my mind that he was dropping out,” Fiedler replied. But, Douglass pressed, the district attorney’s office says that the evidence will show that Zilm at one point said that Davis was reluctant to drop out.

“I was not involved in that conversation,” Fiedler replied.