Sununu Using Corporate Jets for Free Travel

Ever since the White House cut back on John H. Sununu’s use of military aircraft for leisure and political travel, the controversial chief of staff has been soliciting free trips aboard jets provided by American corporations, White House officials said Monday.

In the latest instance, Beneficial Corp., a consumer credit firm headquartered in Peapack, N.J., provided a chartered jet for Sununu to return to Washington from a New York stamp auction and a New Jersey GOP fund-raiser last Wednesday night.

Officials said other corporations are being asked to do likewise whenever Sununu makes similar trips.

Sununu pays nothing for these corporate flights, which are perfectly legal. Beneficial officials said they expect to receive only partial reimbursement from the New Jersey Republican Party for Sununu’s flight last week.

In turning to corporations, Sununu is one of a growing number of top Administration officials who have come to rely on American business to provide air travel for trips that previously would have been funded by the government or paid for out of their own pockets. Commerce Secretary Robert A. Mosbacher has taken more than 30 trips on planes provided by corporations since he took office 2 1/2 years ago.

Although others have been criticized for flying on corporate jets, officials said Sununu sees no potential conflict of interest in accepting travel accommodations from corporations, even those with intense interest in changing government policies.

Beneficial, for example, has been actively involved in battling banking industry reforms proposed by the Bush Administration.

Sununu has said that he must rely on corporate jets in order to remain in constant touch with the White House. “I have to be able to communicate, to work on sensitive papers, to coordinate the White House activities, even while I’m traveling,” he said on Sunday.

But Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), after he was told of Sununu’s flight at the expense of Beneficial, said, “I think it’s a mistake; that’s why you have conflict of interest laws.” Frank added, “What would be so terrible about flying in a regular plane like a normal person?”

White House officials said Sununu is unlikely to be swayed by such criticism. “Sununu doesn’t play by your rules, or our rules, or Washington rules,” one official said. “He plays by his rules and he’s not going to change.”

Until recently, it was illegal for top Administration officials to accept free travel from American corporations. But the law was changed to permit such trips at the request of President Bush as part of the Ethics Reform Act, enacted in late 1989.

White House officials said Sununu began soliciting flights from corporations shortly after Bush imposed a new White House travel policy May 9 that barred the chief of staff from using military aircraft for all political and most personal trips. Under the previous policy, Sununu had used military aircraft to take a ski vacation and visit his dentist in New Hampshire.

The officials said that before the Beneficial flight, Sununu had used corporate jets “three or four times.”

Although the officials said Beneficial is not the only corporation that has provided transportation for the chief of staff since his use of military aircraft was cut back, they declined to identify the other firms that have done so.

As one aide explained, Sununu is in such demand to attend political functions around the country that he has no trouble finding someone to provide him an aircraft. Another official said Sununu’s attitude toward the corporations that provide the planes is: “As long as they pay, that’s fine.”

Beneficial spokesman Bob Wade said his company initially was asked to provide a round-trip chartered flight for Sununu to attend the New Jersey GOP fund-raiser last Wednesday night. The event was held at Hamilton Farm, a facility that Beneficial owns in Bedminster, N.J., a town in the horse country of western New Jersey about an hour’s drive from New York City.

After the company chartered an aircraft for Sununu, Wade said, White House officials said he would use it to return to Washington but not to go to New Jersey.

Instead, Sununu traveled in a government-provided limousine first to New York City, where he attended the stamp auction. It was not clear how he then traveled to New Jersey. The limousine returned to Washington without a passenger.

A New Jersey state party official, who declined to be identified, said he was told by the White House: “ ‘Don’t worry about getting him here,’ just take care of the return trip.”

Wade said that Beneficial’s Washington representative, Gary Perkinson, flew to New Jersey aboard the chartered jet alone, and returned with Sununu. He said Perkinson did some corporate business while he was in the New Jersey area, but he acknowledged that Perkinson would not have flown in a chartered plane had Sununu not requested one.

Sununu and Perkinson discussed “everything from hockey to education” on the return flight, according to Wade. He said the subject of banking reform legislation did not come up.

Beneficial is a politically active firm whose chairman, Finn M. W. Caspersen, along with his son, made $42,750 in contributions to Democratic and Republican candidates in the last congressional elections. At the same time, the Beneficial PAC made $129,475 in contributions to congressional candidates and the company was responsible for $45,000 in so-called “soft money” contributions to the Democratic and Republican parties.

Wade said his firm expects to be reimbursed for Sununu’s flight from the state GOP at an amount equivalent to first-class fare, which will not cover the cost of chartering the plane. Under New Jersey law, corporations are permitted to make such contributions to state political parties.

Sununu will be billed by the White House for some of the cost of his limousine trip to New York City, according to a White House official. The cost is unknown. He said Sununu is not disturbed that the trip has received attention in the press.

“He’s got a thick skin,” the official said.