FBI Admits Donation Probe Fumbled

The FBI has acknowledged overlooking key intelligence information gathered as far back as 1991 that investigators believe shows further Chinese government efforts to buy political influence in the United States, senior U.S. government sources said Thursday.

Atty. Gen. Janet Reno learned of the new evidence on the night of Nov. 5. A senior Justice Department official said Reno was “livid” at the FBI foul-up and two days later apologized to Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.) for failing to disclose information that was germane to Senate hearings into campaign fund-raising abuses. Thompson had suspended his committee’s hearings Oct. 31.

FBI Director Louis J. Freeh, who also apologized to Thompson, has replaced the senior FBI official overseeing the bureau’s investigation into suspected Chinese influence-buying, officials said.

The newly discovered intelligence, much of it culled from electronic surveillance conducted by the FBI and other U.S. agencies during the past six years, includes evidence of the magnitude and means by which Beijing hoped to influence U.S. elections, several officials said. Officials would not provide details of the classified intelligence.

These developments come only two months after Reno ordered a major Justice Department shake-up and replaced the head of a department task force that was looking into campaign finance violations.

*

The continuing series of Justice Department missteps demonstrates “remarkable incompetence,” one senior government official said, and is likely to increase Republican pressure on Reno to seek the appointment of an independent counsel to run the politically sensitive investigation.

Some officials played down the significance of the new evidence and noted that the information was gathered by the FBI as part of a counterintelligence function designed to keep tabs on foreign governments and protect U.S. national security.

Thursday night, the FBI issued a statement saying that FBI counterintelligence files are “voluminous,” consisting of “raw, uncorroborated intelligence that requires significant analysis before the information is appropriate for dissemination.”