Gingrich to Place Donor Inquiry in New Hands

House Republican leaders decided Wednesday to shift at least part of the troubled 16-month investigation of Democratic campaign fund-raising out of the hands of Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), who has directed an inquiry beset by partisanship and personal rancor.

House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) signaled his intent to intervene after Democrats on the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee rebuffed Republican efforts to grant immunity to four key witnesses. The Democrats vowed to continue their blocking maneuvers until Burton, the panel’s combative chairman, agrees to give up power.

GOP insiders said it is now certain that Gingrich will shift at least part of the investigation to the House Oversight Committee headed by Rep. Bill Thomas (R-Bakersfield). During Wednesday’s contentious committee session, Burton staved off an attempt to remove him outright as the leader of the inquiry.

“We’ve tried to avoid having to shift this investigation,” Gingrich said. “But we’ll do whatever we have to to ensure that the American people have the right to know.”

The transfer, expected to play out in coming weeks, underscores the repeated difficulties Republican lawmakers have encountered in trying to profit politically from disclosures of Democratic fund-raising abuses in 1996.

Although an earlier round of Senate hearings into questionable contributions failed to generate the kind of “smoking gun” disclosures that many Republicans were seeking, the House inquiry headed by Burton has produced even less. The Burton investigation has been a spectacle from the start, hampered by internecine warfare and its chairman’s aggressive partisanship.

President Clinton and Vice President Al Gore, meanwhile, appear to have suffered little damage from revelations about their role in the 1996 fund-raising scandal, and the public seems to have responded to the GOP hearings with a collective yawn.

House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said Wednesday he intends to take another shot at Burton today, introducing a measure that would prompt a vote by the entire House on whether Burton’s authority to oversee the inquiry should be curtailed. Although he expects the measure to fail, it would put added pressure on the chairman.

Thomas, a fierce critic of President Clinton’s role in the fund-raising excesses of 1996, now appears to be the GOP’s best hope of using the controversy to discredit Democrats during the current election cycle.

But time is running short. Congress is expected to adjourn in October, giving Thomas just four months to accomplish the objectives that have eluded Burton since the investigation began in January 1997.

On Wednesday, committee Democrats, led by Rep. Henry A. Waxman of Los Angeles, once again blocked Burton’s efforts to grant immunity to witnesses, essentially handcuffing him from taking further testimony.

The Democrats’ refusal to grant immunity to potential witnesses infuriated Republicans, who accused them of stonewalling on behalf of Clinton and Gore.

The Justice Department had not opposed Burton’s effort to grant immunity to the four figures: Kent La, a close business associate of Los Angeles businessman Ted Sioeng; Larry Wong, a friend of convicted Democratic fund-raisers Gene and Nora Lum; and Irene Wu and Nancy Lee, former employees of Torrance businessman Johnny Chien Chuen Chung, who has pleaded guilty to election law violations.

“I believe that Machiavelli would be proud of the subversive and obstructive tactics of the Democrats on this panel and their co-conspirators in the White House,” said Rep. John L. Mica (R-Fla.).

A shift of the inquiry to Thomas might deny Democrats their chief foil. A series of miscues by Burton--calling the president a “scumbag” and flubbing the public release of the taped prison conversations of Clinton friend Webster L. Hubbell, for example--have provided Democrats with ample ammunition to discredit the GOP inquiry.

In Thomas, Democrats will find just as vigorous a partisan but a far more circumspect and politically savvy competitor. Just as important, Republicans have a large enough majority on Thomas’ panel to approve immunity, which requires a two-thirds vote, without any Democratic support.

Thomas has made clear in discussions with Gingrich that he is unwilling to assist Burton with his effort, according to House sources. If he is granted authority to investigate fund-raising abuses, he has sent word that he wants wide latitude.

“Nothing’s been finalized,” Thomas told reporters. “I don’t know what I’m being asked to do.”

Democrats argued that Burton’s inquiry has careened so far out of control that Thomas could only do better.

“There has never been an investigation so plagued by mistakes, raw partisanship and wrong judgments,” said Waxman. “It has become the Dan Burton investigation, not the investigation of the Government Reform and Oversight Committee, not the investigation of the Democrats and Republicans who were elected by the voters.”

Although Gingrich has focused his public ire on Democrats in recent weeks, he and other Republicans have expressed frustration about Burton, whose stumbles have shifted the focus away from Democratic targets of the investigation and toward the investigators themselves.

Burton, after outlining what he considers serious law-breaking by Democrats, vowed to continue his investigation until the House adjourns in the fall. But to break the impasse over immunity, he said, he will recommend to Gingrich that Thomas take over part of the inquiry and share the services of some of Burton’s investigators.

“Obviously we would prefer to keep the entire investigation here,” Burton said.