Ashcroft Says He Supports Tobacco Lawsuit

Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft said Thursday that he has no plans to pull the plug on the Justice Department’s landmark lawsuit against the tobacco industry, even though government lawyers on the case complain that a cash shortage could put them out of business.

“The Department of Justice is proceeding with the case, and I support the department’s position,” Ashcroft said at a Senate hearing, responding to Democratic senators who voiced concerns about the fate of the government’s multibillion-dollar lawsuit.

His assurances did little to mollify critics within the anti-tobacco community who charge that the Bush administration is looking for a way to abandon the litigation.

“It’s time for this administration to decide whether they are really going to pursue this lawsuit or are they going to give the tobacco industry what it wants and deny the American people their day in court,” said William V. Corr, executive vice president of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.

The lawsuit, initiated by the Justice Department in 1999 at the direction of President Clinton, alleges that major cigarette makers knowingly concealed information about the deadly effects of their products and seeks billions of dollars in damages to offset the federal government’s health-care costs for smoking-related illnesses.

The tobacco companies already have knocked out in court a major part of the government’s case, and they maintain that the remaining racketeering charges also are baseless. Moreover, they accuse the federal government of simply piling on to extract more money after the states reached a $246-billion settlement with the industry in 1998.

The federal lawsuit against Big Tobacco is not scheduled to go to trial until 2003. But doubts about its fate flared up this week because of the disclosure of a memo from the Justice Department’s litigation team, first reported by the Washington Post, that warned Ashcroft the lawsuit might have to be dropped unless the department devoted about $57 million to it.

Ashcroft defended the funding of the litigation in an appearance before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee. He said the $1.8 million that he is seeking to fund the tobacco litigation next year is identical to what former Atty. Gen. Janet Reno sought last year. More money would be made available if the need arises, he said.