The Lobbyist Behind Rich’s Pardon

Jack Quinn was vilified this week at a House committee hearing as an amoral fixer who manipulated friendships for financial gain during an effort to obtain a presidential pardon for fugitive financier Marc Rich.

With two congressional committees investigating the controversial pardon granted by former President Clinton to Rich and with politicians in both parties lining up to denounce it, Quinn could be viewed as a would-be power broker who short-circuited his own career.

But in the world of Washington lobbyists, this chapter in Quinn’s life may not be so dim. Certainly, other prominent Washington consultants have survived brushes with scandal to become influential players in the capital minuet of politics, lobbying and public relations.

In fact, many might just like to be in Quinn’s shoes. After all, he did pull off a spectacular feat--deftly obtaining a presidential pardon for Rich despite extraordinary legal obstacles.

And although the uproar over Rich has caused some to question Quinn’s judgment and ethics, almost everyone agrees that it also demonstrated his effectiveness and access.

The question is which end of that equation shapes more heavily the career that Quinn, 51, has been building as a Democratic insider over the last two decades, more recently as Clinton’s White House counsel and now as a well-paid Washington lobbyist.

It is a question that might be asked in Hollywood, on Wall Street or at any city hall: Is it better to be viewed as principled or powerful? The dominant answer probably says more about Washington than about Jack Quinn.

Among Quinn’s contemporaries in the lobbying world, the prevailing view: powerful. Many say that Quinn could not buy at any price the kind of publicity generated in the last few weeks by the controversy.

“It wasn’t pretty, but Jack’s now in fat city. He got the job done,” said one former Clinton aide.

The minority view is that the near-universal condemnation of the Rich pardon has made Quinn too toxic for big corporate clients who prefer that their string-pulling not attract subpoenas and television cameras. Then there is the grumbling among some Clinton allies who believe that Quinn did not fairly alert the then-president to a potential pardon backlash. This, they said, could make other elected officials Quinn hopes to lobby wary about what he is not telling them.

“There’s a danger that Jack has to overcome that people [he is lobbying] will be a little bit gunshy about his advocacy,” said attorney Lanny J. Davis, a former White House special counsel for Clinton. “Notoriety cuts both ways.”

The unusual circumstances around the pardon have left a bad taste that some Washington lobbyists worry could hurt the image of their profession. Even so, the Rich case has become a consuming preoccupation along the K Street corridor of Washington lobbyists.

“Everybody I’ve talked to thinks [Quinn] just taints the whole image,” said one prominent lobbyist. “You can say a lawyer has to represent somebody. But he tried to be too cutesy and he hurts us all.”

Others said that such high-mindedness is nothing more than professional jealousy. In the end, these lobbyists said, the thing potential clients will remember most about this imbroglio is the bottom line: Quinn got Rich off. And when Quinn was put on the griddle Wednesday for a full day’s inquisition by the House Government Reform Committee, he kept his cool, delivering a performance that even Republicans considered polished and calm.

“After all the rubbing of hands and clucking of tongues and a little of ‘There but for the grace of God go I’ . . . Washington and the clients will only remember that Jack Quinn was rather dogged in his defense,” said attorney Leonard Garment, a White House counsel for President Nixon. “He didn’t wince or whine or moan during a couple of hours of testimony when he was being beleaguered by that air of sanctimony that pervades those congressional hearings. And . . . he got his guy off.”

Before the Rich controversy, Quinn was rising inside the Washington lobbying community. The Brooklyn, N.Y., native began his political career working for Democratic candidates as an undergraduate at Georgetown University.

Later on, Quinn joined the law firm Arnold & Porter, acquiring important corporate clients. His big break in politics came in 1988, when he backed Al Gore in his first presidential run. When Gore and Clinton won in 1992, Gore first named Quinn his counsel and, six months later, his chief of staff. In 1994, Clinton drafted Quinn as White House counsel. In December 1996, he returned to Arnold & Porter.

Then, about a year ago, he established his own lobbying firm with Ed Gillespie, a prominent Republican communications strategist. The firm grew quickly, picking up 24 employees (including about a dozen lobbyists) and a stable of blue-chip clients weighted toward technology and communication heavyweights such as Cisco Systems Inc., Viacom Inc. and a coalition working for repeal of the telephone tax.

Rich became a client of Quinn’s in 1999, when he was still at Arnold & Porter, but he has never been a client of the new firm.

Quinn declined to be interviewed for this story, but a source close to him said he has received only supportive calls and notes from clients. None has dropped him, the source said, and the firm expects to have a “very good 2001.”

In fact, few other lobbying firms were better positioned to prosper no matter who won the 2000 presidential race. Quinn remained close to Gore, frequently making the vice president’s case on television. Gillespie, a former communications director for the Republican National Committee, took a leave of absence to help design George W. Bush’s communications office in Austin, Texas.

Still, even if the pardon controversy does not hurt Quinn’s lobbying business, the Rich case probably will have two long-term effects on Quinn’s career in Washington. One is to complicate his relationship with the Clinton circle. Although sources said the former president has expressed no anger at Quinn, many Clinton allies are furious at Quinn for pressing the case directly to his former boss without much apparent concern for Clinton’s political welfare.

“Clinton thought of Quinn as someone who could look at the pardon from both points of view, including that of the president,” one former Clinton advisor said. “Clearly, he didn’t.”

But Peter Mirijanian, a spokesman for Quinn, said Quinn was nothing but direct with the former president about the merits of the case. Mirijanian argued that Quinn is being tainted by circumstances he knew nothing about--such as the fact that Rich’s ex-wife, Denise, gave “an enormous sum” of money to Clinton’s presidential library.

Quinn testified Wednesday that he knew nothing about her donation--reported as ranging from $400,000 to $1 million--during his effort to seek a pardon for Marc Rich.

“All Quinn did was advise Denise Rich to send a letter to the president,” Mirijanian said. “In other words, Jack played it by the book.

“People can only come out of this with a sense of admiration for how smart he was and how well he represented his client. Which is how people get hired in this town.”

Although he won’t be hurt as a lobbyist, most observers believe, the controversy makes it far more difficult for Quinn to take a prominent role in any future Democratic presidential campaign or administration.

“At that point, whoever wants to utilize him will say, ‘Do we want to put up with that part of the story that refers back to the Rich pardon?’ ” said Vin Weber, a former GOP congressman from Minnesota who is now a lobbyist here.

But that may be a price Quinn is willing to pay for an enhanced reputation as a “go-to” guy for the next person caught up in a daunting Washington scandal.

“To persist and be a survivor,” says Garment, “makes him look strong to me.”