Frist Allies Made Thousands Working for His AIDS Charity

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s AIDS charity paid about half a million dollars in consulting fees to members of his political inner circle, according to tax returns providing the first financial accounting of the possible presidential hopeful’s nonprofit.

The returns for World of Hope Inc. also show that the charity raised most of its $4.4 million from 18 sources. They gave $97,950 to $267,735 each to help fund Frist’s efforts to fight AIDS.

The tax forms, filed nine months after they were first due, do not identify the 18 major donors by name. Frist’s lawyer, Alex Vogel, said Friday that he would not give their names because tax law did not require their public disclosure.

Frist’s office provided a list of 96 donors, but did not say how much each contributed.

The donors included several corporations with frequent business before Congress, such as insurer Blue Cross Blue Shield, manufacturer 3M, drug maker Eli Lilly and the Goldman Sachs investment firm.

World of Hope gave $3 million of what it raised to charitable AIDS causes such as Africare and evangelical Christian groups with ties to Republicans -- the Rev. Franklin Graham’s Samaritan’s Purse and the Rev. Luis Cortes Jr.’s Esperanza USA, for example.

The rest of the money went to overhead, records obtained by Associated Press show. That included $456,125 in consulting fees to two firms run by Frist’s longtime political fundraiser, Linus Catignani. One is jointly run by Linda Bond, wife of Sen. Christopher S. Bond (R-Mo.).

The charity also hired the law firm of Vogel’s wife, Jill Holtzman Vogel, and Frist’s Tennessee accountant, Deborah Kolarich.

Kolarich’s name recently surfaced in an e-mail involving Frist’s controversial sale of stock in his family-founded healthcare company. That transaction is under federal investigation.

Jill Holtzman Vogel, who is raising money for a run for the state Senate in Virginia in 2007, has received thousands in contributions this year from Catignani & Bond and from her husband, among numerous other sources, according to data released by the Virginia Public Access Project.

Alex Vogel said Frist picked people to work on his charity whom he trusted and knew, such as Vogel’s wife, and was proud that overhead costs amounted to less than $1 of every $5 raised. “It’s leaner than the average charity,” Vogel said.

Frist is listed as the charity’s president and his wife was listed as secretary. Neither was compensated.

Frist formed the charity in 2003. It drew attention in August 2004 when it held a benefit concert in New York during the Republican National Convention at which President Bush was nominated for reelection.