Those darn Democrats, taking trips paid for by dictators… but, really, this is old news..
Saddam Hussein’s intelligence agency secretly financed a trip to Iraq for three U.S. lawmakers during the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.
An indictment unsealed in Detroit accuses Muthanna Al-Hanooti, a member of a Michigan nonprofit group, of arranging for three members of Congress to travel to Iraq in October 2002 at the behest of Saddam’s regime. Prosecutors say Iraqi intelligence officials paid for the trip through an intermediary.
At the time, the Bush administration was trying to persuade Congress to authorize military action against Iraq.
The lawmakers are not named in the indictment but the dates correspond to a trip by Democratic Reps. Jim McDermott of Washington, David Bonior of Michigan and Mike Thompson of California. There was no indication the three lawmakers knew the trip was underwritten by Saddam.“Obviously we didn’t know it at the time,” McDermott spokesman Michael DeCesare said Wednesday. “The trip was to see the plight of the Iraqi children. That’s the only reason we went.”
Why is this “old news?” Well, the aforementioned Democrats had previously been reported to have been on a pre-war trip to Iraq that reportedly funded by Detroit-area businessman Shakir Al-Khafaji, an Iraqi-American, who also had ties to Saddam’s regime and accompanied them on the trip. Al-Khafaji received loads of cash from the U.N. Oil for Food scandal. Apparently, Al-Khafaji is the “third-party” mentioned in the indictment.
And guess what? Mark and I discussed this trip in our book, Caucus of Corruption.
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