May 27, 2010 2:10 PM

Obama: "Nothing Improper" in Alleged Sestak Job Offer

By
Brian Montopoli
Topics
Democrats ,
Obama Administration
President Obama said at his press conference today that he "can assure the public that nothing improper took place" in conversations between the White House and Rep. Joe Sestak, who suggested earlier this year he was offered a White House job in exchange for dropping his primary challenge against Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter.

Sestak stayed in the race and eventually defeated Specter, at which point Republicans made a renewed push for the White House and Sestak to reveal the nature of the conversations.

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Ranking Member Darrell Issa, who has been pressing this issue for months, called for a special prosecutor in April. He alleges that the White House may have violated anti-bribery provisions of the federal criminal code as well as prohibitions on government officials interfering in elections and using federal jobs for a political purpose if it made the offer.

(Credit: AP)
Yesterday, the seven Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee joined that call, and some Democrats, among them Sen. Dick Durbin and Rep. Anthony Weiner, have called on the White House to make clear exactly what took place.

The president said at the press conference today that "there will be an official response shortly on the Sestak issue which I hope will answer your questions" - and added that "shortly" meant in the very near future.

The White House has bushed off questions about the issue for months, insisting that any conversations that took place were not inappropriate. Sestak has stood by his February allegation of a job offer but declined to discuss it further, saying that doing so gets into politics.

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Add a Comment See all 173 Comments
by SueZeeeQue May 29, 2010 11:39 AM EDT
No matter how much Republicans whine and squeal over this, nothing will come of it.


Reagan did it and nothing came of it either.


The bottom line is that you have to prove that the INTENT of the job offer was to make him drop out of the race so that the other candidate would win.


As we've seen with the Bush administration's outing of a covert CIA operative, it's extremely difficult to prove intent even when someone has clearly broken the law.
Reply to this comment
by mary-miami May 29, 2010 10:56 AM EDT
Big deal. Republicans do stuff like this all the time.
Reply to this comment
by RobAla May 29, 2010 12:11 PM EDT
I'm not a member of either party, but give names and dates of Republicans who have done this. It's easy just to throw mud. Give us some facts.
Even if your statement is true, should we ignore an administration which is tampering with a federal election?
by SueZeeeQue May 29, 2010 12:33 PM EDT
Reagan did it.
by Cuda-Driver May 29, 2010 10:50 AM EDT
For one it was before he formally announced his candidacy for the Senate seat. Since when does offering a job to someone who isn't even running for anything be considered as a crime? Another thing he said he was offered a job period, never did he say it was in exchange for him not to run, I saw the interview.

Experts seem to agree that there's no legal wrongdoing here.
Reply to this comment
by spindoctor2010 May 29, 2010 1:14 AM EDT
Congressman Sestack will eventually have to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth. He is a military man "Admiral" and took an honor oath as an officer. I believe he will do the honorable thing and fully disclose all the conversations and offers that were made by the Obama Administration visa vie Bill Clinton. Does it rise to the letter of the law as bribery to affect the outcome of a Federal Election? Does the 10 weeks that the Obama Administration took to get its story straight amount to witness tampering and conspiracy to obstruct justice? Does Charlie Daniels play a mean fiddle?
Reply to this comment
by Cuda-Driver May 28, 2010 11:35 PM EDT
It's pretty funny that car thief Darrell Issa is now spearheading "ethics" for the Republicans, but it's not surprising. The GOP should be GHP, with the H standing for Hypocrisy.

First it was Obama is not a natural born American, that didn't work. Then it was he is a socialist marxist, that didn't work. Stop health care reform that didn't work etc. etc. Now it's this, when this doesn't work it will be something else. Good luck with that?

Every village has its idiots, of course, but it's sad when citizens allow themselves to be whipped into a frenzy by a Republican propaganda machine masquerading as a legitimate. Republicans have the right to believe the future of the U.S.A. is in jeopardy, but sadly they have not yet correctly identified the real enemy. Perhaps when Republicans finally grow up and mature into thinking adults, they will see the right-leaning power establishment for the oppressive and cunning beast that it is.
Reply to this comment
by Cuda-Driver May 28, 2010 11:33 PM EDT
Remember Kenneth Starr's $30 million investigating white water, A big to do about nothing. The Clintons were never charged. And so what if he had a affair that had nothing to with white water and last I checked an affair between two consenting adults is Not illegal.

This is what Republicans do. They have no accomplishments to run on. This is not the first time something has happened, not that we even know that anything happened this time. Lets spend another $30 million investigating this.

Associated Press story from 1981:

Sen. S. I. Hayakawa on Wednesday spurned a Reagan Administration suggestion that if he drops out of the crowded Republican Senate primary race in California, President Reagan would find him a job.

Hayakawa, who was seeking a second term at the time, was being urged by GOP officials to withdraw from the 1982 primary, a race that included, among others, Reps. Barry Goldwater Jr. & Bob Dornan, San Diego Mayor Pete Wilson, and First Daughter Maureen Reagan. The last thing the White House wanted was a split-conservative field that would end in the nomination of Rep. Pete McCloskey, a longtime anathema to the Right. Hayakawa ultimately decided not to run for re-election. Wilson won the primary and was elected in November.

President Eisenhower (a republican) has done this in the past and that it seems to be accepted by biographers of both President Eisenhower and Chief Justice Warren that Warren?s support for Eisenhower?s presidential bid came with a promise that he would be appointed to the first vacancy on the Supreme Court.

From the NY Times, December 24, 1989:

THIRTY-SIX YEARS AGO, in one of those wonderful twists of politics, the newly inaugurated President Dwight D. Eisenhower made good on a private pledge that he never dreamed he'd have to keep. During the Republican Convention the summer before, Ike had managed to get the support of a key rival, Gov. Earl Warren of California. A quid for the quo, it seems, was that Warren was promised the first vacancy on the United States Supreme Court.

And so it was that Earl Warren was nominated (and confirmed without opposition) to be the 13th Chief Justice of the United States.
Reply to this comment
by 8razman May 28, 2010 10:14 PM EDT
Nah, nothing improper with attempting to alter the outcome of a political election. Nah,nothing wrong here?????????????????
Reply to this comment
by Perish1 May 28, 2010 9:59 PM EDT
cuba-driver you are a complete party stooge.

Reagan was years ago and millions were spent on specaial committees and prosecuters by the democratic congress and senate trying to prove any thing possible against him. Nothing came of anything.You need to drop this diversionary baloney because it isn't going to turn anyone from the fact that the Obama administration is the most corrupt political machine since Tammany Hall.
Reply to this comment
by Cuda-Driver May 29, 2010 8:13 AM EDT
More mindless dribble Perish1. You must to busy watching Fox News to think for yourself. Reagan was an example. So now you think the Republican's should spend millions on special committees and prosecutors trying to prove any thing possible against Obama? Mark my words nothing will come of it. The most corrupt administration ever was the Bush administration. There are a few bushel baskets of felony indictments against Bush and his henchmen that the Obama team needs to start pursuing.
by Cuda-Driver May 28, 2010 8:30 PM EDT
Associated Press story from 1981:

Sen. S. I. Hayakawa on Wednesday spurned a Reagan Administration suggestion that if he drops out of the crowded Republican Senate primary race in California, President Reagan would find him a job.

Hayakawa, who was seeking a second term at the time, was being urged by GOP officials to withdraw from the 1982 primary, a race that included, among others, Reps. Barry Goldwater Jr. & Bob Dornan, San Diego Mayor Pete Wilson, and First Daughter Maureen Reagan. The last thing the White House wanted was a split-conservative field that would end in the nomination of Rep. Pete McCloskey, a longtime anathema to the Right. Hayakawa ultimately decided not to run for re-election. Wilson won the primary and was elected in November.
Reply to this comment
by Cuda-Driver May 28, 2010 7:36 PM EDT
Remember Kenneth Starr's $30 million investigating white water, A big to do about nothing. The Clintons were never charged. And so what if he had a affair that had nothing to with white water and last I checked an affair between two consenting adults is Not illegal.

This is what Republicans do. They have no accomplishments to run on. This is not the first time something has happened, not that we even know that anything happened this time. Lets spend another $30 million investigating this.

I would note (a republican) has done this in the past and that it seems to be accepted by biographers of both President Eisenhower and Chief Justice Warren that Warren?s support for Eisenhower?s presidential bid came with a promise that he would be appointed to the first vacancy on the Supreme Court.

From the NY Times, December 24, 1989:

THIRTY-SIX YEARS AGO, in one of those wonderful twists of politics, the newly inaugurated President Dwight D. Eisenhower made good on a private pledge that he never dreamed he'd have to keep. During the Republican Convention the summer before, Ike had managed to get the support of a key rival, Gov. Earl Warren of California. A quid for the quo, it seems, was that Warren was promised the first vacancy on the United States Supreme Court.

And so it was that Earl Warren was nominated (and confirmed without opposition) to be the 13th Chief Justice of the United States.
Reply to this comment
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