Quin Hillyer, The Examiner
2008-03-21 17:03:00.0
Current rank: Not ranked

WASHINGTON -

Hillary Clinton and five other senators who since 1999 opposed every major proposal to curb lawsuit abuse were among the most frequent recipients of campaign contributions from partners at the disgraced class-action firm Milberg Weiss, according to data analyzed by The Examiner.

Thirteen votes on lawsuit abuse reform proposals previously identified by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) were analyzed by The Examiner. Twelve senators voted for none and 13 voted for just one. Three of those casting one vote for reform were among the lawmakers who received the most donations from Milberg Weiss.

Four former Milberg Weiss partners — Mel Weiss, William Lerach, David Bershad and Steven Schulman — have agreed to guilty pleas in recent months to felonies in conjunction with a $11.7 million kickback scheme that federal prosecutors said led to more than $200 million in tainted fees for the firm in roughly 150 cases, beginning in 1979.

The firm itself is also scheduled for trial later this year on multiple felony charges stemming from a federal investigation that became public in January 2002.

Among them, the four partners and their spouses contributed more than $800,000 to candidates, party committees and political action committees between 2002 and the most recent FEC reporting period. The firm separately donated another $514,000 to Democratic Party campaign committees.

The six senators who always voted nay received the following contributions from the Milberg Weiss partners (and their spouses) between January 2002 and the present: Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., ($21,971 to her senatorial and presidential campaigns combined), Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J. ($12,600), Barbara Boxer, D-Calif. ($12,000), John Kerry, D-Mass. ($11,000), Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. ($9,000), and Joe Biden, D-Del. ($6,920).

The three senators who voted only once to curb lawsuit abuse received the following amounts from Milberg Weiss partners (and their spouses): Bill Nelson, D-Fla. ($16,000), Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. ($14,714), and Russ Feingold, D-Wis. ($12,000).

Two other senators who received substantial donations from the firm, Barack Obama, D-Ill., and Robert Menendez, D-N.J., weren’t in the Senate long enough to be included in the NAM rankings. But Menendez served in the House during that same period, and voted in favor of reform just two of 17 times, according to the manufacturing trade association.

Michael Barone, founder of the Almanac of American Politics, said the Milberg Weiss donations reflect a broader pattern of how the office-holders vote on key bills that involve their financial supporters.

“This is part of the whole trial lawyer orbit,” he said. “On telecom immunity [in the national security wiretaps debate], they were voting to enrich their trial lawyer contributors — and if some of those trial lawyer contributors are actually under indictment, that makes it look even more fishy.”

The top 13 Milberg Weiss contribution recipients were Democrats. The first Republican on the list is Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., who ranked 14th and voted with NAM 67 percent of the time on lawsuit abuse reform bills. Forty-four senators voted for lawsuit abuse curbs more often than Specter.

Ten of the 13 votes tracked by NAM were for proposals supported by a majority of senators voting. Five of the 10 proposals, however, failed to pass because of filibusters conducted by opponents.

One of the bills, the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005, passed the Senate 72-26, but only two of the top Milberg Weiss recipients, Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and Obama, voted for it.

Other issues included in the NAM tally were proposals to put caps on medical liability and on punitive damages in certain circumstances, and to place limits on trial lawyers “forum shopping” for particularly lenient judges.

When The Examiner broadened its search of campaign giving to include all donations by current or recent Milberg Weiss attorneys, the newspaper found that 10 of the top 11 recipients voted for proposals favored by NAM only once or never.

Obama has been in the Senate for just three of the votes on NAM’s list, and voted with NAM on one of those. Senate Banking Committee chairman Chris Dodd, D-CN, voted for NAM’s position on three of the 13 votes.

Quin Hillyer is associate editorial page editor of The Washington Examiner.

E-mail him at qhillyer@dcexaminer.com.