Terry McAuliffe

More than two dozen union presidents were reportedly invited to buy shares in Global Crossing, as the Bermuda-based telecom was first offering its stock to the general public. Now a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., is probing stock transactions by directors of insurance and investment firm ULLICO (f.k.a. Union Labor Life Ins. Co.), a union-dominated firm founded by the AFL. ULLICO's board is chaired by ex-AFL-CIO Building & Construction Trades Dep't president Robert A. Georgine and includes many current and ex-union presidents.

Reportedly, the investigations focus on trading privileges that allegedly allowed ULLICO's board members to profit from the purchase and sale of its shares. The transactions were lucrative because the privately held company's stock price was reset each year based on its book value and the board members could anticipate the change. ULLICO's shares had risen on the strength of several deals, including a $500 million profit on a $7.6 million investment in telecom firm Global Crossing, which declared bankruptcy in Jan. 2002.

Kenneth E. Bates, convicted of shooting a woman in 1985, has been banned from holding office in LIUNA Local 2 in Chicago. He was nominated to run for executive board member. LIUNA's "in-house trial judge" Peter Vaira, ruled Feb. 23 that Bates is disqualified as a candidate because of his conviction. Federal labor law bars anyone convicted of murder and certain other felonies from holding union office for 13 years after being released from prison. But the federal judge who imposed the sentence can drop the restriction, which Bates said he'll attempt to have done. He was sentenced to prison in 1986 and released in 1997.

Jim McGough of Laborers for Justice, a dissident group, challenged Bates' nomination. McGough has dubbed the opposition the "Organized Crime Slate." Local 2 is part of the Chicago Laborers Dist. Council which voted in 1999 to cooperate with the DOJ and LIUNA's controversial "reform" effort. [Chi. Sun-Times 2/27/01]

At Terry McAuliffe's $26 million soft money fundraiser for the Democrat Nat'l Committee on May 24, ten unions each "contributed" $500,000 of union members dues.  The event, a National Tribute to President Clinton, was largest political fundraiser ever.  The ten unions McAuliffe hooked were:

1) Am. Fed'n of State, County & Mun. Employees,
2) Am. Fed'n of Teachers,
3) Communications Workers of Am.,
4) Int'l Ass'n of Machinists
5) Int'l Bhd. of Elec. Workers,
6) Int'l Union of Painters,
7) Nat'l Education Ass'n,
8) Service Employees Int'l Union,
9) Sheet Metal Workers Int'l Ass'n,
10) United Food & Commercial Workers Int'l Union. [Wash. Post 5/24]
 
Reportedly, it was as a favor to AFL-CIO boss John J. Sweeney that McAuliffe chaired the event. Sweeney had become so unhappy with DNC leaders that he threatened to stop affiliated unions from donating to the party unless McAuliffe took over. McAuliffe was unwilling to take the full-time job, but agreed to lead the "drive for dollars." [Time 6/5/00]

At the corruption trial of ex-Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters political director William W. Hamilton, Richard Sullivan, ex-DNC finance director, testified that Terence A. McAuliffe, Bill Clinton's friend and chief fundraiser, played a major role in promoting an illegal money-laundering scheme in which Democratic donors were to contribute to ex-IBT boss Ron Carey's 1996 reelection campaign in exchange for IBT's large donations to Democrats. Describing a Oct. 1996 meeting with the Democrats' fundraising staff, Sullivan testified, "[McAuliffe] said that if we could get a $50,000 contribution for the Carey campaign, he knew we could get $500,000 for Unity from the Teamsters." Unity was a joint fund-raising effort by Clinton-Gore 96 and other Democratic campaign committees.