Hillary's Other Brother Helped Obtain Pardon for Hillary Donors

Hillary's Other Brother Helped Obtain Pardon for Hillary Donors

NewsMax.com Wires
Friday, March 2, 2001

NEW YORK (UPI) – Former president Bill Clinton's brother-in-law Tony Rodham helped obtain a presidential pardon for a Tennessee couple last March over the objections of the Justice Department, the New York Times reported Thursday.

In an interview with the Times, Rodham acknowledged that he had asked the president to pardon Edgar Allen Gregory Jr. and his wife, Vonna Jo. The Gregorys were convicted of bank fraud in 1982, accused of using the assets of a bank they owned to give loans to friends.

"I told him about Ed Gregory," Rodham said. "I didn't push. I told the president about Ed Gregory and that he had applied for a pardon. He's what the pardon process is all about."

The Gregorys were placed on probation. The pardons freed them of the consequences of felony convictions. Rodham said he received no payment.

Contributors to Hillary Clinton

Clinton pardoned the Gregorys on March 15, 2000. The Gregorys are major campaign contributors to Democrats and Republicans, and they contributed to the Senate campaign of Hillary Clinton, Tony Rodham's sister.

Julia Payne, a spokeswoman for the former president, told the newspaper that the pardons were approved on the merits.

"The president has said many, many people advocated pardons directly to him. But the president determines to grant or deny a pardon based on the merits," she said.

Clinton's late flurry of pardons on Jan. 20 included two for which Hugh Rodham, the brother of Hillary and Tony Rodham, was paid $400,000 for his work on two clemency applications, which he returned after the pardon scandal grew and his actions became known.

Wednesday, the Clinton presidential library agreed to allow congressional investigators examining the last-minute pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich to search its donor records. A statement from the House Government Reform Committee said investigators would examine the donor list Friday to look for any possible link between donations and the pardon.

Because of the compromise, a scheduled appearance by library president Skip Rutherford at a committee hearing Thursday has been canceled, according to CNN.

The committee is investigating allegations of influence peddling in the flurry of pardons issued by Bill Clinton in the dying moments of his administration. The probe is focusing on Rich, whose ex-wife, Denise, has donated more than a million dollars to Democratic political causes and the Clinton library.

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