Democratic Contributors Got Hefty Government Contracts

By Michael Weisskopf/TIME

WASHINGTON (Oct. 16) -- Molten Metal Technology was a fledgling environmental firm which had landed $1 million in Energy Department grants. The company was looking for more.

In March 1994, the company hit pay dirt, and so did two of Vice President Al Gore's special interests. On March 22, Molten chief Bill Haney's charitable foundation gave $50,000 to a professorship at the University of Tennessee, named for Gore's late sister.

On March 24, the Energy Department increased Molten's research funding from $1 million to $10 million. That same day, Molten sent the Democratic Party a $15,000 check, part of $130,000 in total gifts from the company or its officers through 1996.

TIME has obtained a letter from Vice President Gore to Molten's Haney, thanking him for the endowment gift and adding in the margin, "You will never know how much this means to me. You are a great friend."

The bridge between Molten Metal, Gore and the Energy Department was a longtime Gore aide, Peter Knight. He served as chairman of the 1996 Clinton-Gore campaign and is known as the vice president's political alter-ego. Knight and his firm have lobbied for Molten Metal since 1993.

During the campaign, it was Knight who wrote many of the call sheets prepared for the vice president's fund-raising forays, phone calls now under investigation by the Justice Department.

Knight, Molten's Haney and the vice president all deny any connection between the Energy Department grants and the university endowment for Gore's sister.

Gore was no stranger to Molten Metal. On Earth Day 1995, Gore visited the plant, calling it "a shining example of American ingenuity." The vice-presidential visit sent Molten Metals stock price sharply higher.

Molten was not the only successful Knight client to make contributions to the University of Tennessee professorship named for Gore's sister.

Lockheed Martin made gifts totalling $50,000 in 1995 and 1997, within months of Energy Department decisions to extend Lockheed Martin's management contracts at the Oak Ridge national laboratory. The contracts were worth $40 million a year.

Lockheed Martin, Knight and Gore deny any link between the gifts and the contracts.

The vice president was responsible for bringing in about half the money required -- $1 million -- for an endowment at the University of Tennessee. Knight, one of Washington's premier lobbyists knew where to find the money. His attorney admits Knight mailed more than 100 letters asking for help on behalf of Gore.

Today, Gore spokeswoman Ginny Terzano said, "The assertion that the vice president's involvement with the Nancy Gore Hunger Chair of Excellence had anything to do with companies receiving government contracts is absolutely baseless. This is innuendo pure and simple. It's offensive that the Gore family's memorial to the vice president's deceased sister could be so abused through innuendo and speculation."

Gore continues raising money apace

Meanwhile, ever the party loyalist, Gore is hard at work raising money most recently in California for Sen. Barbara Boxer, a fellow Democrat who faces an expensive re-election campaign next year.

"One of Barbara's opponents has already spent a quarter of a million dollars on advertising," Gore told a fund-raiser at Los Angeles' Regency Club. "See, there is a determined drive going on."

Neither a congressional investigation or calls for an independent counsel seemed to bother Gore or to slow his fund-raising zeal. The Los Angeles event was the first of several fund-raising appearances on a three-day trip to California. The events should bring Democrats close to $800,000.

The vice president's travels have a certain rhythm. By day, Gore plays to the TV cameras, addressing the issues that drive him, including the environment, high technology and welfare reform.

By night he raises money. Contributions of $500 got donors into the Boxer fund-raiser. Donations of $2,000 got them into a smaller private dinner with the vice president.

Gore's aides say he is as determined as ever to raise money for the 1998 election cycle. And his fund-raising quest will only get more intense as he gets closer to his ultimate battle: the run for the president in 2000.

CNN's Jonathan Karl contributed to this report.

In Other News:

Thursday Oct. 16, 1997

• Democratic Contributors Got Hefty Government Contracts
• Clinton Spares Congress' Money
• Reno Survives House Committee Grilling

E-mail From Washington:
• Gore Praises Hollywood For Imagination, Ethics
• DNC Pitches In In N.J.
• Herman: N.Y. Garment Shops Violate Labor Laws
• More Trade Tensions With Japan

Special Coverage:
• The Money Trail: The White House Tapes