McAuliffe at this juncture

Controversy Follows New DNC Chairman

This Accuracy in Media article points out McAuliffe's considerable shortcomings when he became the DNC chair. There is a lot of interesting stuff including the point that Bill Richardson wanted to be chair, and Gore's choice was pushed out.(January 8, 2001)

"As the Times story pointed out, McAuliffe drew some negative publicity for some of his business and fundraising practices, including a loan guarantee for the Clintons when they were trying to secure a mortgage for their Chappaqua, New York home. That is considered to be an illegal gratuity. He backed off only when challenged by Judicial Watch, the conservative legal watchdog organization with some seventy lawsuits against the Clinton administration.

Left out of the coverage we saw were even more serious scandals in which McAuliffe was involved while serving as the treasurer and chief fundraiser for the Clinton-Gore 1996 campaign. The scheme was a way to finance Ron Carey's campaign against James Hoffa, Jr. to head up the Teamsters Union, and to kick many times more union dollars back to a Democratic fundraising group."