The destinations can be alluring: Paris, Grand Cayman Island, Las Vegas and Jackson Hole, Wyo. The hotels can be the finest: The Greenbrier resort, the Ritz or Mandalay Bay. The ticket can be first class.
And the best part? The traveler–a member of Congress or his or her staff–doesn’t have to pay a dime, whether the expense is $9,000 for airfare, $1,190 for a translator or $35 for a gift jacket.
But a brewing ethics controversy surrounding House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a Republican from Texas, has brought a new wave of media and internal scrutiny targeting privately funded congressional travel. It has set off a scramble among Republicans and Democrats, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California, to revise disclosure forms and discourage future trips until the extent of the damage is clear.
A review of more than 1,000 pages of travel documents that cover the Illinois congressional delegation since 2000 shows that the line between business and pleasure can be blurred. A visit to the site of the proposed nuclear waste facility at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, for example, often also includes a night in Las Vegas.
“If there are instances that all of you uncover where people have operated on the margins and done some stupid things, then you are going to see some panic,” said Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Ill.).
Congressional staffers take the greatest advantage of paid trips, at least in sheer numbers. A review of travel records shows, for instance, that the staff of House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), took at least 211 paid trips since 2000, or roughly one-quarter of the total trips taken by the 21-member Illinois delegation and staff members.
At least 835 trips taken by either Illinois Congress members or their staff highlight the uneasy intersection between private dollars and public policy that raises questions about whether a special interest group is trying to influence legislation.
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And there is little enforcement considering lawmakers file reports within Congress.
Two Chicago Democrats, Reps. Bobby Rush and Luis Gutierrez, did not file any trip records since 2000 with the clerk of the U.S. House. After being contacted by the Tribune, their offices said they were working to comply.
“You brought it to our attention,” Tasha Harris, a Rush spokeswoman, told the Tribune. “We didn’t know we had to file.”
Gutierrez took at least 25 paid trips and Rush more than six, other financial disclosure records show.
Reporting required
After a controversy over ties between lawmakers and lobbyists a decade ago, Congress passed a law requiring members to disclose a trip within 30 days, report which outside group paid for the travel and provide an estimate of the cost. While it is illegal for a lobbyist to directly pay for such travel, a trade association or other group can fund a trip.
Fred Wertheimer, head of the watchdog group Democracy 21, said that while some travel is clearly appropriate, trips to luxury spots give the impression lawmakers are using the travel for personal vacations.
“You don’t often see members traveling to very cold places in the winter and very hot places in the summer,” Wertheimer noted.
To be sure, much of the travel has a clear business purpose and in many cases the venues can be far less glamorous. Still, regardless of the destination, some members concede there can be an appearance problem.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) took seven paid trips since 2000, most for conferences like an Aspen Institute-funded trip to Grand Cayman Island in April 2000.
The international non-profit think tank also paid expenses for the senator and his daughter Jennifer–about $8,400–to travel to Rome in late spring 2003 for a “conference on the global environment.” In 2001, the institute paid for a trip to Florence, Italy, for Durbin and his wife, Loretta–about $8,600–for a conference on “national security and the global environment.”
“These are nice places to visit–I won’t mislead you–but we do serious work there,” Durbin said, noting that no lobbyists were at the conferences. “They are one of the few occasions we have for bipartisan meetings among senators away from Washington to discuss issues, and I really find them valuable.
“They allow you to bring your spouse or a child as an alternative,” Durbin said. “I will readily confess it is an opportunity for me to spend a little time with my wife and she attends sessions with me.”
In total, the Aspen Institute spent nearly $3 million to fund congressional travel since 2000, according to an analysis by PoliticalMoneyLine, a non-partisan group that studies money and politics.
There were no travel disclosures on file from Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.). A spokesman said a report for a staff member’s trip to Seattle in March was refiled late Friday after the office realized its initial disclosure report for the $2,377 trip paid by Microsoft was not on file.
Voluminous and notable filings
But for other members of the delegation, the filings are voluminous and notable.
Barely two weeks before Election Day last November, Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) embarked on a trip to Paris.
It was sponsored by the Jean Jaures Foundation, whose mission states that it provides assistance to democratic groups around the world. The group paid $4,823 for transportation fees and lodging for Emanuel and his wife, Amy Rule. They listed no expenses for meals but hired a translator for $1,190.
“I don’t speak French!” Emanuel explained in an interview Friday, adding he paid for half the trip with his own money.
Since Emanuel was first elected in 2002, he has disclosed seven trips that were paid for by an outside party. In August 2004, HBO paid $2,194 to fly Emanuel from Chicago to Los Angeles for an appearance on “Real Time With Bill Maher,” a late-night political show. Earlier that year, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade paid $2,707 to fly Emanuel to Boca Raton, Fla., to speak at a conference.
Last week, Emanuel introduced legislation to require stricter disclosure on travel and lobbying. As the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Emanuel travels frequently to recruit candidates and deliver speeches at political party functions across the country. He said he rejects most offers to travel with other groups.
“It’s got to be a darn good reason for me to leave my family,” Emanuel said. “I was invited on a hell of a lot more than the ones I went on.”
As the highest-ranking member of the Illinois delegation, Hastert reported only two paid trips, both for bipartisan congressional retreats in the Washington vicinity. Most of his foreign trips were official travel at government expense.
But his staff has made 211 privately financed trips all over the world, records show.
Even members of the speaker’s press staff, which presumably is not directly involved in crafting legislation, took trips abroad and to posh domestic destinations.
Pete Jeffries, who at the time was Hastert’s communications director, took weeklong trips to Japan and France to visit nuclear facilities, paid for by the Nuclear Energy Institute, a trade group for the U.S. nuclear industry. He also took trips to Taiwan, Israel, Russia and Alaska–in the summer–for the stated purpose of learning the “challenges” facing rural telecommunications providers.
John Feehery, who was formerly Hastert’s press secretary, took his wife on a three-day 4th of July trip in 2003 to the resort town of Newport, R.I., for a panel discussion titled “Issues Facing American Workers.”
Then-deputy press secretary Paige Ralston’s travel included an $8,121 trip to Hong Kong in January 2002 paid for by the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office and a $6,428 trip to Sweden in August 2002 sponsored by Saab and listed as a fact-finding mission on defense issues.
“The trips are important,” said Feehery, acknowledging that they are not popular with constituents. He said congressional staff members cannot work in a vacuum and need to get out of Washington.
Mostly official trips
Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.), chairman of the House International Relations Committee, listed no paid travel outside the country in the last four years. Most of his foreign travel consisted of official trips at government expense. He did list one paid trip: NBC paid $9,000 for a private jet to take him round-trip from Chicago to Washington to appear on “Meet the Press” in September 2001.
Hyde’s staff, however, took dozens of paid trips. Press secretary Sam Stratman traveled to Oman in April 2000. The trip was sponsored by the Oman Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and the bill came to $8,510, including $7,450 for transportation that included a business-class ticket. “There is no substitute for having a tactile experience of being on the ground able to assess a situation looking eye to eye,” Stratman said.
Hyde’s top aide, Thomas Mooney, and his wife, Melinda, attended a conference in Bermuda in 2000 paid for by the National Association of Magazine Publishers during which Mooney said he attended a conference and gave a speech. The trip cost about $2,600.
LaHood has taken trips to Lebanon, France and China and said he encourages travel by his staff as well. A church in Peoria often sponsors his trips to Lebanon, the birthplace of his grandfather. LaHood said he has met political leaders in Lebanon and as a result, he has encouraged changes in policy such as a relaxation of the travel ban on Americans going to Lebanon.
He said his trip to France sponsored by the Nuclear Energy Institute was helpful because that country is a leader in recycling material for nuclear power plants and Illinois has a large number of such plants.
Sometimes members are also in demand as speakers. Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D-Ill.) traveled around the country more than 40 times to deliver speeches with expenses picked up by the sponsoring organization. He also took a trip to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in April 2001 with his wife, Sandra, sponsored by the Islamic Institute that cost the organization $19,500.
Jackson, a member of a foreign operations subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee, “actually wishes he could travel more,” said his spokesman Frank Watkins.
The trips can benefit both sides. Pro-Israel Jewish organizations have paid for weeklong trips that Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and his wife, Kimberly, make every other year to Israel, accompanied by influential Jewish leaders from his largely North Shore home district.
After a 2001 trip in which he visited an Israeli air force base, Kirk successfully took up a cause to provide Israel with continuous direct access to U.S. satellite imagery monitoring missile launches from Arab nations.
But he said he understands the skepticism some feel about travel and said members of Congress likely will be more wary. “I think people are going to travel a lot less and they are going to scrutinize it more heavily, which is a good thing,” Kirk said.
Indeed, some members of Congress have ordered staff members to limit travel in light of the recent controversy.
Rep. Jerry Costello (D-Ill.) traveled to Cuba on an agriculture mission; to Mexico to study free trade issues, and to Pebble Beach, Calif., and Jackson Hole, Wyo., to participate in railroad conferences. His wife, Georgia, accompanied him to California on a trip paid by the Association of American Railroads and to Wyoming on a trip paid by Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway.
The Costellos reported nearly $7,000 in expenses on their five-day “fact-finding trip” to Jackson Hole, a posh resort town.
“Frankly, it doesn’t matter to me who sponsors the trip,” Costello said. “I’m going to make my own decision on legislation.”
`Grueling as hell’
Rep. Danny Davis (D-Ill.) has traveled extensively, with trips to Ukraine, Israel, China and Nigeria. Davis, whose district includes Ukrainian Village, went to Kiev last fall at the behest of the Self Reliance Ukrainian American Federal Credit Union, whose members wanted to promote credit unions in their former homeland.
“I’ve never been on a junket in my life,” Davis said. “The trips I’ve taken have been grueling as hell.”
Davis also took his wife, Vera, on several trips, including visits to Nigeria, Taiwan, St. Kitts, Grand Cayman Island and the Virgin Islands.
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) listed 17 trips, including visits to Rome, India, Mexico City and Hawaii. On most foreign trips, she was accompanied by her husband, political consultant Robert Creamer.
“The kind of travel I do is to inform my decisions on major policy issues,” she said.
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Schakowsky acknowledged the expense and relative comfort of some travel. A trip to India with her husband, underwritten by the Confederation of Indian Industry, cost more than $15,000 for the two of them, and included air travel in business class.
Rep. Jerry Weller (R-Ill.) has disclosed 28 trips during the last four years, delivering speeches and attending conferences in Spain, Finland, the Dominican Republic and Sri Lanka. His destinations also include Key Biscayne, Fla., where he addressed the Nasdaq leadership summit and Kiawah Island, S.C., where he spoke at the Association of American Railroads conference.
Transportation expenses ranged from $5,826 paid by the Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry in Sri Lanka to $7.50, which was paid by the National Association of Convenience Stores.
Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) disclosed four trips, including one in which he toured Yucca Mountain, the site of a proposed storage location for nuclear waste, and then took his family along during a trip to Vail, Colo.
Two weeks after she took office in January, Rep. Melissa Bean (D-Ill.) traveled with her husband, Alan, to Florida for a conference on health-care policy paid for by the John F. Kennedy School of Government and the Commonwealth Fund, which supports research on health and social issues.
Transportation, lodging and meals cost about $3,000. Bean also listed a jacket for $35 as an expense and said she believed it was a gift from the sponsor.
Rep. Lane Evans (D-Ill.) took no paid trips since 2000, though his staff did. Rep. Tim Johnson (R-Ill.) has taken no paid trips in his three terms, with the exception of one night’s lodging for $95, paid for by the Champaign County Farm Bureau. Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.), who took office in January, filed no travel disclosure reports.
Not much time to travel
Rep. Don Manzullo (R-Ill.), chairman of the Small Business Committee, with his wife attended a Chicago Board of Trade conference and a meeting of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, both in Boca Raton, Fla.
“I’ve got kids,” he said. “I just don’t have much time to travel.”
Rep. Judy Biggert (R-Ill.), a member of the House ethics committee, listed nine trips. Two involved Republican Party activities and the others were conferences on education, insurance, children’s issues and the Nasdaq stock market.
Biggert said she preferred to limit her overseas travel to government-paid congressional delegations because they tend to be highly structured and offer access to top officials from other countries.
“I pick my trips pretty carefully,” she said. “I’m not going to play golf.”
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Illinois delegation’s travels span the globe
Since 2000, members of the Illinois congressional delegation and their staffs have taken more than 830 domestic and international trips paid for by trade associations, non-profit groups and other organizations. The disclosure records, reviewed by the Tribune, show a glimpse of where the state’s U.S. representatives and senators have traveled.
TRIP EXAMPLES
Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Chicago) traveled to Paris with his wife Oct. 19-24, 2004, to speak at a democracy forum hosted by the Jean Jaures Foundation and met with members of Parliament. Cost of trip: $6,013
Rep. Danny Davis (D-Chicago) traveled to Taiwan Jan. 8-13, 2001, with his wife on a fact-finding and educational visit paid for by the Chinese National Association of Industry and Commerce. Cost: $15,000
Rep. Jerry Weller (R-Morris) traveled to Spain April 6-12, 2001, to deliver a speech at the Transatlantic Policy Network conference. Cost: $4,298
Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Chicago) and his wife traveled to United Arab Emirates and Qatar April 5-12, 2001, in a trip sponsored by the Islamic Institute. Cost: $19,500
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Evanston) traveled to India Jan. 4-13, 2002, with her husband to deliver a speech at the Confederation of Indian Industry. Cost: $15,916
ILLINOIS DELEGATION TRAVEL SINCE 2000
%% REPRESENTATIVES MEMBER STAFF
TRIPS TRIPS
Melissa Bean (D)** 2 1
Judy Biggert (R) 9 17
Jerry Costello (D) 6 12
Danny Davis (D) 37 17
Rahm Emanuel (D)* 7 14
Lane Evans (D) — 5
Luis Gutierrez (D) 25 7
Dennis Hastert (R) 2 211
Henry Hyde (R) 1 65
Jesse Jackson Jr. (D) 41 18
Tim Johnson (R) 1 16
Mark Kirk (R) 5 22
Ray LaHood (R) 4 53
Dan Lipinski (D)** — —
Don Manzullo (R) 6 23
Bobby Rush (D) 6 8
Jan Schakowsky (D) 17 11
John Shimkus (R) 4 46
Jerry Weller (R) 28 36
SENATORS MEMBER STAFF
TRIPS TRIPS
Dick Durbin (D) 7 45
Barack Obama (D)** 0 1
%%
*Elected in 2002
**Elected in 2004
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Note: A dash indicates that no records were on file.
Sources: Clerk of the House of Representatives, Senate Office of Public Records and staff reports
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