The Ties That Bind: Wilson & Abramoff & Safavian & Cunningham & DeLay

More evidence of Rep. Heather Wilson's ties to the Jack Abramoff scandal emerged this week. On Tuesday, David Safavian (right), an Abramoff crony and former member of the Bush administration, was convicted for obstruction of justice as part of the wide-ranging Abramoff investigation. Wilson's campaign has accepted money from both Safavian and Abramoff, as well as the now jailed former California Congressman, Duke Cunningham, and the indicted and disgraced former House Majority Leader, Tom DeLay. Peas in a pod?

According to campaign reports, Wilson got these amounts from Republican members of the culture of corruption:

• David Safavian: $500
• Tom DeLay: $46,959
• Duke Cunningham: $5,000
• Jack Abramoff: $1,000

Safavian was Bush's top federal procurement official in the White House Office of Management and Budget, where he was responsible for setting purchasing policy for the entire government. Previously, he was chief of staff for the General Services Administration (GSA). Wikipedia provides an excellent summary of his career, his ties to Abramoff and others and the charges for which he was convicted. Excerpt:

On June 20, 2006, Safavian was found guilty by a jury in federal court on four of five felony charges. He was found guilty of lying to the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, lying to a GSA ethics official, lying to the GSA's Office of Inspector General, and obstructing the work of the GSA inspector general. Safavian was cleared of of obstructing the committee's investigation.

If you accept money from the sleazy Abramoff pay-for-play A-team, does that make you a part of the scheme? I think it does. The corrupt, influence-buying methods of the Abramoff-DeLay cabal were an open secret in Washington and beyond for years. Could Wilson have been naive about what they were doing? Hardly. And yet she took the tainted money and kept almost all of it. To date, she's reported returned only $10,000 of the money from DeLay. The rest remains in her coffers.

What Abramoff, Safavian, DeLay and others constructed was a massive web of corruption and payoffs with strands stretching far and wide -- including into the Heather Wilson campaign. By all accounts the conviction of Safavian is only the tip of the iceberg, the first of many anticipated indictments and convictions against the Republican corruption machine. More will undoubtedly be revealed.

(Safavian photo credit: Melina Mara/twp - The Washington Post)