From the Chicago Tribune

Bush gala has big donations pouring in
Businesses, individuals to provide $40 million for 2nd inauguration, set to military theme
By Mark Silva
Washington Bureau
Published December 28, 2004
WASHINGTON -- Soldiers will dance free of charge at President Bush's second inauguration, a record $40 million-plus celebration for "a nation at war" financed by some of the same big donors who bankrolled Bush's re-election campaign.
The president's private inaugural committee, calling on corporate and individual donors to contribute as much as $250,000 apiece, has struck a military-minded theme for a three-day series of events leading to the swearing-in on Jan. 20.
"Celebrating Freedom, Honoring Service" is the slogan for a festival that will start with a ceremony at an indoor Washington arena "saluting those who serve," and close with a collection of nine formal balls. The dances will include a Commander-in-Chief Ball open, admission free, to invited members of the military.
"We recognize this time that we are a nation at war," explained Jeanne Phillips, a Texas businesswoman heading the 55th Presidential Inaugural Committee. She is staging a celebration of "our freedom as Americans here at home" and "freedom everywhere."
The Pentagon is selecting active-duty troops and families for the ball--particularly those who have recently returned from Iraq or Afghanistan or soon will be deployed to those countries.
The theme will enable the president to draw on his strongest image, of a determined commander in an unsettling era of war against terrorism. Bush will need to marshal more of the public support that helped him win re-election, as he tackles a tough second-term agenda that will include attempts to overhaul Social Security and the federal tax code as well as curtail the cost of lawsuits alleging medical malpractice.
"He's recognizing the important role that his position as commander in chief played in his re-election, and trying to heighten the identification of his second term with the troops is probably designed to strengthen his popularity as he approaches some very important domestic issues," said John McGlennon, professor of government at the College of William and Mary.
"He is going to need some help with rallying the public around some ideas that they have a lot of skepticism about," he added.
At the same time, McGlennon suggested that a costly, military-theme celebration may sound jarring at a juncture when the Bush administration is predicting rising violence in Iraq as that nation nears elections scheduled 10 days after Bush's inauguration.
"Holding a military ball in conjunction with the inauguration at the same time that there are troops in harm's way is inevitably going to raise some questions about spending money on an elaborate event when we've just gone through some discussion about adequately equipping the troops in Iraq," McGlennon said. "The decision to highlight the president's attachment to Iraq is going to depend on things getting better there."
Most of the money for ceremonies, such as the elaborate balls and the parade through Washington after Bush's swearing-in at the west front of the Capitol, will come from a private committee with a stated budget of $30 million to $40 million. However, it is likely that Bush, who raised a record $270 million for his re-election, will surpass the $40 million spent on his first inauguration in 2001.
By comparison, President Bill Clinton raised and spent $33 million for his inauguration in January 1993 and $23.7 million for his second swearing-in in 1997.
A crew of campaign-honed fundraisers, including Bush "Rangers" who brought in $200,000 apiece for his re-election, is collecting the money for the inauguration.
These include Bill DeWitt, co-chairman of a Cincinnati-based investment firm who helped Bush arrange the financing to purchase part of baseball's Texas Rangers. Bush was managing partner of the team before he was elected Texas governor in 1994.
Courting donors
The fundraisers are asking corporate donors to purchase a $250,000 "underwriter package" that includes tickets to all inaugural events, 20 tickets for one of three candlelight dinners that the president will attend on the eve of the inauguration and two tickets for a more intimate lunch with Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
They are courting individual donors with a $100,000 "sponsor package" that includes fewer tickets to one of the candlelight dinners.
Twenty-one companies and individuals have donated the maximum $250,000. They include businesses with an interest in the outcome of the administration's agenda on such matters as oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Among the top donors: Exxon Mobil Corp., Occidental Petroleum Corp., ChevronTexaco Corp. and Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens, according to the committee's accounting of about $8 million raised through Dec. 23.
Other $250,000 donors include former Enron President Richard Kinder of Houston; Dell computer founder Michael Dell of Austin, Texas; United Technologies Corp.; Stephens Group Inc., an investment firm in Little Rock, Ark.; and Sallie Mae Inc., the Reston, Va.-based organization that makes student loans.
Another 24 companies and individuals have given $100,000 apiece. These include Northrop Grumman Corp., a leading defense contractor; International Paper Co.; financial services company GMAC; and Al Hoffman, the Florida-based finance chairman for the Republican National Committee.
The heavy lifting of Bush's biggest donors will make tickets for others attending the balls more affordable, the inaugural committee says--although prices have not yet been set.
"It's really the generosity of the underwriters and the sponsors who enable the general public to attend events by lowering ticket costs," said Tracey Schmitt, the committee's press secretary.
That generosity also may secure the sort of "access" to decision-makers in the administration that fundraisers often cite as the fruit of contributions during campaigns.
Mike Hightower, a vice president and lobbyist for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida, is among those fundraisers. His company donated $100,000 for Bush's first inauguration. And Hightower, involved in more than $3 million of fundraising for Bush's re-election, is asking his company to help sponsor the 2005 inauguration.
"Blue Cross has been a huge supporter of the president and the administration," Hightower said. "My guess is we'll do something."
Beyond dinner, dancing
What, beyond dinner and dancing, does a company get for its inaugural money?
"The most any company is going to get is access to work an issue," Hightower said. "When you look at where we're going on health care, the president, his father and Jeb [Bush, Florida's governor] have been aligned on what we want, which is access to quality health care. We have been able to sit down with people in the administration and give them our perspective. They have been most generous."
Although the inaugural committee has imposed limits on top donors, there is no legal limit. This makes an inauguration a unique opportunity for political donors in an era when "soft-money" donations to political parties have been strictly curtailed by law and no individual or corporation can give more than $2,000 to a presidential campaign.
"This is one of the few places left where corporations, wealthy individuals and others can provide a huge sum of money to directly help a president, and gain access and influence as a result," said Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21, a Washington-based public interest group.
"It just should not be going on. There is no need to take a pivotal moment in our democracy and turn it into an old-fashioned, big-money Washington operation that benefits the relatively few," he added.
"The alternative is public funding or alternative funding--or not having the need to have nine different inaugural balls," Wertheimer said."Much of funding goes into partying. If we as a country can't find a way to fund the inauguration with either small funds or public contributions, then we ought to cut back on the costs."
One reason for so many balls, the committee maintains, is that people from all 50 states are expected. Residents of each state are assigned to one of eight events, such as the Constitution Ball, Freedom Ball and Liberty Ball.
Tickets to the swearing-in are free but are limited. A congressional committee has distributed 250,000 tickets to lawmakers, who dispense them to constituents.
The government's expense will be limited to about $3 million, supporting the swearing-in and related services. Bush will be escorted by a bigger-than-normal military honor guard, and review troops as he departs.
But the mix of public or private money makes little difference to the public, William and Mary's McGlennon suggests.
"They generally see the money involved in this as all being politics," he said. "There is an enormous amount of people willing to spend money on politics. And there is no question that this money is not being spent on a party, but being spent on politics."
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Inauguration's $250,000 donors
COMPANIES
Altria Corporate Services Inc.
(New York)
Parent company of Kraft and Philip Morris
Ameriquest Capital Corp.
(Orange, Calif.)
Financial services company
Argent Mortgage Company
(Orange, Calif.)
ChevronTexaco Corp.
(Concord, Calif.)
Corporate Capital LLC
(New Orleans)
Investment firm
Exxon Mobil Corp.
(Washington)
Golden Eagle Industries Inc.
(Charlotte)
Buiding materials company
Kojaian Ventures LLC
(Bloomfield Hills, Mich.)
Long Beach Acceptance Corp.
(Paramus, N.J.)
Auto loan company
Occidental Petroleum Corp.
(Los Angeles)
Rooney Holdings Inc.
(Tulsa)
Construction company
Sallie Mae Inc. (Reston, Va.)
Student loan organization
Southern Company Inc.
(Atlanta)
Energy utility
Stephens Group Inc.
(Little Rock, Ark.)
Investment firm
Town and Country Credit
(Irvine, Calif.)
Mortgage company