Claiming that Ohio’s Republican U.S. House Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-2nd) is “conced[ing] that she does deny the Armenian Genocide,” the campaign of her Democratic challenger David Krikorian has just issued a press release (posted in full below), stating that Schmidt has dropped four of her “false statements” complaints against him in her Ohio Election Commission (OEC) case, while petitioning the court to add a new claim in the bargain.
The news comes on the heels of last Saturday’s deposition by the FBI’s former Turkish-American translator Sibel Edmonds who had been subpoenaed last week to testify in the case. The whistleblower had been previous-gagged by two different assertions of the “state secrets” privilege during the Bush Administration. She was finally able to testify on Saturday, under oath, about alleged infiltration, bribery, and blackmail by Turkish agents, of current and former members of the U.S. Congress and other high ranking officials in the Departments of State and Defense. The BRAD BLOG covered the stunning deposition as it happened last Saturday.
Schmidt had challenged Krikorian’s claim, during his 2008 independent campaign against her, that she accepted “blood money” from Turkish agents in exchange for helping to block a Congressional resolution recognizing the 1915 killing of some 1.5 million ethnic Armenians as a genocide….
In today’s statement, Krikorian says: “Jean and her friends at the Turkish Legal Defense Fund are on a fishing expedition … First she brought the charges, then she realized that she could not win her case and petitioned the court to drop the charges, now she is adding a new one. Typical Jean Schmidt behavior, it’s a shame she is not putting forward this kind of effort on the health care debate.”
The campaign said that “the statements Schmidt claimed were false are in relation to her denial of the Armenian Genocide,” adding that “In dropping the charges, Schmidt essentially conceded that she does deny the Armenian Genocide.”
“Being #1 on the Turkish Lobby scoreboard has financial advantages for Jean, but what does it do for our district?” Krikorian asked in the release. He has alleged that the 2nd Congressional district in Ohio has very few, if any, ethnic Turk’s among the voting population. Yet, he notes, “Jean Schmidt took more money from the Turkish Lobby during the 2008 election cycle than any other member of Congress.”
The Cincinnati Enquirer’s Jon Craig has quickly summarized Schmidt’s claims in a blog item posted today.
Earlier this week, Krikorian had issued another press release following Edmonds’ deposition, describing her testimony alleging that “the Turkish Lobby in the United States was under the direction of the Turkish Government and engaged in operations including bribery, espionage and blackmail with certain members of the US House of Representatives to further its objectives in the United States including one of which is the denial of the Armenian Genocide.”
On Saturday, during a break in the whistleblower’s deposition, Krikorian stated to The BRAD BLOG: “From my opinion, if I’m some of the current members of Congress, I’d be very very worried about the information that’s going to come out of this. There are current members of Congress that she has implicated in bribery, espionage. It’s not good. It’s crazy, it’s absolutely crazy. For people in power situations in the United States, who know about this information, if they don’t take action against it, in my opinion, it’s negligence.” (Video of his comments, and those of Edmonds’ and several of the attorneys on all sides was posted here.)
In response to the deposition and flurry of activity in this case, the Turkish Coalition of America posted a scathing, unbylined attack at their blog, on both Krikorian and Edmonds, describing the former’s case as “desperate,” and the latter as “disgruntled and discredited.” That was on Wednesday, prior to yesterday’s hearing in which three claims were dropped, and others were found to have enough “probable cause” to merit an evidentiary hearing in September. We examined that blog item earlier today.
Questions About Ohio Paper’s Coverage of Schmidt/Krikorian Case
In a related matter, Krikorian also notes in his press release that the Cincinnati Enquirer’s original article covering yesterday’s preliminary hearing in the OEC’s Schmidt v. Krikorian case in Columbus was biased in favor of the Schmidt campaign. The Krikorian campaign “challenged their first edition” and was successful in seeing some of the coverage modified, but it was “not good enough,” as Krikorian himself told The BRAD BLOG late this afternoon in a phone conversation.
He charges that the Enquirer ownership is “totally bought and paid for” by the Schmidt campaign. “They never give a fair shake in my opinion,” he said, though he acknowledged the reporter who wrote the story, Jon Craig, “is a good guy” and doesn’t seem to have been the one to influence what he viewed as inappropriately negative coverage. In the press release, his campaign notes that the Enquirer endorsed Schmidt in last year’s campaign.
“If you only read the first few sentences of the article,” Krikorian told us, “you wouldn’t know that she dropped four of the charges. Why isn’t the fact that she dropped charges at least as important as the finding of ‘probable cause’ with a political board who uses a very low threshold to determine that?”
The finding of “probable cause” on several of the “false statements” allegations by the preliminary panel means that a full evidentiary hearing can move forward on September 3rd. “It’s an extremely low bar,” he said. “She’s a sitting Congresswoman. They’re gonna give her the benefit of the doubt. The threshold is very low on a ‘probable cause’ hearing,” which Krikorian says he welcomes. He added that hopes to have Edmonds on the stand to testify during the full September hearing. Currently, Edmonds is out of the country, and may not be back in time to testify, though, she told The BRAD BLOG today, she would like to if it’s possible to get an extension on the hearing.
The BRAD BLOG has obtained a copy of one of the earlier posted versions of the Enquirer article [PDF] and has compared it to the one now online following Krikorian’s complaints to the paper.
The headline originally had read “Officials: Krikorian made ‘false statements,'” while the current version, following pressure from Krikorian’s camp, now reads “State hears Schmidt genocide case.”
The first graf originally reported: “U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt’s Armenian-American opponent made false statements during the 2008 campaign about contributions she received from Turkish political action committees, a unanimous three-member panel of the Ohio Elections Commission ruled today.” The updated version adds the word “probably”, as in “probably made false statements.” Krikorian (accurately) notes that “probable cause” is not the same as “probably.”
Beyond that, the only other substantive change that we noted was a the removal of the final paragraph, which had referred to a finding against Schmidt in a previous OEC “false statements” case, in which she was the defendant. The commission had found, by a 7 to 0 vote, that Schmidt had lied about having received a second undergraduate college degree from the University of Cincinnati. She had, in fact, received only one degree, despite repeated claims to the contrary on her resumes.
We’ve contacted the Enquirer‘s reporter Jon Craig, who cautions against reading anything nefarious into any of the changes. He notes that “we revise stories like ten times a day,” particularly the online versions, and that the final graf was cut for space concerns in the print version, at the request of his editors.
He also notes that he’s had “absolutely no interaction at all” with the Schmidt campaign concerning the story and knew of no contact with his editors either, adding that he’ll normally hear from the editors if they receive such contacts and/or complaints. If we hear different word from those editors, we will, of course update this item with the new information.
The Krikorian Campaign’s press release follows in full below…
Schmidt Drops Four False Statement Claims Against Krikorian
Republican Congresswoman Essentially Admits Denial of Armenian Genocide
Cincinnati, OH – August 13, 2009 – Attorneys for Jean Schmidt petitioned the court today to add a new claim after dropping four of her initial false statement charges against her Democratic opponent David Krikorian.
“Jean and her friends at the Turkish Legal Defense Fund are on a fishing expedition” said Mr. Krikorian “First she brought the charges, then she realized that she could not win her case and petitioned the court to drop the charges, now she is adding a new one. Typical Jean Schmidt behavior, its a shame she is not putting forward this kind of effort on the health care debate” said Mr. Krikorian.
The statements Schmidt claimed were false are in relation to her denial of the Armenian Genocide. In dropping the charges, Schmidt essentially conceded that she does deny the Armenian Genocide.
Jean Schmidt took more money from the Turkish Lobby during the 2008 election cycle than any other member of Congress. “Being #1 on the Turkish Lobby scoreboard has financial advantages for Jean, but what does it do for our district?” asked Mr. Krikorian adding, “We look forward to the full commission hearing in a few weeks.”
A total of five false statement claims will be heard at a full commission hearing on September 3rd at the Ohio Elections Commission in Columbus.
In a related matter, The Cincinnati Enquirer, which endorsed Jean Schmidt in the previous, election is continuing to protect her with its online story about today’s case emphasizing her new charge and downplaying the fact that she dropped four of her initial frivolous claims. The Enquirer changed its article after the campaign challenged their first edition. The editors of the Enquirer have consistently protected Representative Schmidt to the detriment of the citizens of the 2nd district. The phone number for the Enquirer’s editorial department is (513) 768-8359.
Krikorian For Congress
Media@Krikorianforcongress.com
Palmer@Krikorianforcongress.com
What’s the new claim?
It’s surprising Schmidt waited until after Edmonds testified to drop most of her claims. Apparently she didn’t know who Edmonds was. Too late now!
Thanks for staying on top of this.
TheOtherWa ~ Agreed. I also wonder at the chutzpa: filing an anti-defamation lawsuit to legally counter what you know is true. Just how many bases do you have to be SURE are covered to move through the world with that kind of unrelenting moxie? (Wondering where can I get a full-service, custom made, white-wash. And do they sell it by the oz., or by the hour?…)
Jon Craig – c’mon now, Dude. Regardless of the number of C.E.’s online info updates, a reporter even remotely worth their Best Pepper would concede that you buried your lead. There may be nothing nefarious about it, but it follows a bad, bad, trend of bad, bad reporting.
The Turkish factor in this Schmidt/Krikorian equation is quite revealing. On the one hand the Turks, as constituents, have all the right to back a candidate they feel best represented them. But in reality this issue goes much deeper and further than simple “constituency” argument. A foreign nation, Turkey, seems to be at the center of this issue.
Time and again Turkey has shown that when it comes to denying the Armenian Genocide there’s no limit in how far and at what cost they are willing to go to achieve that end.
Until recently this war was ostensibly confined to buying academia in major US universities to use “historians” to rewrite the entire episode concerning the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. Perfect examples are Stanford Shaw, Justin MaCarthy, Heath Lowry etc…
Unfortunately, as NATO member and as close strategic ally to Israel, the Turks have asked and acquired the help of the Israel lobby in the US as well as the US government to help them succeed in their anti-Armenian drive. This is not an allegation nor a secret but a well known reality. From Shimon Peres to ADL’s Abraham Foxman, From Bill Clinton to Barack Obama, all have proven to be loyal “operatives” for this specific Turkish demand.
So it is not surprising to see that the Turkish government, as a consequence of obtaining powerful American allies, feel overly confident in using any and all means to derail any step that might possibly lead to the strengthening of the issue of the Armenian Genocide put forth by Americans of Armenian heritage, thinking all the while that any mess created as a result of these shenanigans can be “easily” clean up by loyal friends of Turkey in the US.
The word “disgust” does not fully convey this shameful charade.
Zareh –
Tremendous comment. Very well, and succinctly put. Thanks for offering the overview here. It matches, nearly identically, what I’ve come to learn about the situation over the last couple of years while cursorily covering it vis a vis the Edmonds case(s).
Just one issue I’d mention in response to your first point about “the Turks, as constituents, hav[ing] all the right to back a candidate they feel best represented them.” That it certainly true. However, Krikorian has noted (as have others, I believe, though I haven’t specifically, independently confirmed myself) that there are few if any Turks in Schimdt’s district (OH-2). So while she may be serving voters of Turkish dissent well, in one say, apparently she doesn’t actually have any!
Again, thanks for the very informative comment. Please don’t be a stranger!
Moments ago, Tunga received last Saturdays deposition in it’s entirety via homing pigeon.
Unfortunately the Turkish agents of doom, acting through their Israeli agents of doom acting through the US CIA has managed to wipe out Tungas’ entire hard drive.
We will post the entire thing just as soon as we get back on line.
All this espionage, treason, etc…over a bill recognizing the Armenian genocide in Turkey? If the bill is passed, does something else happen that I’m not aware of? Like some preferred treatment if your race was a victim of a genocide?
WHY is Turkey trying to stop passage of this bill? It can’t be, just because it would make them “look bad”, or is that simply all it is?
And this statement is beyond party: if we had good, honest politicians in this country, the first thing they’d say is “Hey! People are offering me $$$ to vote a certain way on this!” Aren’t the politicians in this country sickening? It’s, as they say, all about money…all the time. It’s disgusting that these people are actually Americans. There’s a big difference between Americans and the American government.
It’s like our government is some sort of cabal of mobsters or something.
Instead of saying: “Hey! I’m being offered money to vote a certain way!”….they say: “Which side is going to give me the most money?” Like an auction.
I’m going go out on a limb, here, and say I think they’re not just like mobsters, but actually mobsters. Not even separate families anymore — administrative, legislative and judicial — just all one mob of mobsters….
Big Dan:
I’d like to know what the going price is to sell your country, or your state out:
Hundreds, thousands, millions? I’m pretty sure none of these traitors are getting billions. If they were, I might be able to respect them more, (NOT!)
Senator Bob Bennett of Utah just got paid nine thousand bucks,(WOW), from a corporation that is bringing depleted uranium into my state.
You are right: money means everything these days and that makes Jean Schmidt a player. How much dough did she make?
Agent 99:
Your last comment is isn’t crazy at all. Jeff Sharlet, who is brave enough to have written an astounding book called “The Family” quite a while ago, has come back into the spotlight due to the involvement, in that evil organization, of two Republican US congresscritters who got caught having sex recently, (who cares!).
He was on Bill Maher’s program saying that this organization which calls itself “The Family” also refers to themselves as a “Christian Mofia” because they respect the secrecy of that organization in gaining power. I would call them much more dangerous, and I’m positive Somolia would say the same! I’m going to pick up the book and and continue to scare the hell out of myself to give a chance to Americas children. The “greatest generation” apparently failed here, but then they didn’t have the internets.
Find “Real Time” episode 162 on iTunes.
By the way, “The Family” considers themselves to be “the chosen ones”, according to Sharlet, but Jean Schmidt couldn’t be one of those, because she is a woman. Hillary Clinton was only allowed to pray with them, (I would guess at the prayer breakfast: which is the only public event they sponsor, as far as I know.) I haven’t read the book yet.
Already said it once in the last post. Turkey equals sale of nuclear weapons, manufacture of heroin, black ops money, Blackwater type projects being built on the ground in Turkey. Check out Leuren Moret for info on depleted uranium. Real good for our soldiers. Without any baseline radiological studies, no VA benefits. Soldiers that make it get moved into private contractor jobs. Simple.
The only way to keep the guilty out of prison:
Martin Law in the USA – Coming Right Now
http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/7254
Larry: $9,000 here; $1,500 there; $15,000 here – it all adds up!
Larry sez: I’d like to know what the going price is to sell your country, or your state out?
Whatever the “market” dictates.
This story is a great example of the total sellout of the mainstream media…the MSM has not failed. They have succeeded beautifully in keeping pertinent stories such as this; along with major concerns to the people out of the news, out of the public discourse and out of sight. They are doing their job well.
The MSM’s contriving and magnifying fringe issues and making them mainstream has been very effective in keeping America ignorant.
Comparing them to mobsters is mild.
Again thanks to Bradblog for documenting something of importance yet again.
A very sad market, indeed!
Did anyone catch the irony here? Israel is helping another country rewrite history to deny the occurrence of a genocide.
BlueHawk: You got it! The mainstream media was taken over. It speaks for: the wealthy, corporations, the military, and government when government is for THEM and not US. They’re doing their job perfectly: suppressing/ignoring this story.
Do you think they don’t know about it? If anyone thinks the mainstream media “missed” this story, you also think Dick Armey is a “regular grassroots activist”.
…and Steve Forbes. Dick Armey and Steve Forbes run Freedom Works “grassroots” organizer of the anti-healthcare reform Town Hall protests. Steve Forbes: your billionaire “regular Joe 6-pack” grassroots activist. Steve the Plumber.
Congressmen & women should be up front and wear decals like race car drivers…so we know who’s sponsoring them.
“Congressmen & women should be up front and wear decals like race car drivers…so we know who’s sponsoring them.”
Publicly funded orange jumpsuits, starting with a basic name tag and sworn office. Velcro patches from all corporate campaign donors, small country flag pins from friendly countries. Imagine one walks in flying bad colors, this would make CSPAN a hoot!
“Is that a combined federal campaign pin or a three star trucking?” “Is that a Google or Pepsi symbol?”
Okay, while I agree Big Dan, I already see a flaw, they need to be in text not symbols. Otherwise they can be obscured
Got me thinking (always a bad thing) Big Dan, how about elections officials wear colored jumpsuits (red green blue yellow) too. With their name and position. Poll watchers given badges showing their position. Boom, instantly know who is doing what, while keeping everyone humble. When the electronic tabulation devices are outlawed it will make for easier oversight of paper ballots by the public.
Your Invisible Hand scratches my back….I reach around and….
Hey! These are some good ideas!
Categorize them:
Foreign country lobby column of decals, Health corporation decals, etc…in columns. You can’t have them haphazard all over the place! They need to be sorted by lobby topic!!!
Schmidt would have “Turkish Lobby” under the lobby decal column…you’d read it, then go: “Oh! THAT’s why she voted that way! Now it makes sense!”
it was my understanding that this testimony would be released. what is the latest news on that front?
New group tracks foreign lobbyists:
http://blog.sunlightfoundation.com/2009/08/18/pro-publica-and-sunlight-lift-the-lid-on-foreign-lobbying/
follow links to find Turkey #1 in contacts.