Rove, Smith Sold Salmon for Votes
Recent investigations into the Department of Justice have shed light into the way the White House manipulates federal agencies for partisan gain. Now, a story by Jason Leopold, writing in Truthout, suggests that the White House used the Department of Interior to manipulate data about the Klamath River to support Gordon Smith in his 2002 re-election bid, possibly in violation of federal law.
Leopold picks up the narrative with a meeting Karl Rove had with Interior Department managers wherein he tried to strong-arm them into diverting Klamath River water to farms--so that Smith's rural base wouldn't wander.
The way to get Smith reelected to another term, Rove reportedly told the Interior Department officials, would come via the agency's support of a highly controversial measure: diverting water from the Klamath River Basin to farms in the area that were experiencing unusually dry conditions, thereby supporting the GOP's agricultural base.
From there, Rove set up a cabinet-level task force to give the illusion that the administration was seriously considering the question, while behind the scenes, Rove tried to bully scientists into giving him political cover for a decision that had already been made.
[National Marine Fisheries Service biologist Michael] Kelly spoke out publicly in 2003 alleging that he was subjected to political pressure and ordered to ignore scientific evidence that said the plan would likely kill off tens of thousands of Coho salmon, and to support the Klamath River low-water plan Rove wanted enacted to help farmers, who Rove saw as a crucial part of the Republican constituency in the state.
Not only did Rove and the administration undermine the function of federal agencies, they may have committed a crime.
[Rove's former executive assistant Susan] Ralston said [in a deposition] that officials in Rove's shop, the Office of Political Affairs, would regularly brief political appointees at federal agencies about "target states" Republicans needed to focus heavily on to win an election, and efforts cabinet officials needed to take with regard to policy to ensure Republicans were reelected....
If Rove and other White House officials discussed campaign strategy at federal office buildings, that would appear to be a violation of the Hatch Act.
Of course, the rest of the story is well known to Oregonians.
In March 2002, in a sudden reversal of a long standing policy, then Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton and Senator Smith held a joint press conference in Klamath Falls and opened up the irrigation system releasing thousands of gallons of water to 220,000 acres of farmland. The policy shift left the Klamath River basin with unusually low river flows that summer and ended up killing more than 30,000 endangered Coho salmon - the largest fish kill in the history of the West. But the move, as orchestrated by Rove, ended up getting Smith reelected that November.
A year later, a federal judge issued a ruling saying the Bush administration violated the Endangered Species Act by allowing water to be diverted to farmers from Klamath River.
Discuss.
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Jun 21, '07
I'd expect nothing less from Rove. How sad is that?
The Union of Concerned Scientists (www.ucsusa.org) has him to thank for increased membership.
Jun 21, '07
In March 2002, in a sudden reversal of a long standing policy, then Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton and Senator Smith held a joint press conference in Klamath Falls and opened up the irrigation system releasing thousands of gallons of water to 220,000 acres of farmland. The policy shift left the Klamath River basin with unusually low river flows that summer and ended up killing more than 30,000 endangered Coho salmon - the largest fish kill in the history of the West.
For the record, Greg Walden (R-Dist. 2) was also an accomplice in this travesty. Pelican Network has an article on this salmon kill.
Jun 21, '07
In March 2002, in a sudden reversal of a long standing policy, then Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton and Senator Smith held a joint press conference in Klamath Falls and opened up the irrigation system releasing thousands of gallons of water to 220,000 acres of farmland. The policy shift left the Klamath River basin with unusually low river flows that summer and ended up killing more than 30,000 endangered Coho salmon - the largest fish kill in the history of the West.
For the record, Greg Walden (R-Dist. 2) was also an accomplice in this travesty. Pelican Network has an article on this salmon kill.
Jun 21, '07
Yes, the year that Smith was running for re-election against Bill Bradley. That was the year that Avel Gordly and Elizabeth Furse among others turned their back on Democrats and progressive principles, when no less than the invasion of Iraq was on the table, and they endorsed Gordon Smith. With such a clear choice, and so much on the line, war and peace, the degradation of water and wildlife, the degradation of health care for medicare and medicaid patients, it's remarkable that such betrayals would be the order of the day by people who claim to stand on the side of progressive principles and values.
Jun 22, '07
Loaded Orygon had a good post on this a few weeks ago. How in God's name is Smith getting away with this lawbreaking?
link to LoadedOrygun post on Smith, Rove, Hatch Act Violations
Jun 22, '07
More detail in tthis article:
Jun 22, '07
Not looking to fight, however as I remember the events, the 'long standing policy' had been allowing irrigation rights to farmers that had settled the area almost 100 years earlier. Again, and maybe this is a faulty perspective, the cutting off of water had been a relatively new occurance when viewd from a longer term viewpoint.
For the past 10 years water in the Klamath basin has been very political. If Rove utilized fear and coercion against policy/law then he should be investigated for that as well.
Jun 22, '07
You cannot use the apparatus of a federal agency to get someone elected.
Rove can't use our tax dollars as campaign money for Republican candidates.
Illegal. Unethical.
It's that simple.
9:01 a.m.
Jun 22, '07
Anon is right. But it's more than that. The decision to do something with the water should be based on the science, the law, the facts, etc. It should NOT be based on "because we need to re-elect Gordon Smith."
That's the central problem here. The federal government making a policy decision in order to win an election.
Above all else, that's the central logic of the Bush Administration. As Bruce Reed has put it, the hacks are running amok all over the wonks.
Jun 22, '07
A point to note here is that the fishermen that got screwed in this salmon kill live in California and can't vote in Oregon. Smith and Walden didn't give a damn about them so they stacked the deck in favor of farmers in the Klamath Basin who would vote for them. As I understand it, it was a political decision after World War II that encouraged people to farm in the Klamath Basin, an area that was naturally unsuited to farming and one that required irrigation from other sources. This diversion of water should send a signal to any potential opponents of Smith and Walden that they operate on a no-holds barred policy when it comes to getting re-elected. Goody-Two-Shoes? How did Smith ever get that moniker?
9:40 a.m.
Jun 22, '07
Most of the land let for farming in the Klamath basin came after WWII, not "almost a hundred years ago".
That aside, the hardy and rustic individualists that comprised the rural farming communities in the US, have always been among the nation's major welfare recipients as defined by their much more recently adopted right wing ideology.
Often the gummint gives away resources that it does not have, or has promised to multiple stakeholders. In this case, the fish and the Native Americans were on the sidelines as Norton and Smith tried desperately to mollify both the Hardy Individulaist Fishermen and the Hardy Individualist Farmers, while avoiding a shitstorm in an election year.
The actual history here incldued the fact that the guys in charge of releasing a bunch of water from a California dam into the Klamath refused to do so, and raised the fish kill into a national scandal.
Plenty of blame to apportion all around.
12:03 p.m.
Jun 22, '07
Funny, I had a piece I made back for the 2004 election about this (though not Smith focused) which I plan to refresh for the 2008 campaign against SMith (guerilla marketing and leafletting)
Jun 22, '07
Michael Milstein wrote several very good articles for the Oregonian on the Klamath Basin water crisis in 2001. You can get some good background on this if you search for "Michael Milstein Klamath Basin Oregonian."
Jun 25, '07
Not to diminish the severity of the fish kill, but federal, state and tribal biologists estimated that more than 90 pct of the fish killed were not threatened or endangered coho salmon, but nonfederally listed fall-run chinook. FWS estimated 344 coho died.
At the same time, in its report, CDFG said the estimate of about 34,000 fish killed may be 45,000 less than the actual # of mortalities.
BTW, the July 30, 2003 Wall Street Journal article by Tom Hamburger, excerpted above, had the same information as the article you cited (minus the error on the fish #s). That article must have been what truthout was referring to when it said that "details of Rove's involvement in influencing the Interior Department to reverse its policies with regard to the Klamath River basin have been previously reported."
12:59 p.m.
Jun 25, '07
Steve is right, but new evidence has come with the release of the deposition from Susan Ralston, Rove's top aide, to Waxman's Oversight Committee. As the truthout article notes, in it she describes "frequent" discussions about the policy in his daily meetings of the time. Furthermore, she indicates that she doesn't even REMEMBER the Inspector General's investigation into Rove's influence, and that they never asked to see any of Rove's RNC emails on the subject. No wonder they found no influence!
I went deep into the story this morning at LO, and her full deposition is linked there. (That bugged me, that Leopold wrote the story almost entirely based on the depo--and then didn't even link to it. It's not all that easy to find, either).
An interesting remaining question is: how much did Smith know about what Rove was doing for him?
Jun 25, '07
Right!! Please do not even mention the fact that the water was being held hostage (by bad science or outright criminality) by those against the farmers using the federal Endangered Species Act as a weapon. All in the name of saving suckerfish. So the so called GREEN side started the whole mess and put a lot of farmers out of work for nothing. If you totally drained Klamath Lake, you could not kill all the suckerfish, BUT THAT WAS NEVER THE ISSUE, WAS IT?
So when you environmental nazis want to actually have a debate, start with the beginning. It was not the suckerfish, just like it wasn't the spotted owl.
<hr/>But if you have any data that suggests that the suckerfish would not have survived a water drawdown, or that mankind could not possibly have gotten by without this particular brand of suckerfish that inhabits ONLY Klamath Lake, and not every other freaking lake in southern Oregon, by all means, POST YOUR DATA. No one can argue that the Endangered Species Act was a good idea, however, that way it has been used by the liberal envirowackos is unconscionable. In your zeal to use "the ACT" against big business, big agro, etc. the end result will be the eventual gutting of this legislation, and it will be totally justified. Try a better case than Klamath Lake suckerfish, suckers.