By 1996, there had been much mutual back-scratching between the Teamsters, the White House, and the Democratic Party. They couldn t do that directly, of course, so the money was laundered through a liberal public-interest organization, Citizen Action, and through other groups, including the National Council of Senior Citizens and Project Vote.
Federal law prohibits employers from contributing to any union election.
Today, the carnage from this scandal casts a pall over the entire labor movement. Three individuals pleaded guilty to embezzlement, mail fraud, and conspiracy and cooperated with the federal prosecutors. A fourth, William Hamilton, a former political director of the Teamsters union, was found guilty in November 1999 and sentenced to three years in prison. It s difficult for many labor insiders to accept that Trumka hatched such a plan. He has had a close personal friendship with Carey.