WASHINGTON – The Secret Service's records documenting convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff's contacts with Bush administration officials may not reveal all such meetings, the White House said Tuesday.
The Secret Service has agreed to turn over White House visitor logs showing when Abramoff met with administration officials — and with whom. But presidential spokesman Scott McClellan cautioned reporters from viewing the release as all-inclusive.
"I don't know exactly what they'll be providing, but they only have certain records and so I just wouldn't view it as a complete historical record," McClellan said.
Abramoff, who represented Indian tribes in their dealings with Washington politicians and raised at least $100,000 for Bush's re-election campaign, was once one of the city's most successful lobbyists.
When a photo of Bush with Abramoff surfaced earlier this year, the president said he has his picture taken with "a lot of people." In the 2001 photo, Bush is shaking hands with a leader of an Indian tribe. Abramoff is in the background.
The president has said that he does not know Abramoff personally, but Abramoff told the Washingtonian magazine that he had met with Bush nearly a dozen times and that the president knew him well enough to joke with him.
McClellan has said that Abramoff attended Hanukkah receptions at the White House in 2001 and 2002, and some additional staff-level meetings. "But I said I couldn't rule out that there might be other large events that may have taken place that he attended, but that's what I know and that still stands," McClellan said.
Abramoff pleaded guilty in January in Washington to federal charges stemming from an investigation into his ties with members of Congress and the Bush administration. He also pleaded guilty to fraud charges in Miami concerning a multimillion-dollar purchase of SunCruz Casinos gambling fleet in 2000.
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