Media distributor severs ties with commentator By Judy Keen and Jim Drinkard, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON - Armstrong Williams, who was paid by the Education Department to promote President Bush's education policies, says the public outcry and his firing by the company that syndicated his newspaper column are "the price you pay" for a mistake.
USA TODAY reported on Friday that Williams, a prominent black pundit, was paid $240,000 to promote No Child Left Behind as part of a $1 million department contract with the Ketchum public relations firm. The contract required Williams to comment on Bush's program on his TV and radio show, to interview Education Secretary Rod Paige and to produce radio spots that aired on his show. (Related link: Williams contract)
Williams said he deeply regrets his actions. "It's important that I have a credible voice and that I'm not perceived as being paid for what I say," he said. "This is my responsibility. I blame no one, I get the message, and I will be better."
People For the American Way, a liberal interest group, today will launch an online campaign urging Williams to return the money. "It's the taxpayers' money given out illegally," says Ralph Neas, the group's president.
Williams said in an interview Sunday that he won't return the money. "That would be ludicrous," he said, "because they bought advertising, and they got it."
Several members of Congress are demanding investigations.
Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings was among Democrats in Congress who asked President Bush to "publicly renounce the use of covert propaganda to influence public opinion" and reveal whether other commentators have been paid to promote his policies.
Law restricts federal funds
Congress has barred the use of taxpayer money to influence policies of the federal government. In practice, that means federal departments and agencies are prohibited from mounting public relations campaigns that are intended to sway congressional action.
Most federal agencies warn their employees against such activity. A 2002 memo for the Air Force, for example, advises workers that the law bars publicity 'tending to emphasize the importance of the agency or activity in question' to avoid 'self-aggrandizement' and 'puffery.'
Among the applicable laws:
The Anti-Lobbying Act, a 1919 law, prohibits the use of any federal funds to 'directly or indirectly' influence government policy through any 'personal service, advertisement, telegram, telephone, letter, printed or written matter, or other device.'
The Anti-Deficiency Act, dating to 1906, bars any government official from spending taxpayer dollars for any purpose not authorized by Congress.
Provisions routinely added to appropriations bills forbid the use of federal funds for 'publicity or propaganda purposes within the United States not heretofore authorized by Congress.'
In a report released in May, the congressional Government Accountability Office said the laws help to 'mark the boundary between an agency making information available to the public,' which is permissible, and 'agencies creating news reports unbeknownst to the receiving audience,' which is not.
"It is unbelievable that the administration used limited taxpayer dollars to self-promote No Child Left Behind, while underfunding money for our schools, books, technology and after-school programs," Cummings said.
Rep. John Boehner, an Ohio Republican who chairs the House Education Committee, also called for an inquiry by the Education Department's inspector general.
Williams' support for Bush's policies came as the president's campaign was trying to woo black voters. Bush received 9% of black votes in 2000 and 11% in 2004.
Bush spokesman Scott McClellan said the White House is not involved in departments' contracts and referred questions to the Education Department.
John Gibbons, an Education Department spokesman, said the contract followed standard government procedures. He said there are no plans to continue with "similar outreach."
Several federal laws forbid the use of taxpayer money to influence public opinion on matters of government policy with the intent of shaping policy or putting pressure on Congress. Administrations have run afoul of those laws periodically, but criminal prosecution is rare.
At least twice in the past year, Congress' Government Accountability Office has chastised federal agencies for disseminating information to the public disguised as news reports without disclosing that the information was produced by the government.
The Department of Health and Human Services hired Ketchum - the same firm that paid Williams - to produce news releases promoting the Medicare prescription-drug benefit. The material aired on at least 40 TV stations, but because audiences weren't told it came from the government, it constituted "covert propaganda," GAO said.
The agency last week issued a similar criticism of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, which distributed news segments about drug use among youth.
The practice isn't new. In 1987, the Reagan administration's State Department was found to have violated the law by paying consultants to write opinion pieces for newspapers endorsing the administration's hotly debated support for anti-communist rebels in Nicaragua.
Complaints also arose in 2003 when Attorney General John Ashcroft mounted a public relations campaign in support of another controversial Bush administration initiative, the USA Patriot Act, which gave authorities more tools to investigate terrorism.
The GAO found that Ashcroft's campaign, which included speaking trips to 14 states, cost $210,000. But the department's inspector general ruled that it did not violate the anti-lobbying law because Ashcroft, as a presidential appointee, is exempt from it.
Williams, 45, a former aide to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, is one of the nation's top black conservative voices. He hosts The Right Side on TV and radio and has written op-ed pieces for newspapers while running a public relations firm, Graham Williams Group.
Tribune Media Services, which distributed Williams' weekly newspaper column, told him Friday that it was terminating its relationship with him immediately.
"Readers may well ask themselves if the views expressed in his columns are his own, or whether they have been purchased by a third party," Tribune Media Services said in a statement.