Mike Espy: Kid in the Candy Store

Mike Espy
Thursday, August 28th 1997: This morning I contacted Tyson Foods asking for a comment on Mike Espy's indictment for accepting gifts from American agribusiness. Tyson was one firm which allegedly favored Mike Espy with inappropriate gifts. Ed Nicholson, a Tyson spokesman, summed up my feelings quite well:

The indictment announced today by Mr. Smaltz charges former Secretary Espy with receiving illegal gratuities from seven companies, including Tyson Foods. These allegations, as they relate to Tyson Foods, are the same allegations Mr. Smaltz announced nearly three years and at least $15 million ago. They are as flimsy now as they were then, and the dollar values associated with them are grossly inflated. The Secretary was never asked by Tyson for special treatment, and none was ever offered or received. We deplore the Independent CounselÕs apparent view that acts of common hospitality ­ consisting of a couple of meals and a football game ­ can rise to the level of criminal conduct in the absence of any attempt by our company to exploit its non-existent special relationship with Mr. Espy.

On November 17th 1994 Mike Espy, then the outgoing Secretary of Agriculture, was standing on the patio of the USDA Administration Building. There were television cameras -- government owned -- to record and broadcast, over a local area network, a bittersweet ceremony honoring Espy. In his remarks, Espy said "It's not how long you serve--it's how well you serve." He might have added 'It's where you serve" as well.

Espy, a multi-term congressman, who resigned his office to take the top USDA post, woke up this morning facing a federal grand jury indictment alleging he received a little more than $35,000 in favors for himself, his brother and his girlfriend.

In a sense, Espy is the victim as much as he might be a perpetrator. An ongoing five year GOP-sponsored witch hunt has cost many their careers, their families and their dreams. Kenneth Starr's failure to indict the Clintons and his extraordinary expenditure of public funds in that effort seems to have stirred up a new kind of American hatefulness -- aimed at "the other side" and armed with the law.

One can imagine Espy's panic when stories began to surface about little favors done for him by giant agribusiness. One can only guess what it's like to be a Black man that made it to cabinet secretary only to have the rug pulled out from under him -- largely through his own stupidity and lack of caution. That panic and disappointment led him, says the prosecutor, to try and cover up his deeds.

As they say, "If they want you, they'll get you."
Espy was indicted on 39 felony counts including mail and wire fraud, violations of the Meat Inspection Act of 1907, taking illegal gratuities, making false statements and tampering with a witness.

Smaltz says Espy broke the law by accepting tickets to professional basketball, football and tennis events. He may have accepted gifts including a Waterford crystal bowl, luggage, lavish cross-country trips, cash payments to his girlfriend and a $10,000 contribution to his brother Henry's unsuccessful campaign for Congress.

But then Espy did not report the gifts properly and misled federal investigators and President Clinton's chief of staff about them, prosecutors said. They said Espy also asked USDA staff official to doctor a document requested by the inspector general regarding a lobbyist who paid for his and his girlfriend's trip to a National Football League playoff game in Dallas in 1994. That's tampering.

To add to his pain, Espy's girlfriend Patricia Dempsey -- who is named in the indictment but not charged -- is said to be cooperating with investigators in exchange for immunity.

If Espy was taking gifts and favors from the very people he regulated he was wrong -- criminally wrong and could serve a lot of time in prison for his lack of judgement.

The mainstream media seems to think Espy was simply off the wall, one day asking the Chairman of Quaker Oats for a couple of tickets, worth about eighty bucks, to a Bulls game, and later accepting a couple of thousand dollars from another agribusiness to cover his stay at the Super Bowl. He seemed indiscriminate, perhaps out of control.

But in this atmosphere of unbridled corruption Espy looks like a kid caught shoplifting penny candy at a five and dime. The indictment says Espy either lied to investigators or quickly made restitution and called the matter an oversight when confronted with his actions. Sounds to me like a teenager caught sneaking in after midnight.

Espy has been practicing law in Mississippi since he stepped down. For three years he's been sweating it out, hoping against hope, treading water in an uncertain and polluted sea.

Prosecutor Smaltz's lack of beefy accusations leads one to believe that Espy was a tyro in a world of outstretched white-gloved palms that Washington so eagerly breeds. Smaltz has failed to show that Espy did any favors for his petty benefactors and hurts his case for lack of a quid pro quo.

The indictment did not accuse Espy's Agriculture Department of granting any favors to the companies or changing any policies as a consequence of the gifts. At a news conference this afternoon, the independent counsel in the case, Donald C. Smaltz, said the laws Espy was charged with breaking did not require such a finding.

Espy's attorney, who also represents Pauline Kanchanalak, a Thai national -- accused of illegal contributions to the Democrats -- is Reid Weingarten, of the prestigious Steptoe firm. Weingarten says, "Never has so much been made of so little...In an effort to justify three years and countless millions spent on this investigation, the special prosecutor has stretched criminal statutes beyond recognition and taken trivial, personal and entirely benign activities and attempted to distort them into criminal acts. These efforts will ultimately prove unavailing and we look forward to going to court and restoring Mike Espy's good name."

He might be right.

Finger Lickin' Good
Was Espy the victim of hardened businessmen who have played the game in Washington longer than he's been alive? Maybe. Most of the gifts are alleged to have come from chicken giant Tyson Foods and Sun-Diamond Growers. Tyson and Sun have also been the target of government-sponsored investigations. Sun was convicted of giving about $9,000 worth of gifts to Espy last year and Tyson is on official notice it may be indicted soon. Don Tyson himself is talking to prosecutors in exchange for immunity and may testify at Espy's trial. But are the Tyson brothers greedy, or just offering southern hospitality?

I can't help but wonder what a jury might think. Here's Mike Espy supposedly taking some luggage, a couple of plane rides, trips and cheap sports tickets from guys worth billions. His brother gets a political donation from an agribusiness executive. His girlfriend gets a $1,200 scholarship from another.

But who's trying him for this. In a sense it's the law, but in another sense it's the Congress and all elected officials who take and take from the same corporate coffers -- not $35,000 -- but millions. some of which can be directly traced to the elusive quid-pro-quo.

A juror might think...Espy, if he was truly criminally intentioned, could have gained millions for himself if he'd rally wanted to play ball. It's been done before. It continues today. Why has this man been singled out?

The truth is, I don't know.

But you can be sure those questions will be asked during jury deliberations on Espy's fate.

Don't get me wrong. I think the facts should be tried. If Espy broke the law he should pay. I'm just wondering about the really big fish --Congressional shakedown artists. When, if ever, will they face the bar?

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