|
|||
|
|||
|
|
Ed Rollins Denies Hillary Private Eye Charge
Longtime GOP political strategist Ed Rollins is denying that his client, New York Senate hopeful K.T. McFarland, is using Hillary Clinton's one-time private detective to dig up dirt on her Republican primary opponent. McFarland is facing former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer in the GOP primary in a race to see who will oppose Mrs. Clinton this fall. In an exclusive interview with NewsMax, Rollins acknowledged that McFarland hired the detective agency, Investigative Group International (IGI), but he insisted that it was to probe McFarland's own background. Rollins noted that McFarland and notorious IGI chief Terry Lenzner are "longtime friends." "Mr. McFarland asked [Lenzner] if there was anything in their backgrounds that might become political issue," Rollins explained. Lenzner came up empty, he said, adding that his report on the McFarlands made for "very dull reading." Rollins vehemently denied allegations that Mrs. Clinton's one-time detective had unearthed dirt on Spencer. Spencer's campaign has complained that Lenzner was feeding McFarland's campaign information about his private life. "The Spencer stuff that I have dug up you can get - I had interns go to the library," Rollins told NewsMax. "Everything I've said about Spencer both publicly and privately has come out of a newspaper story or Channel 12, there was some coverage, up in Yonkers." In published interviews, Rollins has accused the former Yonkers mayor of cheating on his wife and putting his mistress on the public payroll. In 2002, Spencer acknowledged that he had an affair with his chief of staff, whom he married that year. Rollins insists that information came from published sources, not from any private detective like Lenzner. Rollins acknowledged that while Lenzner was recruited before he joined McFarland's team, his ties to Mrs. Clinton might raise eyebrows. "Look, my recommendation would never be to hire a high profile private investigator - particularly in this day when private investigators are getting more and more high profile . . . But [the McFarlands] had a relationship and a friendship [with Lenzner]," Rollins said. The top Republican strategist said he does not plan to include Mr. Clinton's previous sexual misconduct in either the primary or in the general election if McFarland squares off with Hillary. Rollins also denied charges from Spencer's campaign that Democrat donors, including several who had donated to Mrs. Clinton's Senate bid, were secretly trying to sabotage GOP chances by bankrolling Mrs. McFarland. "These people give to both Democrats and Republicans - they're all personal friends of K.T. McFarland," he told NewsMax, noting that many of the same Democrats donated to top Republicans like George Pataki, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain. Editor's note:
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
2006 Elections
Inside Cover Stories |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| All Rights Reserved © 2006 NewsMax.Com |