Immigrant Measure Still Backed by Gays

Advocates focused their fury on several Democrats on the Judiciary Committee, which considered more than 300 amendments to the bill, after the senators warned the chairman, Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, that they would not vote for an amendment he wanted to introduce. The measure by Mr. Leahy, also a Democrat, would have allowed American citizens to seek permanent resident status — a document known as a green card — for a foreign same-sex partners.

But as the bill now moves to the Senate floor, the political damage from the episode for the Democrats — including senators who have been firm allies of gay causes like Mr. Leahy, Charles E. Schumer of New York and Richard J. Durbin of Illinois — may not be as severe as it first appeared. Gay rights advocates, stepping back from the loss, said the overhaul still contained many measures that could benefit gay immigrants, most of which came through the committee gantlet unscathed.

Other provisions that the committee agreed to add to the bill, dealing with asylum and immigration detention, had been the subject of vigorous lobbying by gay organizations.

The committee outcome was a relief for Republicans in the bipartisan group of eight senators that wrote the bill, who had said the same-sex amendment would cripple the entire measure. By fending it off, Republicans held on to crucial support from evangelical Christians and Roman Catholics.

“To try to redefine marriage within the immigration bill would mean the bill would fall apart,” Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a Republican, told Mr. Leahy in the moments of high suspense last Tuesday evening before the Vermont senator announced his decision. Mr. Graham said support from conservative evangelical churches, which have put on an ambitious campaign to pass the overhaul, “made it possible for a guy like me to survive the emotional nature of this debate.”

One activist who had intensely mixed feelings about the committee’s results was Felipe Sousa-Rodriguez, co-director of Get Equal, an organization that seeks legal equality for gay people.

“I can’t deny my outrage when I felt betrayed,” said Mr. Sousa-Rodriguez, who said he had delivered thousands of petitions to Mr. Schumer’s Washington office just a week earlier.

But he said he was ready to push for the bill on the Senate floor, where lawmakers expect to take it up the week of June 10. “Many of my friends will benefit from the overall legislation,” he said.

Like many gay advocates, Mr. Sousa-Rodriguez, who was born in Brazil, sees the legislation from several angles. He is one of as many as 1.7 million young immigrants who were brought here illegally as children. Those immigrants would be eligible under the Senate bill for an accelerated five-year path to citizenship. They include a vocal contingent of youths who are gay.

But Mr. Sousa-Rodriguez is also legally married to an immigrant from Colombia, Juan, who is about to become an American citizen. If the same-sex amendment were to become law, Mr. Sousa-Rodriguez’s husband could seek a green card for him immediately, without waiting five years. In the Judiciary Committee debate, Mr. Leahy kept everyone, including his own staff, wondering until the final hour whether he would formally introduce the same-sex amendment. He had sponsored similar legislation many times in the Senate, and he left no doubt in his opening statement about his strong support for the provision.

But then he turned to the other senators on the committee, asking them for their views. In agonized comments the Democrats, also including Dianne Feinstein of California and Al Franken of Minnesota, replayed the Republican warnings that the measure would be a deal breaker.

According to several Senate aides, the Democrats were surprised and miffed that Mr. Leahy shifted the burden to them to nix the amendment.

“He did it in a way that made others walk the plank and kept his hands clean,” one Democratic aide said, “and that was not appreciated.”

In the end Mr. Leahy withheld his amendment, leaving open the option of introducing it later. The committee sent the bill to the Senate floor on a strong bipartisan vote.

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L.B.J.’s Gettysburg Address

In American history, 1963 was a year rich in speeches. But of all the signature speeches that year, it’s the one that has been all but forgotten that might have transformed the country the most.

Fifty years ago, on Memorial Day in 1963, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson gave a speech in Gettysburg, Pa., that foreshadowed profound changes that would be achieved in only 13 months and that mark us still.

The occasion was a speech that almost wasn’t given at all, for an anniversary that was still a month off, delivered by a man who had grown weary of his apparent uselessness in an office that neither interested him nor engaged his capacious gifts. It is a reminder that the titanic events of history sometimes occur away from the main stage — and proof of the power of a great idea, even if it is delivered ahead of its time.

“One hundred years ago, the slave was freed,” Johnson said at the cemetery in a ceremony marking the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg. “One hundred years later, the Negro remains in bondage to the color of his skin.”

With those two sentences, Johnson accomplished two things. He answered King’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail.” And he signaled where the later Johnson administration might lead, which was to the legislation now known as the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Six months later, after Kennedy was assassinated, Johnson became president and vowed to press ahead on civil rights, saying that was what the presidency was for — even though he was a Southern Democrat and many of his Congressional allies were devout segregationists.

And yet Johnson nearly didn’t give his Gettysburg speech at all. He dismissed the invitation with a shrug when it arrived in the vice president’s office. He was distracted, distressed and depressed. Almost nothing interested him.

He was moping too much, “and it was becoming obvious,” George E. Reedy, a Johnson press secretary, said in an oral history recorded for the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library in Austin, Tex. “He just looked lugubrious. He reminded me of one of those Tennessee bloodhounds, you know, with the drooping ears.”

His closest aides never sent Johnson’s regrets to the Gettysburg invitation, leaving the option open, hoping to lure the vice president to use the occasion to break out of his funk. Juanita Roberts, Johnson’s personal secretary, saw special appeal in the opportunity, and she dashed off a note to Horace Busby, who was Johnson’s head speechwriter.

“Do you think something good could be made here?” she wondered. “The distinguished son of distinguished confederates on the 100th anniv. of the battle —.”

Then she wrote Johnson directly, saying, “I can’t regret this one yet — I am excited by the possibilities it could offer.” She told the vice president that this was a chance to deliver “a masterpiece to be remembered by” and suggested that Dwight D. Eisenhower, living in Gettysburg in retirement from the presidency, might be drawn to the event.

By then the idea had gained momentum, all except the Eisenhower element. “Bringing in nationally prominent Republicans, however, could reduce the advantage of this situation,” a top Johnson aide, probably Busby, wrote in an unsigned internal memo that now rests in the files of the Johnson Library.

All politics, in L.B.J.’s time as in ours, is personal.

So Busby drove over to the Elms, Johnson’s house in the Spring Valley section of Northwest Washington, and sat by the pool as the vice president, who was deeply affected by his experience as a young man teaching Mexican-American children, thought aloud about race. Busby was so startled by how fluent and articulate Johnson was that on the way home he pulled his car over to the curb and recorded what Johnson had said.

The final product, shaped by Busby and Harry C. McPherson Jr., another close adviser, thus was more stenography than speech craftsmanship — and it was all the more powerful if you looked carefully at Johnson’s remarks and saw how they grew out of King’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” in which the civil-rights leader spoke of his frustration with the pace of change:

“For years now I have heard the word ‘Wait!’ It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This ‘Wait’ has almost always meant ‘Never.’ We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that ‘justice too long delayed is justice denied.’ ”

Johnson’s speech directly addressed King: “The Negro today asks justice. We do not answer him — we do not answer those who lie beneath this soil — when we reply to the Negro by asking, ‘Patience.’ It is empty to plead that the solution to the dilemmas of the present rests on the hands of the clock.”

The speech was given on Memorial Day, May 30, 1963, not on the anniversary of a battle now regarded as a turning point in the Civil War. Johnson’s visit to Gettysburg was a helicopter trip that took but 2 hours and 34 minutes, start to finish, but it was indicative of the bigger journey he would take as president.

David M. Shribman is the executive editor of The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and a former Washington correspondent for The New York Times and for The Boston Globe, where he won a Pulitzer Prize in 1995 for his coverage of politics.

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Wind Down the War on Terrorism? Republicans Say No

Republican lawmakers on Sunday criticized President Obama’s vision for winding down the war on terrorism, using talk show appearances to accuse him of misunderstanding the threat in a way that will embolden unfriendly nations.

“We show this lack of resolve, talking about the war being over,” Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, said on “Fox News Sunday.” “What do you think the Iranians are thinking? At the end of the day, this is the most tone-deaf president I ever could imagine.”

In his first major foreign policy address of his second term, Mr. Obama said last week that it was time for the United States to narrow the scope of its long battle against terrorists and begin a transition away from a war footing.

In addition to renewing his call to close the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, he said he would seek to limit his own war powers. He also issued new policy guidelines that would shift the responsibility for drone strikes to the military from the Central Intelligence Agency, and said there would be stricter standards for such attacks.

Mr. Graham, a strong supporter of the drone program, said he objected to changing the standards. Separately, he called for a special counsel to investigate both the Justice Department, which has come under scrutiny for seizing journalists’ phone records, and the Internal Revenue Service, which has acknowledged that it unfairly targeted conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status.

Democrats, including Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida and Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, praised Mr. Obama for what they said was a necessary rebalancing of civil liberties and national security interests. “We have to balance our values,” Ms. Wasserman Schultz said Sunday on the ABC News program “This Week.”

But at least two lawmakers — the current and former chairmen of the House Homeland Security Committee, Representative Michael McCaul of Texas and Peter T. King of New York — complained specifically about the president’s remarks about Guantánamo Bay.

Mr. McCaul warned against closing the detention center, especially if it meant moving prisoners to the United States. “Name me one American city that would like to host these guys,” he said on the CNN program “State of the Union.”

More than half the remaining 166 detainees at Guantánamo Bay are Yemeni; of these, 56 have been cleared to go home. Mr. Obama has proposed repatriating detainees when he can, but will still face the thorny question of what to do several dozen men who cannot be prosecuted and who have been deemed to be too dangerous to release.

Mr. King, appearing with Ms. Wasserman Schultz on “This Week,” said the detention facility had been a success. “Many experts believe it did work,” he said, adding that he was “very concerned about sending detainees back to Yemen.” Noting that Mr. Obama had campaigned on a promise to close the prison, he said the president “could have done a lot more than he has done if he was serious about it rather than just moralizing.”

In calling for a special counsel, Mr. Graham said the Justice Department had begun to “criminalize journalism” and had engaged in “an overreach” in investigating leaks of classified national security information. He also complained of an “organized effort” within the I.R.S. to target political opponents of the president. “I think it comes from the top,” he said, although current and former I.R.S. officials have said Mr. Obama did not know of the targeting.

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Horne's defense plan detailed

As the campaign-finance allegations against Attorney General Tom Horne hang in legal limbo, documents obtained by The Arizona Republic offer insights into the case Horne and his co-defendant would make if it goes to court.

An attorney representing Kathleen Winn, Horne's director of community outreach, argues in the documents that allegations the two illegally coordinated campaign efforts are based on speculation. Attorney Timothy La Sota also questions investigators' tactics, revealing they not only continued to tail Horne more than a year after the alleged violation, but also followed Winn's attorney, Larry Debus.

Investigators' techniques "raise questions of bias and political motives and taint this entire investigation," La Sota wrote in a letter to the Secretary of State's Office.

"Despite all the resources poured into this investigation, all the interviews and surveillance … the FBI and Maricopa County Attorney's Office have speculation and conjecture, but not hard evidence," he wrote.

Horne and Winn last year were accused of unlawfully coordinating campaign spending during the 2010 election, when Horne was the Republican candidate for attorney general and Winn was chairwoman of Business Leaders for Arizona, an independent-expenditure committee. Both have denied wrongdoing.

After a 14-month investigation, Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery accused Horne and Winn of collaborating to quickly raise more than $500,000 to run negative ads against his Democratic opponent. By law, candidates are not allowed to coordinate certain activities with independent-expenditure committees.

Montgomery pursued a civil-enforcement action, but a judge this month ruled the case could not move forward because of legal technicalities and procedural failings by the Secretary of State's Office, which found reasonable cause exists to believe a campaign-finance violation occurred.

"While we certainly welcomed Mr. La Sota's submission, it doesn't change our reasonable cause determination," said Matt Roberts, Secretary of State Ken Bennett's spokesman. "It doesn't sway our opinion at all."

Montgomery declined to comment on La Sota's letter.

A spokesman for the FBI also declined to comment.

The judge said the secretary of state must submit the case to the Arizona Attorney General's Office to determine how to proceed. The Attorney General's Office can send the case to another law-enforcement agency or a private attorney for review, Montgomery has said.

While the case is with the Attorney General's Office, Horne, Winn "and immediate staff such as executive assistants," won't have access to information, discussion, or decisions on the case, according to Horne's spokeswoman.

In his letter to the secretary of state, La Sota says:

Despite authorities' "exhaustive" and "expensive" investigation, they were only left with "speculation and conjecture" about coordination.

La Sota wrote that calls between Winn and Horne before the release of an attack ad against Horne's Democratic rival were tied to a complex real-estate deal -- not the ad. Horne never referred anyone to an independent campaign to make a donation, never suggested to Winn the names of people to be solicited for contributions, never spoke to anyone about contributing to an independent campaign, and never weighed in on how an independent campaign's money should be spent.

A statute that Winn and Horne are accused of violating is unconstitutional.

La Sota argues the Arizona Revised Statute 16-905 "is blatantly unconstitutional" because contribution limits were too low, and therefore violated free speech and equal protection under the U.S. and Arizona constitutions. La Sota points out that the state Legislature this session raised contribution limits partly because "they were ripe for a free-speech challenge."

La Sota says Montgomery, in testifying before lawmakers, blamed the number of investigations by his office on low contribution limits. An affidavit from an official with the Goldwater Institute declaring current individual contribution limits under current state statutes are unconstitutional is included with La Sota's letter.

The FBI "came with an agenda and that was to get Tom Horne."

La Sota questions why the FBI was involved in the investigation. Authorities have said the FBI took the case because Horne was conflicted from investigating himself. La Sota accuses the FBI of attempting to "intimidate witnesses and lie to them in order to get them to say what they wanted." He accuses the FBI of threatening to use "the 'Martha Stewart' treatment"-- to send them to prison for lying -- to get them to cooperate.

La Sota says the FBI's undercover surveillance of Horne was "the most unseemly part" of the investigation. "The FBI was following the Arizona Attorney General around years after alleged civil campaign finance violations had been committed, looking for any type of infraction that they might be able to pin on him," he wrote. "What in the world did this have to do with a civil campaign finance matter?"

During that surveillance, the FBI saw Horne back a borrowed car into a Range Rover and leave without leaving a note. An FBI report states Horne did not leave a note because he was having an extramarital affair with a subordinate who was with him during the accident. Earlier this month, he pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor hit-and-run charge stemming from the incident and paid a $300 fine.

Democrats are trying to use Horne's driving offense -- and the FBI report accusing him of an affair -- to their advantage as Horne gears up for a re-election campaign. One Democratic senator has called on lawmakers to initiate impeachment hearings against Horne, and this week, the state Democratic Party called on him to explain the circumstances surrounding the accident.

La Sota also takes issue with investigators having a mole in the Attorney General's Office: "A one point and perhaps still to this day, the FBI had what they call a human asset apparently inside" the agency. La Sota said the mole raises questions about potential "invasions of attorney-client protected relationships to federalism concerns."

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Thompson Picks Up Backing of a Fiscal Repairman

In recent weeks, William C. Thompson Jr. has been increasingly unfurling mayoral endorsements from African-American and Hispanic leaders, hoping to solidify his base.

But now Mr. Thompson, a Democratic candidate and former city comptroller, is adding someone who is synonymous with fiscal gravitas: Richard Ravitch.

Mr. Ravitch, a former lieutenant governor, is best known as a Mr. Fix-It, beginning in the 1970s, for helping to rescue fiscally wobbly institutions, like the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. He also embodies the kind of old guard Democrat who is comfortable with Wall Street and the corridors of power, and he will lead Mr. Thompson’s budget and finance advisory group.

For Mr. Thompson, Mr. Ravitch’s nod, twinned with the recent endorsement of Merryl H. Tisch, chancellor of the state’s Board of Regents, underscores his broad and diverse base of support. It also signals that, in a liberal Democratic field, Mr. Thompson can appeal to more centrist establishment figures.

Even former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, a Republican, told a television reporter recently that if Joseph J. Lhota, a former deputy mayor of his, were not running, he would most likely back Mr. Thompson, whom he called an “honorable man.”

Mr. Thompson said that the city’s budget challenges meant that this was “an all-hands-on-deck moment.” But he said that “there is no better partner in that effort than Richard Ravitch” to help the city “overcome these fiscal challenges.”

In an interview, Mr. Ravitch said he had “nothing against” the other candidates, especially Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker, and Bill de Blasio, the public advocate. But he said he decided to back Mr. Thompson, a longtime friend, because “I think he will be the best fiscal steward by dint of his experience and his personality.”

“He certainly understands that he isn’t going to preside over an expansive period in New York City’s history,” Mr. Ravitch continued.

He added, “It’s important to have broad acquaintances and roots in the political structure, because ultimately whatever choice you make on the tough decisions, you’re going to have a lot of unhappy people, and there has to be a residuum of good will and relationships.”

Mr. Ravitch has made donations to candidates (including $2,000 to Mr. Thompson, and $1,000 to Ms. Quinn, for the 2013 election), but he rarely makes endorsements. In fact, he said he could not remember the last time he publicly backed a citywide candidate (other than himself, he joked, when he ran unsuccessfully for mayor in 1989).

He also said he had voted for Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, though he declined to say whether he voted for Mr. Bloomberg or Mr. Thompson in their contest in 2009.

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Public Hearing in Albany Is Held Without the Public

Even before the hearing began, government watchdog groups complained that Republicans who led the panel would not allow them to testify.

The Senate’s sergeants-at-arms went a step further: they would not allow members of the public into the hearing room, first saying that they needed to save space for legislative staff, then saying that the room had reached capacity. (At the same time, people in the room were posting images on Twitter of empty chairs.) Some reporters were also stopped from entering the hearing room; they were later allowed to enter.

The chaotic scene came during a particularly embarrassing period in Albany. On Friday, a former Democratic senator from Queens, Shirley L. Huntley, was revealed to have made secret recordings for law enforcement. Then on Monday, a former leader of the Democratic caucus, Senator John L. Sampson of Brooklyn, was charged with embezzlement and other crimes.

One of the top priorities for Democrats in the legislative session this year is a push to adopt a statewide system to provide public matching funds for candidates, modeled after the city’s system.

Republicans, who have partial control of the State Senate, oppose the idea. The chairman of the State Senate Elections Committee, Thomas F. O’Mara, a Republican from Big Flats, said he organized the hearing to provide a window into “what can go wrong when taxpayer dollars are used to fund political campaigns.”

The hearing was held in a stuffy conference room on the Capitol’s first floor, occupied by senators and invited speakers, and guarded by a clutch of sergeants-at-arms. About a dozen staff members were milling about, but there were a smattering of seats available, including several at the main table, where lawmakers shared space with a few members of the Capitol’s press corps.

During the hearing, protesters pressed up to a ground-floor window that had been opened to allow fresh air into the stifling room; the window was quickly closed after protesters found it.

Government watchdog groups — including the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, Common Cause New York, the League of Women Voters of New York State and the New York Public Interest Research Group — sent a complaint to the state’s Committee on Open Government while the hearing was still under way on Tuesday afternoon, alleging violations of the state’s Open Meetings Law.

“Despite the fact that we’ve seen this recent string of scandals, it seems the Senate is more interested in holding a star chamber than actually getting to the root of these problems,” said Bill Mahoney, the research coordinator for the research group. “Until they start proposing real solutions to the plague of corruption, they’re going to be just as much to blame for all the problems that New York is undergoing.”

Senate Republicans defended their handling of the hearing.

A spokesman, Scott Reif, said the groups that advocated public financing “say they support free speech, yet they attempted to disrupt a hearing and prevent members of the Elections Committee from taking testimony.”

“This hearing was webcast live and we made every effort to get as many people into the room as possible, including every reporter who wanted to attend,” Mr. Reif added. “As the room reached occupancy, we were instructed to close the room.”

The hearing also drew the attention of a group from the Occupy movement who staged a symbolic “corporate wedding” on the Capitol’s Great Western Staircase, with people portraying a money-loving politician, the Monopoly Man and a demonic pastor. Several people were dressed as bundles of $50 bills and an oil derrick.

While the performance seemed to be by amateurs, the show drew a small crowd. After all, it was open to the public.

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Early Voting Means Easier Voting

New York State is a national laggard when it comes to voting. The state has one of the worst voter turnout records in the country, not least because the act of voting is cumbersome and uninviting. In November, 53.6 percent of registered voters cast ballots, leaving New York 44th among the 50 states and the District of Columbia for voter participation.

For Op-Ed, follow @nytopinion and to hear from the editorial page editor, Andrew Rosenthal, follow @andyrNYT.

One fix would be to allow early voting. There are 32 states that give voters a chance to cast their ballots early and in person, some providing polling spots on weekends. Democrats in New York’s Assembly voted this week to give voters as many as 15 days and two weekends before Election Day to cast their ballots in person. The bill would require multiple voting sites in each county. This would reduce long lines, especially in the cities, on Election Day.

All but one Republican voted no. And Senate Republicans are resisting, too. Why? Not, they say, because they want to discourage voting. Their complaint is that early voting would be too expensive for upstate counties. That problem could be addressed by cutting back on the extra hours and adding a little extra state money.

There are other ways that New York’s reluctant legislators could make voting a less frustrating experience. They could make it easier for voters to change parties, which can take longer than a year. They could simplify confusing ballots. They could require the New York City Board of Elections to hire qualified people, not simply political cronies, to run the elections. They could set up a system of public financing to encourage greater competition in most races, which in turn would help attract people to the polls.

Early voting, which Gov. Andrew Cuomo supports, would be a good start. The Senate leader, Dean Skelos, and his fellow Republicans should agree to give voters a break on Election Days.

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George M. Leader, a Former Governor, Dies at 95

His death was announced by a spokeswoman for the Country Meadows center, the first in a network of 10 such facilities that Mr. Leader and his wife founded in 1985.

Mr. Leader, a Democrat, was a state senator who had been given little chance of beating Lt. Gov. Lloyd Wood, a rumpled, cigar-chomping political boss, when he won the governorship.

The victory was credited to his television advertising campaign, one of the earliest in American politics. Two years before, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower was the first to use TV ads extensively in a presidential campaign.

Mr. Leader was only 37 when he took office in 1955, making him the second-youngest governor in Pennsylvania history. (Robert E. Pattison was 32 when he was inaugurated in 1883.) He was the first Pennsylvania governor to appoint a black cabinet officer. Mr. Leader served one four-year term, the maximum allowed by law at the time.

One of Mr. Leader’s main accomplishments was cutting the population in Pennsylvania’s mental hospitals to 11,000 from 39,000; he did so by giving more state money to mental health clinics that helped patients adjust to life outside hospitals.

He also signed a law changing Pennsylvania’s school code to require the education of the disabled. Within five years, 250,000 more children swelled the enrollment lists in public schools.

He lost a bid for the United States Senate to the Republican Hugh Scott in 1958 and never ran for office again, devoting himself to his assisted-living businesses and to causes like prison reform.

“When I was governor, we had 7,000 people in prison. Today we have 33,000 in state prisons, and we can’t keep up,” Mr. Leader said in 1996. “We could do the same thing with the prison population that we did with the mental health population.”

Mr. Leader belonged to an old York County family. The village of Leader Heights bears the family’s name.

George Michael Leader was born on Jan. 17, 1918, the third of Guy and Beulah Leader’s seven children. He grew up on his parents’ poultry farm and attended a one-room schoolhouse. He later attended Gettysburg College and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania.

He served aboard the aircraft carrier Randolph during World War II. When the war ended, he returned to York County and used a G.I. loan to buy a 110-acre farm.

Mr. Leader and his wife, the former Mary Jane Strickler, whom he married in 1939, were both living at Country Meadows when she died in March 2011.

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Renzi's corruption trial set

Several years after his congressional career ended amid an FBI corruption probe, former U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi is expected to get his day in court with a trial that opens on Tuesday in Tucson.

Timeline

2001

Republican Rick Renzi runs for Congress. Authorities later allege that he funneled money from insurance clients into his campaign treasury.

2002

Renzi wins election over Democrat George Cordova.

Federal Election Commission orders audit of Renzi campaign finances.

2004

FEC audit says Renzi made $369,000 in "impermissible" loans to his campaign.

Renzi is re-elected, defeating Paul Babbitt.

2005

Resolution Copper begins trying to orchestrate a real-estate swap to obtain copper-rich federal land near Superior.

Authorities allege that Renzi told Resolution that there will be no deal unless property owned by business associate James Sandlin is included. Resolution reportedly balks.

2006

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington names Renzi among 20 "most corrupt" members of Congress.

Department of Justice secretly approves FBI wiretaps and search warrants targeting Renzi.

News leaks of possible indictment.

Renzi is elected to a third term, defeating Ellen Simon.

2007

FBI raids Renzi's business.

Renzi resigns from House Intelligence Committee, then announces he will not seek a fourth term.

2008

Renzi is indicted on 35 counts.

A superseding indictment lists 49 felonies.

2010

All wiretap evidence is suppressed from Renzi's future trial due to FBI misconduct.

Judge refuses to disqualify Justice Department team for prosecutorial misconduct.

2011

9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals refuses to throw out case based on claims of congressional immunity.

2012

After failure of 11 land-swap bills, Resolution Copper shuts down planned operations near Superior.

2013

Members of Arizona delegation introduce new land-exchange measure.

May7: Renzi trial scheduled to begin.

Source: U.S. District Court records and Arizona Republic archives

The three-term Republican House member, who pleaded not guilty, is accused of extortion, fraud, racketeering, money laundering and other crimes involving his insurance business and his conduct as a legislator.

The U.S. District Court case file reveals a web of political intrigue amid a tangle of legal complications. So far, three dozen attorneys have taken part in litigation, which has produced more than 1,145 motions, briefs, responses, judicial rulings and appeals.

Among the mysteries as the trial convenes: Who tipped off federal investigators? Why? What will Renzi's defense strategy be? And will he take the witness stand?

The defense team declined comment, but it is clear from legal papers that the trial will involve contrasting depictions of the 54-year-old businessman turned politician.

Prosecutors are poised to describe Renzi as a manipulator who embezzled money from business customers, funneled the cash into his election treasury and used his legislative power to profit from an extortion conspiracy.

The defense is geared to present Renzi as a pragmatist whose private and public dealings overlapped but were not criminal; or, perhaps, as the victim of political enemies who dragged him down with help from overzealous federal agents.

Spelling out narratives likely will require more than a month of the trial, dozens of witnesses and tens of thousands of pages of evidence.

"This is just going to be fascinating," said Mike Black, a Phoenix attorney who briefly represented one of Renzi's co-defendants. "I might even go down there just to watch."

Winding through appeals

Renzi was first indicted in February 2008 and eventually faced 49 felony counts.

The charges arise from two sets of allegations that, if true, would constitute a betrayal of the public trust and corruption of the U.S. political system: First, Renzi is accused of defrauding clients at his Patriot Insurance Agency by taking funds that were intended as premiums and using the money to win his first House race in 2002. Second, Renzi is charged with orchestrating a land-swap deal after taking office to benefit a real-estate investor who owed him money.

While it is not unusual for white-collar cases to defy the speedy-trial model of justice, Renzi's litigation has been particularly glacial due to rare constitutional issues that come with prosecution of a former member of Congress.

Delays included two appeals handled by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and numerous hearings to resolve disputes.

Defense attorneys partially succeeded in efforts to get charges thrown out and evidence suppressed but failed in a bid to disqualify the Justice Department team based on claims of prosecutorial misconduct. Among the pretrial issues that had to be sorted out by U.S. District Judge David Bury:

FBI agents who monitored wiretaps improperly listened to phone calls between Renzi and his attorneys, destroyed their notes and misled a judge about the conversations. Bury found the government's conduct egregious and suppressed all evidence from electronic surveillance.

Defense attorneys contended that charges of embezzlement were bogus because, as Renzi's companies were structured, he merely borrowed money. The Appeals Court agreed.

Perhaps most significantly, defense lawyers contended that all charges related to the land-swap deal should be dropped because a clause in the U.S. Constitution prohibits the criminal investigation of a federal lawmaker for legislative acts.

Under the so-called Speech or Debate Clause, Renzi's attorneys argued, the Justice Department violated U.S. law not just by wiretapping the congressman, but by interviewing his staffers and obtaining his records.

The constitutional provision was drafted to prevent the executive branch from using its law-enforcement authority as a political weapon against opponents in Congress. Members of the House and Senate are generally immune to criminal prosecution for their legislative conduct.

In this case, House lawyers filed briefs supporting Renzi's legal position while the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington argued on behalf of the government.

The Speech or Debate question went to the 9th Circuit, which ruled that Renzi's conduct was not protected.

Still, the issue is likely to resurface during the trial, and House lawyers have asked to remain as players in future courtroom disputes.

Setbacks for prosecutors

The government has suffered a number of setbacks leading up to the trial.

Sixteen counts against Renzi have been dismissed so far, including a tax charge that was thrown out a few weeks ago. Andrew Beardall, Renzi's lawyer in the insurance case, was acquitted. Dwayne Lequire, the insurance-company accountant, was found guilty but the Appeals Court overturned his verdict and issued an acquittal.

The investigation and prosecution have cost U.S. taxpayers and defendants untold millions. Lequire is now seeking more than $400,000 from the government as compensation for his legal expenses. His attorney, Mark Willimann, said the Justice Department keeps losing in Renzi's case because prosecutors went "well beyond the realm of decency" in filing charges.

Although the case was launched under the administration of Republican President George W. Bush and former U.S. Attorney Paul Charlton, also a Republican, Willimann said he believes it was orchestrated by Democrats to oust a GOP incumbent.

"This is purely political," he said. "Renzi did nothing wrong here. … I think the government is in (cover-up) mode. They've got a tiger by the tail, and they didn't realize the tail was long enough for Mr. Renzi to turn around and bite them."

A Justice Department spokesman declined comment.

Controversial mine plan

Richard George Renzi, an insurance and real-estate entrepreneur who also owned a southern Arizona vineyard, was elected to Arizona's 1st Congressional District in 2002, the year he got his law degree. He was viewed as a conservative Catholic with 12 kids and a wide-open political future.

In 2005, Resolution Copper Mining was seeking to trade about 5,000acres of private property for 2,400acres of government land near Superior -- a parcel containing one of America's richest remaining copper deposits. Mining plans call for excavation up to 7,000feet underground to exploit an estimated $61billion in ore, providing 3,700 jobs.

Such real-estate swaps require congressional approval.

According to prosecutors, Renzi vowed to block legislation unless Resolution purchased and included a 480-acre alfalfa field from business associate James Sandlin, who owed him money. On the other hand, if Sandlin's property was part of the deal, Renzi ensured approval, according to prosecutors.

Sandlin, convicted by a Texas jury in 2008 on related charges of filing false financial information, is going to trial on Tuesday with Renzi to face additional charges. His attorney did not respond to an interview request.

The indictment says Resolution balked at Renzi's extortion attempt. A group of other speculators, including former Arizona governor and ex-Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt, then bought Sandlin's land and agreed to make it part of the exchange, according to the indictment, and Renzi introduced legislation to authorize the deal.

That bill died after FBI agents raided Renzi's home and news leaked of a possible indictment. It is impossible to say whether the scandal damaged future prospects for the controversial land swap. However, 11 bills have failed in Congress so far, opposed by some conservation groups, the Apache tribe and Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz..

In December, Resolution announced that it was dismissing 400 workers and essentially abandoning the project.

Two months later, Arizona's congressional delegation offered a 12th version of the land-exchange bill. That, too, appears to be stalled.

Grijalva said he has repeatedly voted against the project because Resolution and its congressional sponsors will not agree to an environmental review and a more careful valuation of the copper reserves before the deal is struck. He said the Superior mine could have severe ecological impacts but would be nearly impossible to stop if land is transferred into private ownership.

Grijalva said Renzi's trial may bring out more information about the land-exchange deal and the mining company's role.

"It puts Resolution Copper front and center," he said. "I think there's some exposure that's going to happen. … And I believe the asset in the ground -- the copper -- is worth much, much more than the trade we're getting."

Grijalva and others said Resolution officials have been portrayed as "white hats" -- good guys who blew the whistle on corruption -- but Renzi's defense attorneys likely will challenge their motives and credibility.

"This trial is as much a difficult situation for the company as it is for Renzi," he said. "The defense is going to be vigorous, and it has to be against the company."

Resolution Copper has been represented by lobbyist Ron Ober, a longtime Democratic Party operative who once served as chief of staff for former Sen. Dennis DeConcini, D-Ariz. Ober works with public-relations specialist Troy Corder, a former staffer for Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and former Arizona Govs. Fife Symington and Jane Dee Hull.

Neither Ober nor Corder would comment on the Renzi trial or its impact on the planned copper project in Superior.

Jennifer Russo, director of communications at Resolution's parent company, Rio Tinto Copper Group, said the land-swap bill was affected by Renzi's controversy while he was in office, but today's legislation is moving forward with bipartisan support. She emphasized that, in the criminal case, Resolution "did nothing wrong and is a cooperating government witness."

If a land swap is approved, Russo said, a full environmental report will be completed before mining gets under way.

"We are pleased with the progress being made in the 113th Congress," she added, "and we are working through all issues and concerns that have been raised."

Reach the reporter at dennis .wagner@arizonarepublic.com.

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