Casino Bid Prompted High-Stakes Lobbying

Norton's aides contacted Dobson's group to calm things down, the former official said, and told it that whatever the decision, the Jenas would need to clear more hurdles before opening a casino.

Help on the Hill

In addition to the grass-roots pressure on Interior, Abramoff and his lobbying team sought allies on Capitol Hill.

David Vitter, a Republican congressman from Louisiana and longtime gambling foe, wrote a three-page letter in February 2002 to Norton, urging her to reject the Jena compact.

Reed was delighted. He forwarded to Abramoff the details of four telephone calls made by top Vitter supporters to the congressman's staff, lauding his efforts to block the Jenas. "He's feeling the love," Reed wrote in an e-mail to Abramoff.

Reed's Committee Against Gambling Expansion followed up by mailing thousands of postcards to voters praising Vitter. Vitter, who was mulling a run for governor, said he later got the group's permission to use its name in his own phone-banking effort. The gambling furor raised Vitter's political profile, and he went on to win the Senate seat vacated by Democrat John B. Breaux last year.

At the time of the Jena fight, Vitter said, he had no idea that Reed and Abramoff were behind the group or that it was funded with Coushatta casino money. When newspaper stories last summer reported the link, he said, he was "surprised and quite frankly disappointed." Vitter said he never dealt with Abramoff and had met him only once, in passing.

With the March 7 deadline for Interior's decision approaching, Vitter fired off another strong letter to Norton, this one co-signed by 26 House conservatives, as Federici had predicted.

Over the next two weeks, senior members of Congress also weighed in with letters, among them Sens. Thad Cochran and Trent Lott, Mississippi Republicans and longtime supporters of the Mississippi Choctaws who received $68,500 and $27,000, respectively, from Abramoff's lobbying team and tribal clients. Breaux, whose legislative aide, Stephanie Leger Short, had just gone to work for Abramoff as a Coushatta lobbyist, sent Norton a stack of anti-Jena constituent mail. Breaux received $14,250 from the lobbyists and their tribal clients.

On March 6, Poncho, the Coushatta chief, approved cutting 61 checks to members of Congress and their political action committees, some for as much as $25,000, according to tribal and federal election records. The list labeled "Coushatta requests" was prepared by Abramoff, according to tribal representatives. One list provided to The Post by tribal council member David Sickey includes a request for $100,000 for CREA and the notation: "Council for Republican Advocacy (Norton)."

One day later, Interior announced its decision on the Jena casino. Assistant Secretary Neal A. McCaleb said that Louisiana's revenue-sharing proposal amounted to an impermissible tax on the tribe. The casino plan was scuttled.

Second Chance

But the Jenas were not finished. They and their casino development company hired new lobbyists at Patton Boggs LLP. Soon they had a new proposal for a casino in Logansport, La., in a district represented by Rep. Jim McCrery (R).

The Jenas also hired lobbyist Wallace Henderson, former chief of staff to Breaux and then-Rep. W.J. "Billy" Tauzin (R). In early 2003, the two lawmakers shocked the Abramoff lobbying team when they offered the Jenas tacit support.