Barack Obama, shown here speaking at a roundtable discussion on predatory lending in Chicago Wednesday, has parted ways with an adviser who was vetting his potential running mates. (AP Photo)
Longtime Washington insider Jim Johnson became the first casualty of the general election campaign Wednesday, leaving his seat on Barack Obama’s running-mate search team after coming under fire for his lucrative ties to financial corporations and lenders.
Johnson, a former Fannie Mae CEO who also helped vet running mates for Walter Mondale in 1984 and John Kerry in 2004, stepped down following reports that he received favorable loan terms from a mortgage lender that Obama has criticized sharply on the campaign trail.
“Jim did not want to distract in any way from the very important task of gathering information about my vice presidential nominee, so he has made a decision to step aside that I accept,” Obama said in a statement issued after three days of criticism.
Though there appears to have been nothing illegal about Johnson’s actions, John McCain’s campaign has used his prominent role in the Obama campaign to portray the presumptive Democratic nominee as hypocritical.
And when Johnson stepped down Wednesday, the McCain campaign attacked Obama for caving to pressure.
“Jim Johnson’s resignation raises serious questions about Barack Obama’s judgment,” spokesman Tucker Bounds said in a statement, adding “the American people have reason to question the judgment of a candidate who has shown he will only make the right call when under pressure from the news media. America can’t afford a president who flip-flops on key questions in the course of 24 hours.”
The crossfire portends the scrutiny that every campaign aide or adviser easily could face in the months leading to the November election.
During the Democratic primary, Obama and Hillary Clinton each waved goodbye to several aides and advisers who in some way had offended the other side. Obama foreign policy adviser Samantha Power left after calling Clinton a “monster” in an interview with a Scottish newspaper. Geraldine Ferraro, a former vice presidential candidate, left her seat on Clinton’s finance team after saying Obama was being aided politically by his race.
The general election campaign formally began last week, when Obama clinched the Democratic nomination, and Johnson swiftly became an early target of Republicans.
The Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend that Johnson received favorable loan terms from lender Countrywide Financial Corp., a firm Obama has criticized for contributing to the home mortgage crisis. That report opened the door for several other reports, including by The Washington Post and The New York Times, which revisited Johnson’s history with Fannie Mae before the company drew the scrutiny of regulators and his role on several boards granting hefty payouts to CEOs.
Don’t expect Johnson’s exit to end criticism about either candidate’s campaign team.
The Republican National Committee released a statement Wednesday saying, “If Barack Obama is concerned his campaign’s ties to special interests are distracting from his VP search and message, why is Eric Holder still on his search committee?”
Holder, a former deputy attorney general, has come under fire by Republicans for his role in helping fugitive financier Marc Rich get a pardon from President Clinton. He is still on the running-mate search team for Obama along with Caroline Kennedy.
Obama’s campaign in turn issued a fiery counterattack on McCain, criticizing him for keeping lobbyists and former lobbyists close.
In recent weeks, McCain has endured a mini-staffing purge, getting rid of campaign operatives whose lobbying ties had come to the surface.
“We don’t need any lectures from a campaign that waited 15 months to purge the lobbyists from their staff,” Obama spokesman Bill Burton said. “It’s too bad their campaign is still rife with lobbyist influence and doesn’t see a similar ‘perception problem’ with the man currently running their own vice presidential selection process.”
The campaign was referring to Arthur Culvahouse, a former Reagan official and former lobbyist who is advising McCain in his running-mate hunt.
Meanwhile, Johnson continued to garner kind words from Democrats on Wednesday, despite his exit from the Obama campaign.
“We have a very good selection process underway, and I am confident that it will produce a number of highly qualified candidates for me to choose from in the weeks ahead. I remain grateful to Jim for his service and his efforts in this process,” Obama said in his statement.
Kerry, speaking with reporters on a conference call Wednesday, praised Johnson for the work he did four years ago and said the criticism is just “one of those … Washington grab stories.”
“Jim Johnson is a very experienced, very discreet, very capable individual who is performing a voluntary function without pay … he’s not seeking a job,” Kerry said.
“Jim Johnson is a capable guy. He has been vetting VPs for a while,” Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean told MSNBC on Wednesday. He said Johnson just was doing a volunteer job, and “this is nothing to do with special interests and influence in the campaign, unlike John McCain.”
After McCain on Monday called the Johnson connection a “contradiction” for Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee told reporters he can’t be expected to track down the mortgage history of his search committee members.
“I would have to hire the vetter to vet the vetters,” Obama said in St. Louis, Mo., on Tuesday, adding that Johnson was not technically working for him since he was an unpaid volunteer.
Obama strategist David Axelrod repeated that argument in an interview Wednesday morning.
“We honestly didn’t ask him for his mortgage statements of his financials and I don’t think anyone would expect us to,” he told MSNBC. “We can’t vet all the vetters.”
McCain’s campaign went after Obama on Tuesday for being “in a state of denial” about Johnson’s role in the campaign and his past taking “sweetheart deals” from Countrywide.
FOX News’ Bonney Kapp and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Johnson, a former Fannie Mae CEO who also helped vet running mates for Walter Mondale in 1984 and John Kerry in 2004, stepped down following reports that he received favorable loan terms from a mortgage lender that Obama has criticized sharply on the campaign trail.
“Jim did not want to distract in any way from the very important task of gathering information about my vice presidential nominee, so he has made a decision to step aside that I accept,” Obama said in a statement issued after three days of criticism.
Though there appears to have been nothing illegal about Johnson’s actions, John McCain’s campaign has used his prominent role in the Obama campaign to portray the presumptive Democratic nominee as hypocritical.
And when Johnson stepped down Wednesday, the McCain campaign attacked Obama for caving to pressure.
“Jim Johnson’s resignation raises serious questions about Barack Obama’s judgment,” spokesman Tucker Bounds said in a statement, adding “the American people have reason to question the judgment of a candidate who has shown he will only make the right call when under pressure from the news media. America can’t afford a president who flip-flops on key questions in the course of 24 hours.”
The crossfire portends the scrutiny that every campaign aide or adviser easily could face in the months leading to the November election.
During the Democratic primary, Obama and Hillary Clinton each waved goodbye to several aides and advisers who in some way had offended the other side. Obama foreign policy adviser Samantha Power left after calling Clinton a “monster” in an interview with a Scottish newspaper. Geraldine Ferraro, a former vice presidential candidate, left her seat on Clinton’s finance team after saying Obama was being aided politically by his race.
The general election campaign formally began last week, when Obama clinched the Democratic nomination, and Johnson swiftly became an early target of Republicans.
The Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend that Johnson received favorable loan terms from lender Countrywide Financial Corp., a firm Obama has criticized for contributing to the home mortgage crisis. That report opened the door for several other reports, including by The Washington Post and The New York Times, which revisited Johnson’s history with Fannie Mae before the company drew the scrutiny of regulators and his role on several boards granting hefty payouts to CEOs.
Don’t expect Johnson’s exit to end criticism about either candidate’s campaign team.
The Republican National Committee released a statement Wednesday saying, “If Barack Obama is concerned his campaign’s ties to special interests are distracting from his VP search and message, why is Eric Holder still on his search committee?”
Holder, a former deputy attorney general, has come under fire by Republicans for his role in helping fugitive financier Marc Rich get a pardon from President Clinton. He is still on the running-mate search team for Obama along with Caroline Kennedy.
Obama’s campaign in turn issued a fiery counterattack on McCain, criticizing him for keeping lobbyists and former lobbyists close.
In recent weeks, McCain has endured a mini-staffing purge, getting rid of campaign operatives whose lobbying ties had come to the surface.
“We don’t need any lectures from a campaign that waited 15 months to purge the lobbyists from their staff,” Obama spokesman Bill Burton said. “It’s too bad their campaign is still rife with lobbyist influence and doesn’t see a similar ‘perception problem’ with the man currently running their own vice presidential selection process.”
The campaign was referring to Arthur Culvahouse, a former Reagan official and former lobbyist who is advising McCain in his running-mate hunt.
Meanwhile, Johnson continued to garner kind words from Democrats on Wednesday, despite his exit from the Obama campaign.
“We have a very good selection process underway, and I am confident that it will produce a number of highly qualified candidates for me to choose from in the weeks ahead. I remain grateful to Jim for his service and his efforts in this process,” Obama said in his statement.
Kerry, speaking with reporters on a conference call Wednesday, praised Johnson for the work he did four years ago and said the criticism is just “one of those … Washington grab stories.”
“Jim Johnson is a very experienced, very discreet, very capable individual who is performing a voluntary function without pay … he’s not seeking a job,” Kerry said.
“Jim Johnson is a capable guy. He has been vetting VPs for a while,” Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean told MSNBC on Wednesday. He said Johnson just was doing a volunteer job, and “this is nothing to do with special interests and influence in the campaign, unlike John McCain.”
After McCain on Monday called the Johnson connection a “contradiction” for Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee told reporters he can’t be expected to track down the mortgage history of his search committee members.
“I would have to hire the vetter to vet the vetters,” Obama said in St. Louis, Mo., on Tuesday, adding that Johnson was not technically working for him since he was an unpaid volunteer.
Obama strategist David Axelrod repeated that argument in an interview Wednesday morning.
“We honestly didn’t ask him for his mortgage statements of his financials and I don’t think anyone would expect us to,” he told MSNBC. “We can’t vet all the vetters.”
McCain’s campaign went after Obama on Tuesday for being “in a state of denial” about Johnson’s role in the campaign and his past taking “sweetheart deals” from Countrywide.
FOX News’ Bonney Kapp and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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