McCain official responds to Palin charge
Posted: Thursday, November 12, 2009 7:12 PM by Mark Murray
Filed Under:
Sarah Palin
From NBC's Mark Murray
In her new book, according to the Associated Press, Sarah Palin alleges that the McCain campaign gave her a $500,000 bill to pay for the campaign vetting her for the VP nod. She also makes the charge that the McCain camp said they would have paid all the bills had they won, but since they lost, the bills were her responsibility.
A senior McCain campaign official tells First Read that Palin's charge isn't true. The $500,000 charge came from Palin attorney Thomas Van Flein, and much of it had to do with Van Flein's work on the infamous Troopergate investigation that began before McCain selected her as his VP.
This senior McCain campaign official says they considered the $500,000 bill from Palin's lawyer to be exorbitant -- plus, even if they wanted to, they couldn't use their general-election funds to pay for it (remember that McCain accepted some $84 million in federal funds for the general election).
"Everyone thought it was ridiculous," the senior McCain official tells First Read.
*** UPDATE *** The AP originally reported that the bill Palin said she received for the VP vetting was $500,000. But in a later write-through, the AP changed it to "one-tenth of the $500,000 was a bill she received to pay for the McCain campaign vetting her for the VP nod." So approximately $50,000...
Marc Ambinder has more. "The McCain campaign footed the bill for Art Culvahouse's investigation of Palin before she was elected. Palin was urged by campaign lawyers to set up a legal defense fund to pay for the investigations and ethics complaints that had nothing to do with her presidential bid. 'I can confirm that she was not billed for any vetting costs by the campaign,' said Trevor Potter, the campaign's general counsel. 'I do not know if she was billed by her own lawyer for his assistance to her in the vetting process, but from the excerpt that has been read to me by the AP, it sounds as if that is what she is describing.'"
