Cuban exile leader, Don King among Reid donors

Benjamin Grove

Friday, March 10, 2000 | 11:17 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., took $5,000 last year from a Miami company founded by the late Jorge Mas Canosa, the powerful leader of the America's Cuban exiles and an anti-Castro crusader who rose to prominence making hefty donations to politicians.

Reid, a strong advocate of democracy in Cuba, has been a longtime friend of the Mas family that owns MasTec, a large telecommunications company, a company spokesman said. Mas died at 58 in 1997, and Jorge Mas Jr. is now a company leader.

"His father (Jorge Mas) was a very good friend of Sen. Reid before his passing," MasTec spokesman Fernando Rojas said. "There continues to be a close personal friendship because of (Reid's) support for the fundamental values of freedom, democracy and human rights."

MasTec was one of 51 donors who in 1999 contributed $301,150 in unregulated and unrestricted "soft money" to Reid's Searchlight Leadership Fund political action committee, which funnels much of the money to Reid's political allies in Nevada.

Reid voluntarily released the list of donors earlier this week after weathering some criticism for keeping it under wraps.

Reid was not legally required to disclose the soft money donors. Soft money is not subject to the same federal rules as other "hard money" donations that are used to help candidates in federal races.

Reid, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate and an Appropriations Committee member, is one of 43 known members of Congress who keep soft money accounts, but among the few to disclose donor names.

Reid's largest donation, $50,000, came from fiery boxing promoter Don King, a regular contributor to Reid. Promoter Bob Arum's Top Rank Boxing gave Reid $10,000.

Legislation is pending in Congress that would loosen the relationships between promoters and fighters. Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., who co-sponsored the bill with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has said "unscrupulous" promoters are tarnishing the sport.

"He makes a lot of contributions to a lot of different people," Don King Productions spokesman Greg Fritz said. "Some are Democrats and some are Republicans. There is really no special reason he gave money to Sen. Reid except he supports what he is doing."

Fritz said King gives "literally millions" of dollars to charities and political candidates.

A closer look at Reid's donor list reveals that he took $10,000 from Annapolis, Md.-based Synergics Energy Development, which produces some of the world's hydroelectric power and is trying to expand in India and Pakistan. Reid recently has become a player in U.S. relations between the two rival nations.

The senator visited both countries in January to promote peace negotiations, discuss nuclear weapons testing and make a case for more U.S. business in the nations.

Synergics officials said much of India suffers from blackouts because of energy shortages, due much in part to reliance on coal. They believe hydroelectric power is key to the future for India and Pakistan.

"That's our pitch: You're talking about clean, renewable energy," said David Carroll, Synergics' director of governmental relations. "That's something we have been working on with (President Clinton)."

Carroll added that Synergics has two projects in Nevada, one at Lake Lahontan near Fallon in Northern Nevada and one planned for the Blue Diamond area southwest of Las Vegas. Carroll also said a former company official with Voith, the international parent company of Synergics, is a friend of the father-in-law of Paul DiNino, Reid's political director.

The second largest Reid donation came from Metabolife International, a San Diego-based herbal diet pill maker, which gave Reid $25,000. The company gave the same sum to first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is running for the Senate in New York.

The company has been the target of critics who say its diet pill Metabolife 356 should have more explicit warning labels because the product's active ingredient ephedra, a stimulant chemical cousin of an ingredient in methamphetamine, may contribute to heart attacks and strokes.

A company representative said Metabolife had given money to both political parties and about 25 individual politicians. The 6-year-old company is trying to get to know key members of Congress through donations, but no one has ever talked about specific company issues with Reid, said Garry Mauro, an attorney for the company.

"He doesn't sit on any committees that matter to us," Mauro said. "If we ever have any problems, we can go to him and he'll know who we are. We don't anticipate anything."

Henderson developer Phyllis Thompson gave Reid $15,000, his third largest donation. Anderson Dairy was fourth on the list, giving Reid $12,000. The company was counting on Reid and Bryan last year to pull Anderson out of a dairy agreement hammered out in Congress that would have hurt the company.

"That was a good example of the good we feel he has done fighting for the state," Anderson vice president Dave Coon said. "But even beyond that, his positions on nuclear waste and other issues happen to be the same as our positions. He's always been our friend."

Anderson has been a Reid supporter since Reid's earliest days in politics, Coon said.

Other donors to Reid's political action committee include:

Companies with heavy Nevada interests, such as gold mining giant Barrick Goldstrike ($10,000); power company Sierra Pacific ($10,000); cable company Telecommunications Inc, or TCI ($10,000).

Gaming and hotel companies Boyd Gaming Corp. ($5,000); Caesars ($5,000); Marriott ($5,000); Lake Las Vegas Resort ($5,000); Las Vegas Tropicana ($5,000).

Las Vegas real estate broker Focus Commercial Group ($5,000); and Bechtel ($2,000), an international engineering firm with major projects at Yucca Mountain and the Nevada Test Site.

Alcoholic drink maker Bacardi-Martin USA ($5,000); soft drink maker Ocean Spray Cranberries Inc. ($5,000).

National law firms Verner Liipfert ($5,000) and Greenberg, Traurig ($2,500).