ABC Reporter Arrested in Denver Taking Pictures of Senators, Big Donors

ABC Reporter Arrested in Denver Taking Pictures of Senators, Big Donors


Asa Eslocker Was Investigating the Role of Lobbyists and Top Donors at the Convention


By BRIAN ROSS
DENVER Aug. 27, 2008
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Police in Denver arrested an ABC News producer today as he and a camera crew were attempting to take pictures on a public sidewalk of Democratic Senators and VIP donors leaving a private meeting at the Brown's Palace Hotel.


http://a.abcnews.com/images/Blotter/..._080827_mn.jpgPolice in Denver arrested an ABC News producer today as he and a camera crew were attempting to take pictures on a public sidewalk of Democratic Senators and VIP donors leaving a private meeting at the Brown's Palace Hotel.
(ABC News)

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Police on the scene refused to tell ABC lawyers the charges against the producer, Asa Eslocker, who works with the ABC News investigative unit.



A police official later told lawyers for ABC News that Eslocker is being charged with trespass, interference, and failure to follow a lawful order. He also said the arrest followed a signed complaint from the Brown Palace Hotel.



Eslocker was put in handcuffs and loaded in the back of a police van which headed for a nearby police station.

Related
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PHOTOS: On the Money Trail at the DNC

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The Money Trail: Putting on the Ritz, VIP Treatment for Big Money Democrats

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More From Brian Ross and the Investigative Team




Video taken at the scene shows a hotel security guard, wearing the uniform of a Boulder County sheriff, ordering Eslocker off the sidewalk in front of the hotel, to the side of the entrance.



The sheriff's officer is seen telling Eslocker the sidewalk is owned by the hotel. Later he is seen pushing Eslocker off the sidewalk into oncoming traffic, forcing him to the other side of the street.




About 15 minutes later, on-duty Denver police arrived and placed Eslocker under arrest after Eslocker asked why he was being ordered away from the front of the hotel. Dozens of pedestrians can be seen walking by the hotel, located in the heart of downtown Denver.



Eslocker and his ABC News colleagues are spending the week investigating the role of corporate lobbyists and wealthy donors at the convention for a series of Money Trail reports on ABC World News with Charles Gibson.

Click Here for the Investigative Homepage.

Here's the story he got arrested for doing....

The Money Trail: Putting on the Ritz, VIP Treatment for Big Money Democrats


Cocktails and Canapés in the Sky Box While Delegates Line Up for $7 Hot Dogs


By BRIAN ROSS, RHONDA SCHWARTZ, AVNI PATEL & ASA ESLOCKER
DENVER Aug. 27, 2008
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While its elected officials say it is the party of "the working people," Democrats are quietly running an elaborate VIP program that rewards wealthy contributors with luxury perks and insider access at the Denver convention, part of what the party calls a "business plan."
http://a.abcnews.com/images/Blotter/..._080827_mn.jpgWealthy members of the "Pelosi 100" attend a private, lavish party Monday night in the penthouse suite of the Denver Performing Arts Center, featuring Tony Bennett, John Legend and James Taylor.


(ABC News)

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Republicans run a similar program for their top donors and the Democrats seem to have learned from it.



"You have helped us put in the business plan for winning elections," Democratic party chairman Howard Dean told donors at a private party this week, attended by an ABC News reporter.



"Without your money none of this happens," Dean said.



Watch the full Money Trail report tonight on ABC's World News with Charles Gibson.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) created the "Pelosi 100" for people "who contribute and raise $100,000 in personal funds," according to documents obtained by ABC News.

Related
http://a.abcnews.com/images/Blotter/..._080825_mc.jpgThe Money Trail: Lobbyists Gone Wild as Obama Remains Silent

http://a.abcnews.com/images/Blotter/..._080825_mc.jpg PHOTOS: On the Money Trail at the DNC

http://a.abcnews.com/images/Internat..._080714_mc.jpgMore From Brian Ross and the Investigative Team


The wealthy members of the "Pelosi 100" attended a private, lavish party Monday night in the penthouse suite of the Denver Performing Arts Center, featuring Tony Bennett, John Legend and James Taylor.



There was a heavy security presence with police telling reporters "no media is allowed," although observers on the balcony of a nearby apartment building could view the scene.



Also included in the $100,000 Pelosi package was "preferred booking" at a top downtown Denver hotel, four convention hall credentials and access to luxury sky boxes overlooking the convention floor.




Last night, the wealthy donors in the sky box watched as Sen. Hillary Clinton praised Barack Obama for knowing "the government must be about we the people, not we the favored few."

Watch Charlie Gibson, Diane Sawyer and George Stephanopoulos at the Democratic Convention - TONIGHT at 10 p.m. ET on ABC

The favored few in the Democratic Finance Committee skybox were treated to an open bar and food in silver chafing dishes.



Delegates outside the closed curtain of the sky box stood in line for $7 hot dogs and were not permitted to bring food to their seats at the Pepsi Center.

Like I said, the security in Denver is about silencing anyone who has something negative and informational about Obama. You are not able to even be heard from where you are required to stay, you cannot pass out literature from the area to any delegate for you are about a mile away from where they will be walking, they won't ever even know that you are there or what your message is unless they get lost or they go off diliberately looking for you. Even when you are stuck in the cage, Obama supporters are riding into the cages to find out what you have to say. Obviously they knew who Eslocker is and what he wanted.

I keep looking at the photo of this man because on my way into a long winding maze of cement blocks looking for the "free speech zone" I interacted with a reporter who looked just like him, who was acting rather sneaky. Actually, that is exactly why I spoke to him. Here was a reporter acting like he was up to something more than just a straight up report. I saw him walking around ahead of me in the last location left for me to hunt for the cages, but as I neared him, he slowed to let me pass. Then he moved to the left of me, yet aimlessly and looking away like one does when he doesn't want to be noticed or recognized. I am 95% sure that this is the same man. I was dressed rather funky since I was on a long walk and didn't want to be taken for being a conservative, just a safety measure since it was likely that I would be walking alone around some unfriendly groups. He may have thought I was one of the dressed down campaign spies. Our exchange was brief.

I asked him if he was going to the "free speech zone" and he said he didn't even know where it was and I remarked that it was "hidden free speech." I pointed about and explained where he couldn't go having already tried several ways to access the area. I asked him where he was from and he told me the network, ABC, I believe. He stood, making it clear that that was not his destination as I continued walking. In leaving his side, I replied, "well, welcome. I'm sure you'll find it pleasant here." lol This might also explain why I was followed by a biker wearing an Obama shirt into my cage.

Hopefully the video is still here. It's already been moved once, but here's tryin':

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=5670682 Wait for the ad to finish.

Anyone with a brain (and allowed to use it) can see that the only 'spin' to be put on this is straight into the ground. (I would have made Guardzilla throw me off the sidewalk. Then I would have sued him, his employer, and the city if they had me arrested.)

Fascinating.... This whole election lends itself to many thoughts of what may come.

You know, Phil, this is the change you can believe in:

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q...TY0ODY=&w=MA==

Barack Obama, Aspiring Commissar
By the Editors

While the Obama coronation proceeds apace in Denver, it is in Chicago that Americans are getting a disturbing demonstration of his thuggish methods of stifling criticism. Stanley Kurtz, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, is a Harvard-educated social anthropologist and frequent contributor to National Review, among other publications. He is widely respected for his meticulous research and measured commentary. For months, he has been doing the job the mainstream media refuses to do: examining the background and public record of Barack Obama, the first-term senator Democrats are about to make their nominee for president despite the shallowness of his experience and achievement.

Kurtz has written extensively, and with characteristic attention to factual detail, about Obama’s early career as a “community organizer,” his cultivation of benefactors in the most radical cauldrons of Chicago politics, his long-time pastor’s immersion in Black Liberation Theology, his ties to anti-American zealots, and the years in the Illinois state legislature this self-styled agent of change spent practicing the by-the-numbers left-wing politics of redistribution and race-consciousness, remaining soft on crime and extreme on abortion.This has led Kurtz, naturally, to scrutinize the relationship between Obama and one of his early political sponsors, William Ayers. Ayers, as we have previously detailed, is a confessed terrorist who, having escaped prosecution due to surveillance violations that came to light during his decade on the lam after a bombing spree, landed an influential professorship in education at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). As he has made clear several times before and after helping to launch Obama’s political career, Ayers remains defiantly proud of bombing the Pentagon, the U.S. Capitol, and other targets. He expresses regret only that he didn’t do more.

Far from abandoning his radical politics, he has simply changed methods: the classroom, rather than the detonator, is now his instrument for campaigning against an America he portrays as racist and imperialist.Obama supporters risibly complain that shining a light on the Obama/Ayers relationship is a “smear” and smacks of “guilt by association.” A presidential candidate’s choice to associate himself with an unrepentant terrorist would be highly relevant in any event — does anyone think the Obamedia would keep mum if John McCain had a long-standing relationship with David Duke or an abortion-clinic bomber? But we are talking about more than a mere “association.” Bluntly, Obama has lied about his relationship with Ayers, whom he now dismisses as “a guy who lives in my neighborhood.” Ayers and Obama have made joint appearances together; they have argued together for “reforms” of the criminal justice system to make it more criminal-friendly; Obama gushed with praise for Ayers’ 1997 polemical book on the Chicago courts; and they sat together for three years on the board of the Woods Fund, a left-wing enterprise that distributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to their ideological allies. Most significant, they worked closely together on the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC).The CAC was a major education reform project, proposed by Ayers, which was underwritten by a $49.2 million grant from the Annenberg Foundation, complemented by another $100 million in private and public funding. The project ran for about five years, beginning in 1995. As the liberal researcher Steve Diamond has recounted, Ayers ran its operational arm, the “Chicago School Reform Collaborative.” Obama, then a 33-year-old, third-year associate at a small law firm, having no executive experience, was brought in to chair the board of directors, which oversaw all “fiscal matters.”

By the time the CAC’s operations were wound down in 2001 it had doled out more than $100 million in grants but had failed to achieve any improvement in the Chicago schools. What little is known about the grants Obama oversaw is troubling. As Diamond relates, one of the first CAC awards in 1995 was $175,000 for the “Small Schools Workshop,” which had been founded by Ayers and was then headed by Mike Klonsky. It was only the beginning of the CAC’s generous funding of Klonsky — a committed Maoist who had been an Ayers comrade in the radical Students for a Democratic Society (the forerunner of Ayers’ Weatherman terrorist organization), and who hosted a “social justice” blog on the Obama campaign website until his writings were hastily purged in June after Diamond called attention to them. The CAC records, said to comprise 70 linear feet of files, have long been maintained at the library of the UIC, the public university where Ayers teaches. This summer, Kurtz made an appointment to review them and, after being assured access, was blocked from seeing them by library administrators, who stammered about needing permission from the “donor” — whom they declined to identify. Kurtz energetically raised public awareness to the stonewalling, and the library finally relented this week. That is, as Barack Obama prepares to accept the Democrats’ nomination tonight, the records of his only significant executive experience just became available for review on Tuesday.Kurtz began his review, and on Wednesday was invited on Milt Rosenberg’s radio program to discuss it.

Rosenberg is a Chicago institution. His program, “Extension 720,” has aired for more than 30 years — a civil forum where knowledgeable guests from across the political spectrum discuss important issues in revealing two-hour interviews. What happened Wednesday night was stunning, as even the normally unflappable Rosenberg observed.The Obama campaign — which has emissaries appearing everywhere — declined Rosenberg’s invitation to have a representative appear on the program and respond to Kurtz’s factual assertions. The campaign did, however, issue an “Obama Action Wire” that encouraged supporters to contact the program (telephone information was provided) and use scripted “talking points” to disrupt Kurtz’s appearance, which it deemed “unacceptable.” As the Politico’s Ben Smith reported, the campaign also urged supporters to demand that Rosenberg scrap the appearance of Kurtz, whom the campaign libeled as a “smear-merchant” and a “slimy character assassin.” The rant was reminiscent of the work of the left-wing media “watch-dog” Media Matters for America.Other than denigrating Kurtz for being conservative, Obama’s operatives have provided no response to the substance of his claims. In their only pretense of engaging him, they accuse him of telling “a flat out lie” that Ayers recruited Obama for the CAC. Though it is a reasonable inference that Ayers recruited Obama, the careful Kurtz has stopped short of making it — observing only that Obama offers no explanation of how he was recruited if not through Ayers, his friend and the CAC’s driving force.The station, WGN, has made a stream of the broadcast available online, here, and it has to be heard to be believed. Obama’s robotic legions dutifully jammed the station’s phone lines and inundated the program with emails, attacking Kurtz personally. Pressed by Rosenberg to specify what inaccuracies Kurtz was guilty of, caller after caller demurred, mulishly railing that “we just want it to stop,” and that criticism of Obama was “just not what we want to hear as Americans.” Remarkably, as Obama sympathizers raced through their script, they echoed the campaign’s insistence that it was Rosenberg who was “lowering the standards of political discourse” by having Kurtz on, rather than the campaign by shouting him down.Kurtz has obviously hit a nerve. It is the same nerve hit by the American Issues Project, whose television ad calling for examination of the Obama/Ayers relationship has prompted the Obama campaign to demand that the Justice Department begin a criminal investigation. Obama fancies himself as “post-partisan.” He is that only in the sense that he apparently brooks no criticism. This episode could be an alarming preview of what life will be like for the media should the party of the Fairness Doctrine gain unified control of the federal government next year.

Here's the email that was sent out prior to the airing:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/chi-ob...,3744149.story

Obama's e-mail about WGN-AM

Text of the e-mail the Obama campaign sent to supporters:

August 28, 2008 In the next few hours, we have a crucial opportunity to fight one of the most cynical and offensive smears ever launched against Barack.

Tonight, WGN radio is giving right-wing hatchet man Stanley Kurtz a forum to air his baseless, fear-mongering terrorist smears. He's currently scheduled to spend a solid two-hour block from 9:00 to 11:00 p.m. pushing lies, distortions, and manipulations about Barack and University of Illinois professor William Ayers.

Tell WGN that by providing Kurtz with airtime, they are legitimizing baseless attacks from a smear-merchant and lowering the standards of political discourse.

Call into the "Extension 720" show with Milt Rosenberg at (312) 591-7200

(Show airs from 9:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. tonight)

Then report back on your call at http://my.barackobama.com/WGNstandards

Kurtz has been using his absurd TV appearances in an awkward and dishonest attempt to play the terrorism card. His current ploy is to embellish the relationship between Barack and Ayers.

Just last night on Fox News, Kurtz drastically exaggerated Barack's connection with Ayers by claiming Ayers had recruited Barack to the board of the Annenberg Challenge. That is completely false and has been disproved in numerous press accounts.

It is absolutely unacceptable that WGN would give a slimy character assassin like Kurtz time for his divisive, destructive ranting on our public airwaves. At the very least, they should offer sane, honest rebuttal to every one of Kurtz's lies.

Kurtz is scheduled to appear from 9:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. in the Chicago market.

Calling will only take a minute, and it will make a huge difference if we nip this smear in the bud. Confront Kurtz tonight before this goes any further:

http://my.barackobama.com/WGNstandards

Please forward this email to everyone you know who can make a call tonight.

Keep fighting the good fight,

Obama Action Wire

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Facts on Barack and William Ayers:

William Ayers was involved with the Weather Underground when Barack Obama was eight years old, and Barack has roundly condemned their actions.

Last night on Fox News, Kurtz tried to radicalize an education reform program in Chicago called the Annenberg Challenge. The Challenge was funded by Republican Walter Annenberg, introduced by Mayor Daley and Republican Governor Jim Edgar, and one of its initiatives was even praised by John McCain.

Kurtz claimed on Fox News that William Ayers recruited Obama to the Annenberg Challenge -- a flat out lie. Ayers did not serve on the board of the Challenge, and he had nothing to do with Barack's recruitment. Some more background on Stanley Kurtz:

Stanley Kurtz Is Tied To Bill Kristol's Conservative Think Tank. Kurtz is a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. The Policy Advisory Board includes: William Kristol. [Bio, policy advisory board, EPPC website, accessed 8/27/08]

Stanley Kurtz Was A Research Fellow At The Hoover Institution. In 2004, Stanley Kurtz was a research fellow at the Hoover Institution. [Boston Globe, 3/10/04]

Stanley Kurtz Claimed That Same Sex Marriage In Denmark Led To A Decline In Marriage Resulting In 60 Percent Of Children Being Born Out Of Wedlock. Stanley Kurtz stated: "Data from European demographers and statistical bureaus show that a majority of children in Sweden and Norway are now born out of wedlock, as are 60 percent of first-born children in Denmark. In socially liberal districts of Norway, where the idea of same-sex registered partnerships is widely accepted, marriage itself has almost entirely disappeared. [Boston Globe, 3/10/04]

Analysis Of Statistics On Marriage In Scandinavia Was Debunked. "Kurtz's argument -- which O'Reilly embraces -- is that when legal rights are accorded to gays, through some unspecified process heterosexual couples begin bearing children out of wedlock and refuse to marry when they otherwise would. There are many government policies that alter the incentives to get and stay married, and thus have direct and unsurprising effects on marriage; for instance, the availability of no-fault divorce leads to more divorces, and laws providing the same rights for cohabitating heterosexual couples as married couples lead to fewer marriages, as couples make private commitments to each other without seeking the imprimatur of the state. But neither Kurtz nor O'Reilly has provided a plausible justification for their belief that extending rights to gay couples harms heterosexual marriage." [Media Matters For America, 6/3/05]

Claimed That The National Nursing Shortage Was The "Fault Of Feminism." In 2002, the Los Angeles Times reported, "Back at National Review Online, contributing editor Stanley Kurtz makes the same point! He, too, says women shouldn't be trying to play by men's rules. Of course he has a slightly different take. According to Kurtz, the national nurse shortage is the fault of feminism, for bringing about "the replacement of a traditional ethic of sacrifice by a post-'60s ethos of self-fulfillment." Kurtz stated at the time "Nursing was once built around a spirit of feminine compassion and sacrifice. In the new, feminist world, that is unacceptable." [Los Angeles Times, 7/21/2002]

Stanley Kurtz Stated That The Harvard Faculty No Confidence Vote In Lawrence Summers Would Cause "Lasting Damage To The Cultural Left." On March 19, 2005, Stanley Kurtz stated on the National Review Online website, "I think the vote of no confidence in Lawrence Summers is a wonderful thing. Harvard continues to discredit itself with the American public. The faculty is trapped. If Summers resigns, this extraordinary example of political correctness will come back to haunt Harvard, and the entire academy, for years. But if Summers hangs on, the faculty itself will have been humiliated -- checked by the very fact of public scrutiny. Either way, Harvard is tearing itself apart. So long as the public simply writes of the academy, the mice can play. But the intense public scrutiny in this case puts the captains of political correctness into a no-win situation. Like the closely watched Susan Estrich fiasco, this battle is doing lasting damage to the cultural left. As they say, sunlight is the best disinfectant." [National Review Online, 3/19/05]

The Obama Action Wire is a grassroots rapid response group for supporters to fight smears, spread the truth, push back on misleading media, and take positive action.

Forward this email to everyone you know or sign up for the Obama Action Wire now. Related links

• Obama vs. WGN radio

Copyright © 2008, Chicago Tribune

http://www.nieuwsbank.nl/en/2008/08/29/v010.htm

ABC News reporter arrested in Denver during the Democratic National ..


Reporters Without Borders


United States28 August 2008

ABC News reporter arrested in Denver during the Democratic National Convention

Reporters Without Borders condemns the arrest of ABC News producer Asa Eslocker on August 27 in downtown Denver and calls on the Denver Police Department to drop all charges against the reporter.

Eslocker had been photographing high-ranking political officials in town for the Democratic National Convention for a story he was preparing on corporate donors and lobbyists. A video posted on ABC News's website shows a Denver sheriff's officer asking Eslocker to move from in front of the Brown Palace Hotel and then pushing him into oncoming traffic after he did not immediately comply. According to ABC News, Denver Police arrived two hours later and arrested Eslocker.

"The use of unnecessary force and the arrest of a journalist who was reporting an important political story is deeply troubling and unacceptable," Reporters Without Borders said. "The attempts at intimidation that were evident in the captured images of Eslocker's arrest simply because he refused to leave a shared, publicly used space reflect negatively on the Denver police and sheriff's departments' commitment to uphold a journalist's right to gather important news."

The Denver Police department has charged Eslocker with trespassing, interference, and refusing to obey a lawful order. He was released after posting a $500 bond.

"We call on the prosecutors to drop all charges against Eslocker," the organization added.

According to ABC News, arresting officers claimed that Eslocker was taken into custody after the Brown Palace Hotel had filed a complaint against him. Officers on the scene reportedly told Eslocker that the sidewalk in front of the hotel where Eslocker had been working was privately owned.

A spokesperson for the hotel told Reporters Without Borders that it does not own the sidewalk.

The spokesperson said that the hotel had requested that Eslocker not obstruct the hotel's entrance, and that he was arrested after refusing several requests from police to stand clear of the doors. It did not file a formal complaint until after the arrest.

When Eslocker refused to move, a sheriff's deputy first physically removed him by forcing him into the street and oncoming traffic. He was arrested two hours later. A video of the arrest shows a police officer grabbing Eslocker by the neck and then twisting his arm behind his back. He is later handcuffed and taken into custody. The same officer who had earlier forced Eslocker off of the sidewalk is also recorded telling the cameraman to stop filming.

"We're going to defend Asa vigorously and his right to do the kind of reporting we were doing," said Jeffrey Schneider, senior vice president of ABC News.

"It would be very troubling to us if Asa was specifically targeted," Schneider said. According to Schneider, on August 26, the day before Eslocker's arrest, an event at the hotel had drawn dozens of reporters and public citizens who had congregated on the same sidewalk, blocking the hotel doors. No arrests were made or complaints expressed.

The hotel spokesperson could not confirm those details.

"We're very troubled that our producer was arrested yesterday simply doing his job on a public sidewalk," Schneider said. "We certainly hope that cooler heads will prevail and that these charges will ultimately be dropped. In the meantime, we're going to continue working hard to expose the confluence of politics and big money."

Eslocker's court date is scheduled for September 25.

On August 25, USA Today videographer Garrett Hubbard was roughed up by a Denver police officer as he was filming a protest that officers were trying to contain. Eslocker is the first journalist reported arrested during the Democratic National Convention.

See ABC News story and watch the video: See the original