Grandpa Sam goes to Washington...

Di worked as a nanny in San Francisco for the Fox family. Great family. They came to our wedding and everything. Grandpa Fox, Sam, is a very rich and powerful player on the political stage. Grandpa Sam has recently been in the news...

The White House announced this morning that it was withdrawing the nomination of Sam Fox of Clayton, Mo., to become ambassador to Belgium amid controversy over Fox’s financial support for Swift Boat Veterans for Truth in the 2004 presidential campaign.

The White House issued its statement with no explanation a half-hour before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was scheduled to vote on Fox’s nomination.

Fox, a wealthy businessman and one of the national GOP’s most reliable political donors, contributed $50,000 in the last election to the group that vigorously attacked Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic nominee, alleging that Kerry did not deserve the medals he had won after his service in Vietnam.

Kerry allies branded the campaign a smear and some Democrats believe that it cost their party the election.

Kerry, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, aggressively questioned Fox about the contribution as well as about European politics during Fox’s initial appearance in front of the committee last month.

Kerry said this morning: “Sam Fox had every opportunity to disavow the politics of personal destruction and to embrace the truth. He chose not to. The White House made the right decision to withdraw the nomination. I hope this signals a new day in political discourse.”


Sen. Christopher "Kit" Bond, R-Mo., said he was very disappointed, especially given Fox’s sterling reputation in Missouri. "The man is extremely well-respected in the community, very generous and gives to a lot of problems."

Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., also spoke critically of Fox during the hearing and Tuesday, Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., declared Tuesday that he would oppose Fox’s nomination.

Obama said this morning that he had "serious concerns about Mr. Fox’s candor, judgment and qualifications for this important post, and I am pleased that the Bush administration acknowledged that it would not be able to muster the votes to confirm his nomination."

Former Navy veterans who served with Kerry had initiated an anti-Fox campaign, sending letters to Capitol Hill and making appeals to members, among them Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.

"The bottom line is that what was done to Kerry was unconscionable. I served with John Kerry; I know what he was made of," Wade Sanders, a former assistant secretary of the Navy, said in an interview with the Post-Dispatch this week.

McCaskill and Bond said they had not wavered in their backing of Fox.

Fox, 77, who is national chairman of the Jewish Republican Coalition, has contributed over $1 million to Republican campaigns since the 1990s.

When Kerry pressed him on the contributions to the Swift Boat group, Fox declined to apologize or to explain in a fashion that mollified Kerry and others on the committee.

"When I’m asked, I just generally give," Fox said at the time.

By Bill Lambrecht
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
03/28/2007