Stanford was looking for Washington's embrace

By Randall Mikkelsen

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Texas billionaire Allen Stanford was a newcomer to Washington politics, but he looked to make a splash at last year's Democratic convention and spread money on both sides of the aisle, records show.

Stanford, charged by federal regulators on Tuesday with running a "massive" fraud through his Stanford Financial Group, opened a Washington lobbying office about two years ago, after buying the Washington Research Group, a policy study unit of Charles Schwab & Co in 2005.

The company's lobbying spending rose sharply in 2008 to $2.8 million, on its own and through the lobbying firm Ben Barnes Group, according to records accessed through the Centre for Responsive Politics, which tracks campaign contributions and lobbying.

Stanford donated $4,600 to Barack Obama's presidential campaign that year. One of Stanford's aides, James Davis, who was also charged in the case, donated $2,300 to Republican John McCain a year earlier.

Stanford's political action committee and employees have given more than $2.4 million to parties and candidates for federal office since 1989, nearly two thirds of which went to Democrats, the Centre for Responsive Politics said.

The company also paid $7,441 in 2004 for Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas to visit Antigua, home of Stanford International Bank, according to watchdog Legistorm.

The company's website features a video of Stanford delivering welcoming comments at a glittery event his company helped sponsor in conjunction with the Democratic national convention in Denver last year.

The video showed former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and then-Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean appearing at the event, a bipartisan seminar conducted every four years by the nonprofit National Democratic Institute.