to billionaire Tom Hicks?

Puppet for Bush, Partners

While on paper the Arlington Sports Facilities Development Authority was a public entity, in practice it was merely a puppet for Bush and his partners. According to documents obtained by the Center for Public Integrity, the owners would identify the land they wanted to acquire. A Rangers owner, Mike Reilly, a Realtor, would then offer to buy the parcels for prices he set, which in several cases were well below what the owners believed their property was worth. If the landowners refused to sell to the Rangers at the offered price, the Arlington Sports Facilities Development Authority could take possession of their land and leave the price to be determined in court.

Several of the landowners took the authority to court over the seizures and won settlements totaling $11 million. In a final insult to taxpayers, the Rangers resisted paying the settlements, trying to pass off yet another cost to Arlington residents. (The Rangers, under new ownership, finally agreed to pay up last year.)

When confronted with the seamy details of the land grab, Bush professed ignorance. But Schieffer, the team’s former president, has testified that he kept Bush aware of the land transfers. In October 1990, Bush also let this slip to a reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram: “The idea of making a land play, absolutely, to plunk the field down in the middle of a big piece of land, that’s kind of always been the strategy.”

It was a strategy that would have an enormous payoff for Bush personally.

After he became governor of Texas, Bush put his all of his assets into a blind trust, with one notable exception: his stake in the Rangers. Schieffer kept Bush apprised of the owner’s efforts to sell the team to Thomas O. Hicks, the chairman of Hicks, Muse, Tate and Furst, Inc., a firm that specializes in leveraged buyouts and until recently owned AMFM, Inc., the nation’s largest chain of radio stations. Hicks and employees of his companies are Bush’s No. 4 career patron, having given him at least $290,400.

In 1998, Hicks helped provide Bush with an even greater windfall. He bought the Texas Rangers for $250 million, three times what Bush and his partners had paid 10 years earlier. The new stadium and the real estate around it greatly boosted the final sale price. And, since his partners had upped Bush’s stake in the team from 1.8 to 11.8 percent, his cut from the proceeds of the sale was $14.9 million, a 25-fold return on his investment of $606,302. Rainwater, who had put far more money into the team than Bush, made $25 million.

Just as important as the cash, however, was the cachet that came with the deal’s success. The Ballpark at Arlington finally opened in April 1994, just as Bush was running for governor. He touted the new stadium as a win-win proposition for taxpayers and the team. “Am I going to benefit off it financially?” he asked reporters. He answered his own question : “I hope so.” Four years later, everyone would know by how much.

Excerpted from The Buying of the President 2000 (Avon), by Charles Lewis and the Center for Public Integrity. Annys Shin contributed substantially to this report while a senior associate with the Center.

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