Brazile Spread Rumor About Former President Bush

WASHINGTON -- When running for president, Michael S. Dukakis fired campaign aide Donna Brazile, who later became Al Gore's campaign manager, for spreading a rumor that then-Vice President George H.W. Bush was having an affair with his executive assistant, according to a new book by Bush's daughter, Doro Bush Koch.

Only a few news accounts in 1999 mentioned the firing of Donna Brazile, now a Democratic strategist, for spreading the rumor about Bush and Jennifer Fitzgerald, Bush's executive assistant when he was chief liaison to China and later director of Central Intelligence. Asked about the rumor back then, George H.W. Bush told Newsweek in June 1987, "The answer to the Big ‘A' question is N-O." Koch's account is the first to quote Dukakis himself about the incident. "To hell with that," Dukakis told Koch. "I just said, ‘Look, we're not going to have any part of that.'"

"I love that he [Dukakis] fired her, and that he wasn't going to stand for that," Doro Koch said in a NewsMax interview. "And one of the funny things that happened to me, and I didn't interview her for the book because I just didn't have time, but I bumped into Donna Brazile one day. And she came up to me and she said — this is so typical of my dad — she said, ‘I love your father!' I said, ‘Really?' And she said, ‘Your dad, he forgave me for all that, and I'd do anything for him. Do you want me to write a blurb for the book?'"

That footnote did not appear in the book, which is being published this week by Warner Books.

As Koch tells it, the idea for her book came from Patty Presock, perhaps former President Bush's closest assistant in the White House. Presock kept separate files for some of Bush's most personal correspondence and notes, with the idea that they might someday form the basis for a book.

"Patty and I, we're close and everything; but she never told me, or told Dad, so it was a big surprise when she mentioned it to Dad one day and then Dad e-mailed me with this idea," Koch said. That was March 2005. "And meanwhile, I was looking for a project. I had just come off the campaign, and I didn't know what I was going to do, but I wanted to do something. I run the Barbara Bush Foundation, but that's sort of part time. I love doing it, but I wanted to do a little more, and this sort of came up."

Koch, who lives in suburban Maryland, spent most of the summer of 2005 with her parents in Kennebunkport, Maine, gathering material. Her mother Barbara wrote a forward to the book. Her sister-in-law, Tricia Reilly Koch, helped with research and accompanied her on interviews.

For the first time,

"My dad is a relationships guy," Koch said. "He still maintains a really good relationship with Gov. Sununu, which I think is amazing. I mean people whom basically Dad has had to fire, and they still love my dad."

The book says that when Ronald Reagan was undergoing surgery, presidential power was temporarily transferred to Bush, who was vice president. During that time, Bush stumbled and momentarily blacked out while playing tennis, leaving the country without a president for a few seconds.

Asked if her father regretted anything, Koch said, "He regretted saying ‘Read my lips — no new taxes.' Then he had to go ahead and agree to a deal that would raise taxes for the good of the American people, but to his own political peril."

She said Bush felt that if he had had the communication skills of a Ronald Reagan, he might have been able to explain his decision better.

Asked what her father was proud of, Koch said, "Dad is not someone who will tell you, ‘Well, I'm most proud of this.' But I think Dad is very proud of ushering in the end of the Cold War without a conflict. And to this day, he maintains all these relationships with world leaders and people he knew when he was president, and I'm sure he's proud of that."

Koch said her father has chosen not to write an autobiography because, rather than looking back, he's always looking for the next project.

"His mother taught him a lot of the very basic lessons in life," Koch said. "And one of them was, ‘Don't talk about yourself.' I think that must have had something to do with it."

Despite being a politician, Koch said, "My dad has sort of maintained his moral compass throughout and has been able to hold on to what's important in life. Obviously, going in I admired him. But coming out of it, I admire him just tenfold. Lou Gehrig, who said he was the luckiest man on the face of the earth, is my dad's hero. And my dad feels that way as well."

103-103-112-103