Surveillance Video Surfaces in FBI Debate Probe

W A S H I N G T O N, Sept. 27, 2000 -- — FBI agents investigating the mysterious delivery of GOP presidential candidate George W. Bush’s secret debate prep material to Democratic rival Al Gore’s camp have questioned a woman about a trip to the post office that was captured by surveillance cameras.

According to law enforcement sources, the FBI obtained the surveillance videotape from a post office in Austin, Texas, also home to the Bush campaign headquarters.

The tape shows Yvette Lozano, a low-level aide to Bush media consultant Mark McKinnon, with a package on Sept. 11 — the same date found on the postmark of the package mailed to a Gore campaign adviser.

Nice Pants

Lozano, who was fingerprinted and interviewed by the FBI, says the package contained a pair of pants she was mailing back to The Gap for McKinnon. He backs her story.

“It’s a terrible, unfortunate coincidence,” McKinnon said today on ABCNEWS’ Good Morning America. “They’re targeting a young, innocent woman whose only mistake was to mail a package for me to get some pants.”

Holding up the package he said contained the pants he received in exchange from The Gap, McKinnon added, “We are absolutely positive, absolutely, that she was not mailing the package in question. It was this package.”

Lozano may have fallen under suspicion because both she and McKinnon have a history of helping Democrats. Lozano worked for former Texas Goo. Ann Richards, whom Bush unseated, and state Rep. Vilma Luna. McKinnon, who runs Maverick Media consulting in Austin, also worked for Richards as well as other Democrats before signing on with the Bush team.

McKinnon said he gave the FBI his credit card information so agents can track the package and corroborate their story. And both McKinnon and Lozano have offered to take a lie detector test.

Bush Camp, FBI Clash

The Bush campaign is crying foul, accusing the Clinton administration of interfering with the inquiry.

“Someone in power in Washington … has leaked erroneous information implicating a young woman who is innocent,” Bush spokeswoman Karen Hughes told reporters in Los Angeles on Tuesday. “This causes us to seriously question whether the FBI is being allowed to do its job and actually investigate or whether someone in Washington is playing politics with this investigation.”

“They’re a professional law enforcement agency,” responded Gore spokesman Chris Lehane. “We’re very, very comfortable having the FBI take up this investigation. For some reason, the Bush campaign does not seem to be very comfortable with the FBI.”

Saying the investigation was tilted against Bush associates, Hughes demanded the FBI focus more on the Gore team.

“The only people interested in taking Governor Bush’s tapes and helping Al Gore are people who support Al Gore,” Hughes insisted, “not people who work for Governor Bush.”

On Friday, law enforcement sources told ABCNEWS the person believed to be responsible for sending the materials was employed by an outside firm working for the Bush campaign.

“I will tell you, it’s not one of my supporters,” Bush said Tuesday on CNN’s Larry King Live. “Somebody who is for me is not going to be sending tapes to the Gore campaign.”

McKinnon called suggestions that the materials were mailed intentionally by the Bush campaign in order to embarrass Gore and allow the Texas governor to withdraw from the upcoming presidential debates “outrageous.”

“That’s just absurd,” he said. “[That] we were doing this because we were trying to blow off the debates is just an outrageous notion.”

“That’s a question we should let the FBI handle,” Lehane said when asked about the theory today.

After placing several calls to the FBI to register concerns about the investigation, Bush campaign manager Joe Allbaugh spoke to FBI Director Louis Freeh for the first time on Tuesday. Campaign sources said Freeh assured Allbaugh he was taking an intense personal interest in the case.

On Sept. 13, Tom Downey, a former congressman who was set to play the role of Bush in Gore’s mock debates, received a mailed package containing a secret tape and documents related to Bush’s debate preparations. Downey said he quickly turned the materials over to the FBI.

The package had an Austin postmark and return address.

Law enforcement sources told ABCNEWS they are talking to anybody who might know anything about the tape — regardless of whether they are Republicans or Democrats. Agents have contacted people associated with both the Bush and Gore campaigns.

“I believe that we are going to get to the bottom of it,” Bush said Tuesday. “And I look forward to finding out who it is.”

Aides to the vice president say they are cooperating fully with the investigation.

“I think at this point, we just get out of the way,” said one Gore adviser.

Mole at Large?

Tuesday, Hughes also sought to link the episode to the recent suspension of a Gore campaign staff member who bragged he knew of a “mole” in the Bush camp but then retracted his initial statement after being questioned by ABCNEWS.

“The Gore campaign has obviously had a problem because they have had to suspend one of their employees for boasting about the presence of a mole,” Hughes said.

“I think the man ought to tell us who it is,” said Bush on Larry King Live. “I would like to know who it is.”

There is no indication that the two matters are related.

ABCNEWS’ Mark Halperin, John Berman, Ariane DeVogue, Beverley Lumpkin and Brian Hartman contributed to this report.