AUSTIN, Texas — When a judge said last month that a political committee founded by House Majority Leader Tom DeLay had broken the law by failing to report $500,000 in donations, the Texas congressman distanced himself from the matter.
DeLay's representatives insisted that he was a mere figurehead of the committee, Texans for a Republican Majority. He had no control over its day-to-day operation, they said, and his lawyer dismissed suggestions of impropriety as "outlandish."
But in summer 2002, a crucial period of fundraising and activism for the committee, DeLay stepped off an airplane in Austin and received a list of people who were to attend a fundraiser billed as "a private meeting with Tom DeLay." Three days earlier, a Texans for a Republican Majority staffer had e-mailed three other DeLay associates to ask for the list.
"Have that on the ground in Austin for T.D.," he wrote.
The 11 lobbyists and executives on the roster had an ambitious wish list in Austin and Washington. Among them were representatives of the chemical industry, a wheelchair distributor and a powerful Texas law firm with strong ties to the GOP.
A database analysis shows that between 2000 and 2004, the groups represented that day gave at least $323,000 to DeLay's campaigns or political committees, including $77,500 to Texans for a Republican Majority.
None of that money was donated at the meeting itself, and the donations were just a tiny portion of the millions DeLay has helped raise in recent years to dispense to conservative politicians through an innovative operation that has given him rare power in Washington and Texas.
But the roster of attendees, DeLay's interest in the event and the ensuing donations do illuminate the private world where DeLay builds his political base.
The fundraiser was one of several similar events described in GOP activists' files, which were subpoenaed in a lawsuit brought by five Democratic candidates here.
Watchdog groups say the documents suggest that DeLay's involvement in the committee -- which he founded in 2001 using $50,000 provided by a parallel group he had run for years in Washington, Americans for a Republican Majority -- was deeper than he has acknowledged.
In one August 2002 e-mail, for instance, a DeLay fundraiser asked a fellow aide for a "top 10 list" of potential donors to Texans for a Republican Majority. The e-mail said DeLay would personally contact certain prospects. Another exchange suggested that two donor checks would be delivered to DeLay himself.
