Ruling Targets DeLay Fundraising Arm

Texas District Judge Joseph Hart determined that the treasurer, Bill Ceverha, must pay five Democratic candidates who lost their elections a combined $196,660 in damages.

The ruling marks the first time -- amid a flood of lawsuits and criminal investigations surrounding the Republican Party's rapid rise to power in Texas -- that a piece of the GOP's aggressive fundraising operation has been found illegal.

"It won't be the last," said Craig McDonald, director of Texans for Public Justice, a nonpartisan group that fights the influence of money in politics. He said the ruling showed that Republican activists "blatantly violated Texas law," which banned corporate contributions to legislative candidates.

Hart's decision, which came in a lawsuit brought by the Democratic candidates, added to the pressure on DeLay, under siege for ethics problems and questions about his relationships with lobbyists.

But Bobby Burchfield, DeLay's attorney in Washington, dismissed the lawsuit as part of a left-wing "jihad" against DeLay. DeLay was not a defendant in the suit, and Burchfield noted that his name was nowhere to be found in the judge's decision.

"It is outlandish to suggest that this decision could implicate him," Burchfield said.

Ceverha's attorney, Terry Scarborough, said his client would appeal. He said Ceverha was "exercising his constitutional rights of freedom of speech and freedom of association."

Ceverha, a prominent GOP consultant and one of President Bush's top fundraisers, is treasurer of Texans for a Republican Majority, a political action committee founded by DeLay in 2001. The group is an arm of DeLay's Americans for a Republican Majority, which assists in the election of conservative politicians.

Reverberations from the 2002 election cycle in Texas hit Congress two years later.

Republicans, long the minority here, took control of both houses of the Legislature in 2002 -- they already held the governorship. At DeLay's urging, lawmakers seized upon their victories to redraw congressional districts. Last year, the new maps gave the GOP a net gain of six seats in the Texas congressional delegation -- helping to cement the party's control of Congress.