The Associated Press continues its long pattern of biased political coverage with this article, which implies that former lobbyist Jack Abramoff gave 11 times more money to Republicans than Democrats:

This week, President Bush said it seemed to him that Abramoff “was an equal money dispenser, that he was giving money to people in both political parties.”

Historically, tribal money had been going to Democrats almost exclusively. Abramoff changed that.

The lobbyist ordered one tribal client to make hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign donations. A list, obtained by The Associated Press, earmarked $90,000 of the money for the Republican Party, none for Democrats.

Of the hundreds of thousands of dollars that Abramoff directed the tribe to donate to congressional campaigns, the Republican-Democrat breakdown was 11-to-1.

As Red State diarist Shiner observes, that’s more than a little misleading. Taking into account all of the contributions controlled by Team Abramoff between 1999 and 2004–not just those funneled through one tribe–Democrats received about half as much money as Republicans. The second-highest recipient was Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) with $131,000. Other Democrat recipients include Sens. Patty Murray ($49,480), Harry Reid ($47,000), Byron Dorgan ($44,050), Tom Daschle (41,750), and Rep. Dick Gephardt ($39,000).

Abramoff was an equal-opportunity slimeball. Would it pain the AP to just report the facts every once in a while?

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