PRESIDENT BUSH’S re-election campaign will give to charity thousands of dollars received from the lobbyist at the heart of a Capitol Hill bribery investigation, while the White House and nervous politicians from both parties scrambled to distance themselves from the widening corruption scandal.

Scott McClellan, Mr Bush’s spokesman, said yesterday that Jack Abramoff, the disgraced lobbyist who pleaded guilty on Tuesday to bribing politicians, donated thousands to last year’s Bush-Cheney re-election campaign. Abramoff, whose plea deal with federal prosecutors makes him the star witness in an investigation that could implicate at least 12 politicians, most of them Republicans, also raised more than $100,000 (£57,000) for Mr Bush’s re-election campaign, earning him the honorary title “pioneer”.

Although there is no suggestion that Mr Bush or any senior administration officials were involved, the White House’s swift efforts to wash its hands of any dealings with Abramoff demonstrated just how radioactive the once-powerful lobbyist has become in a city where he lavished meals, travel and campaign donations on dozens of politicians. Abramoff pleaded guilty yesterday to separate conspiracy and fraud charges in Florida. He acknowledged that he faked documents used to get a $60million loan to buy gambling ships in 2000. Under a plea agreement four other charges were dropped.

The Republican Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, yesterday became the latest in a growing line of politicians to dump campaign contributions received from Abramoff and his clients, in what is shaping up to be the biggest political corruption scandal in Washington for more than a decade.

Mr Hastert gave about $70,000 to charity, although his spokesman said that the contributions had been legal. Democrats, keen to make the Abramoff scandal a central plank of their campaign for November’s mid-term congressional elections, pounced on Abramoff’s guilty plea. Nancy Pelosi, the party’s leader in the House of Representatives, said: “This Republican congress is the most corrupt in history.”

Yet although the Justice Department’s investigation appears to be focusing on several high-profile Republicans, some senior Democrats also had dealings with Abramoff, making it far from certain that Democrats will be able to paint the scandal as an exclusively Republican problem. Recent polls suggest that the US public has little confidence in the ethics of either party.

Abramoff pleaded guilty to defrauding several Native American tribes — who had hired him to lobby on behalf of their gambling interests — of tens of millions of dollars. He then used that money to lavish golfing fees, meals, gifts, foreign trips and campaign funds on politicians in direct exchange for legislative action favourable to his clients.

Campaign contributions are not illegal unless there is an express agreement that the money is being paid in exchange for a legislative action.

Abramoff’s largesse “went far beyond lawful lobbying”, said Alice Fisher, head of the Justice Department’s criminal division. “The corruption scheme with Mr Abramoff is very extensive. We’re going to follow this wherever it goes. Government officials and government action are not for sale.”

Since 1999 Abramoff has directed more than $4.4 million to political candidates, two thirds to Republicans, one third to Democrats.

The politician most immediately implicated in the scandal is Bob Ney, a Republican congressman from Ohio. Mr Ney, chairman of the House Administration Committee and referred to as “Representative No 1” in Tuesday’s plea deal, is accused of advancing the interests of several of Abramoff’s clients. Mr Ney, who has not been charged, denied wrong- doing, saying: “I obviously did not know. . . the self-serving and fraudulent nature of Abramoff’s activities.”

Another person under scrutiny is Tom DeLay, the former Republican House leader, who is facing campaign finance charges in Texas. Mr DeLay has taken three overseas trips with Abramoff, including a golfing trip to St Andrews, and received more than $70,000 in campaign contributions from Abramoff and his clients.

Also in the spotlight are Conrad Burns, a Republican senator from Montana, the largest recipient of Abramoff-related campaign contributions, and John Doolittle, a Republican congressman from California, whose wife received payments from Abramoff’s lobbying firm.

The number of politicians under investigation makes the Abramoff investigation the biggest federal corruption case since the Abscam scandal more than 20 years ago. Then, FBI agents posed as Arab sheikhs and offered bribes to members of congress. Six politicians were convicted of taking bribes.

Some analysts are comparing the potential fallout with the 1992 House banking scandal, which finished the careers of 77 politicians.

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