The Mafias President: Nixon and the Mob
by Don Fulsom
Unbeknownst to most people even now, the election of 1968 placed the patron saint of the Mafia in the White House. In other words, Richard Nixon would go on to not only lead a criminal presidency; he would be totally indebted to our nations top mobsters.
By 1969, thanks in large part to his long-time campaign manager and political advisor Murray Chotiner, a lawyer who specialized in representing mobsters, Nixon had participated in secret criminal dealings for more than 20 years with sketchy figures such as Mickey Cohen, Mob financial guru Meyer Lansky, Teamsters union chief Jimmy Hoffa, and New Orleans Mafia boss Carlos Marcello. And with Chotiner as one of his key behind-the-scenes advisors in the White House, Nixons ties to the Mafia didnt end there. The Mafias President reveals a mind-blowing litany of favors Nixon exchanged with these sinister characters over decades, ranging from springing Jimmy Hoffa from prison to banning the federal government from using the terms Mafia and La Cosa Nostra. Drawing on newly released government tapes, documents, and other fresh information, The Mafias President by Don Fulsom offers a carefully reported, deeply researched account of Richard Nixons secret connections to Americas top crime lords. Read an excerpt of The Mafias President below.
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At the same time, Roughhouse Rothman was now funneling money from Santos and other ousted Havana casino owners into a paramilitary anti-Castro organization in Miami. Called the International Anti-Communist Brigade, it was headed by none other than future Watergate felon Frank Sturgis.
In May 1973, Santos Trafficante demonstrated the closeness of his special longtime bond with President Richard Nixonand the unique inside information he had on the Watergate scandalwhen he privately disclosed to a friendly Washington law firm that the break-in at Democratic headquarters was ordered by Nixon personally. The Mafia godfather said Nixon was terrified that the Democrats might have evidence of his prior role as organizer of the effort to assassinate Fidel Castro. (Nixon never even told the Warren Commission of those plots, or of his prior relationship withof all peopleJack Ruby, the killer of alleged JFK assassin Lee Harvey Oswald.)
Trafficante additionally claimed that Nixon had dispatched the CIAs chief of security, Sheffield Edwards, to Florida in late July 1960 to assure Trafficante that the vice president was indeed the organizer of the Castro murder plans. The Florida Mob boss made these revelations to investigators for prominent DC attorney F. Lee Baileywho once represented Trafficante, and who was then defending Watergate burglar James McCord.
The godfathers disclosures about Nixons role in the Watergate scandal, and in earlier efforts to kill Castro, were not made public until recently. One of Baileys investigators, Daniel Sheehan, revealed them in his memoirs, and in college lecture halls where he taught as a professor. Sheehan says Trafficante reported that Nixon used a secure scrambler phone to get Howard Hughes on board in the Castro murder schemeadding that Hughes then chose his own right-hand man, Robert Maheu, to help coordinate the effort.
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