Sharpton Smells Racism in Probe

The Rev. Al Sharpton insisted yesterday he did nothing illegal while raising money for his presidential campaign — and suggested racism could be behind an FBI investigation into his fund-raising. "I assure you that everything handed to us was properly filed," said Sharpton, referring to $140,000 in donations collected by two shady businessmen who later were caught by a wiretap speculating that Sharpton had not reported most of that money to the Federal Election Commission. "It is very suspicious that we have a pattern here," Sharpton said yesterday, citing both the FBI's secret videotape and bugging surveillance of a 2003 meeting he had with the fund-raisers and an FBI microphone found in the office of Philadelphia Mayor John Street, who also is black. "People understand what this smells like," Sharpton said at a press conference outside The Post, which detailed the federal probe yesterday in a front-page story. "I know that there were irregularities in Mr. [John] Edwards's [presidential campaign] . . . I know there were questions about John Kerry's mortgaging his house for his campaign. I don't know of any of them being wiretapped," Sharpton said. Sharpton reportedly was seen on the FBI secret videotape pocketing campaign donations from two fund-raisers during a meeting on May 9, 2003, and then demanding $25,000 more. [more]