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Bush DUI Arrest Fallout: Source Denies Connection to Gore Campaign

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

LOU WATERS, CNN ANCHOR: Lawyer, Democratic activist, and former Maine gubernatorial candidate Tom Connolly acknowledges he is the one who gave the news of Bush's 1976 arrest to a reporter.

CNN's Bill Delaney has talked with Tom Connolly. And Bill joins us now from Portland, Maine.

BILL DELANEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, thank you, Lou. First, I ought to say, behind us, there is a rather big crowd. We just happened to be at a place where vice presidential nominee Dick Cheney is about to appear, that explains the people behind us.

But what we are here to talk about, Lou, as you said, is Tom Connolly, a lawyer here in Portland for more than 20 years, specializing interestingly enough in OUI cases, operating under the influence, what George W. Bush was charged with 24 years ago.

Now Connolly put this explosive story out there yesterday, but he says he has no connection whatsoever to the Gore campaign. He is a Democrat, he did, as you say, did run for governor in 1998, but he says he has no particularly intimate ties to the Democratic Party beyond that. He's no political operative, he says.

Here's how he says he got the information on Bush's drunken driving conviction 24 years ago. Yesterday, Thursday, an elderly man was having a chiropractic treatment. This elderly man said to the chiropractor, you know, 24 years ago, I was in a courtroom for driving under the influence, and you know who was in the courtroom with me? George W. Bush.

Well, the chiropractor took this in, the elderly man on the chiropractor's table has apparently never thought it was a particularly important story to put out there. The chiropractor, recognizing that it was a particularly important story to put it out there, called a -- a man described as a Democratic public official here in Portland, Maine. This Democratic -- unnamed Democratic public official passed the information on to Tom Connolly, the lawyer.

Tom Connolly, the lawyer, who happened to be at the Cumberland County Courthouse in Portland, Maine at the time got the phone call, immediately turned to some lawyers nearby and said: Guess what I just heard? Well, at that moment, a local TV reporter heard Tom Connolly talking to these other attorneys about the drunken driving conviction of George W. Bush and she began to ask him about it. That is how the story broke.

Now Tom Connolly says he -- when we talked to Tom Connolly about an hour and a half ago, he told us why he did it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM CONNOLLY (D), FMR. MAINE GOV. CANDIDATE: This struck me as a true thing, an important thing. and relevant, and my obligation is to bring it out, and let you people process it and let the American people become aware. I think that the truth will set us free that way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DELANEY: Connolly says he put it out there because it reflects on the character of Bush, he wonders why the Bush camp didn't put it out there before. But again, he says categorically, the Gore campaign had nothing do with the information he's now put out there -- Lou.

WATERS: All right, CNN's Bill Delaney in Portland, Maine. That will not be the end of the story of course. We will continue to follow it.

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