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Tom Daschle's former Democratic colleagues
were rallying to his defense after he met behind closed doors with
the Senate Finance Committee to discuss problems with back taxes
and potential conflicts of interest, but lawmakers promised he will
face more questions.
      

Daschle, a former senate majority leader, is President Barack
Obama's nominee to oversee the Health and Human Services
Department.
      


Republican members of the committee avoided reporters after the
committee meeting Monday, but an aide to Sen. Charles Grassley,
R-Iowa, said the senator still has a lot of questions he will
explore at Daschle's confirmation hearing Feb. 10.
      


Those questions will focus on tax issues, such as the $128,203
in back taxes and $11,964 in interest that he paid last month, said
the aide. Daschle will also be questioned about the potential
conflicts of interests he would face because he accepted speaking
fees from health care interests, said the aide, who asked not to be
identified because the aide was not authorized to speak publicly on
the matter.
      


Daschle also provided advice to health insurers and hospitals
through his work at a law firm.
      


Daschle began the day apologizing for his failure to fully pay
his taxes from 2005 through 2007. He capped it off that way as well
after meeting with the committee behind closed doors.
      


"It was completely inadvertent, but that's no excuse," he
said. "I apologize to President Obama, to my colleagues and to the
American people."
      


Obama said he was "absolutely" sticking with his choice for
health secretary.
      


The White House both underscored the magnitude of the problem
and tried to downplay it in the space of seven words. "Nobody's
perfect," said press secretary Robert Gibbs. "It was a serious
mistake."
      


Nobody was predicting defeat for Daschle's nomination, but it
was proving an unsavory pill to swallow for senators who only last
week confirmed Timothy Geithner as treasury secretary despite his
own tax-payment problems. It's an issue that strikes a nerve among
lawmakers' constituents, who are struggling with their own serious
money problems.
      


Daschle did get warm words of support from numerous Democratic
senators. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., gave him an especially
important endorsement, since the two men have had tussles in the
past over Baucus' handling of GOP tax-cut proposals, Medicare
changes and other issues.
      


"His tax mistakes are regrettable," Baucus said. "But his tax
mistakes do not change his qualifications to lead on health care
reform. They do not change my support for his nomination."
      


Some senators laid the blame for Daschle's tax woes on his
employers rather than on Daschle. Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.,
said the friend that provided him with a chauffeur service for
three years, Leo Hindery Jr., should have given Daschle a tax form
that would make clear the service was to be treated as income.
      


In a letter released Monday, Daschle sought to explain how he
overlooked taxes on income for consulting work and the use of the
car service. He also deducted more in charitable contributions than
he should have.
      


Gibbs noted Daschle's long tenure as a senator from South Dakota
and said it would be up to the Senate to weigh a "serious but
corrected mistake against that three-decade career in public
service."
      

"We still think he's the best person to do health care reform
and shepherd a very complicated process through Congress to achieve
savings and cut costs for the American people," Gibbs said. The
White House also had suggested Geithner was indispensable for the
national economic revival in arguing for his confirmation despite
tax problems.
      


Melanie Sloan, the executive director of Citizens for
Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, noted the Geithner
nomination in saying she suspected tax problems would not prevent
Daschle from becoming the next health secretary.
      


"If the guy who is overseeing the IRS can get away with a tax
problem, how are you going to hold up the health and human services
secretary over taxes?" she asked.

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