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As it relates to my business, I got people that was in my business that runs my business. The young lady that is my station manager and vice president has been with the station longer than I have, so I don't have a problem. My thing in my business is still the decision maker.

Mr. Saunders, I had asked you earlier in Executive Session if you had any objection to sharing this information with the committee in public session. I ask you once again, do you have any objection to sharing and discussing that information --
A. No.
Q. -- credit report? And indicating that he agrees to that.

Mr. Chairman, the first matter that came to the attention committee counsel was a confession of judgment dated June 2nd, 1993 from Mr. Saunders to a Mr. John H. Pembroke.

Mr. Saunders, I understand from listening to you briefly that Mr. Pembroke was a shareholder with you in the corporation that ran WPAL; is that correct?
A. Yes.
Q. And that you had a Buy Out Agreement whereby he took your note for payment of his interest, so you were buying his interest. And there was a disagreement as to how much you owed him, but because of some record keeping problems on both of your parts, I believe that you said, but that you had signed this confession of judgment this past June in the amount of $40,000; is that correct?
A. Right.
Q. Has that judgment been paid?
A. No, it has not. We're working on an acceptable agreement between me and him to pay it off. That's --
Q. Was suit brought by Mr. Pembroke before you entered into this confession of judgement?
A. Yeah.
Q. It was brought on the note -- the promissory note that you signed for him in December, 1983?
A. '85, I think.
Q. But he brought suit in order to collect the funds; is that correct?
A. Right, after the disagreement on how much it was supposed to be, but we paid him over $200,000 which was the original loan.

I know nothing about that particular payment, one payment of $349, until 1993 when we checked with the credit record and we tried get them to give us their record on it and they had nothing on it. But we went on and paid them $349 and they gave us a letter clearing that up. We have that record.
Q. Mr. Saunders, if you could --
A. And, again, I would like to also make sure that that car was leased to WPAL, Incorporated.
Q. Mr. Saunders, I had asked you earlier if you had personal guarantied that payment in some way and if you could provide documentation of how

Additionally, there is an entry here for South Carolina National Bank for an installment loan which was more or less indicated also to be an open account. That the original loan amount was $80,000. The amount currently due on that account is $54,000. I believe that's their indication here as reported in February, 1992.

The rating given to that relationship is an O-9. O indicating that it was an open account. The 9 being once again that it was written off as bad debt. Are you familiar with that loan?
A. Yes, that's a loan again with WPAL, Incorporated.
Q. Are you aware of any type of collection proceedings brought by SCNB to recover those amounts from you?
A. We're still paying SCN a large note that SCN carried a bank note on our -- on our station at this point.
Q. Are they trying to collect on the $54,000?
A. It will be added to the back end of our note.
Q. So that was the agreement for the refinancing was for you to pick up that indebtedness?
A. Uh-huh.
Q. Could you provide evidence of that to the committee?
A. Okay.
Q. Mr. Saunders, you had at my request provided a copy of a letter that you had mailed out on October 10th, 1993. I'll be glad to provide you with a copy of it. Do you recall this letter, Mr. Saunders?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that your signature there?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. There are some attachments attached to that letter, two pages and I believe labeled "A Synopsis of Resume."
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Was that an attachment you included with the letter?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Did you draft this letter, Mr. Saunders?
A. Yes, sir. Along with a couple of my daughters.
Q. If you wouldn't mind, I would like to read at least a portion of the letter into the record and include the letter in its entirety later. "Dear" -- and I take this letter was sent to members of the General Assembly; is that correct?
A. And some other people.

And there were so many times, I knew some of the things that was happening and there were people saying in this -- especially in this city that I had dropped out of the race all the time and that I wanted to make sure that everybody understood that I was in and that I was going to be in until you guys to decide here today whether I'm going to be in or not.
Q. And the word "support," would you please explain one more time what support you were seeking from -- you said you sent it to 170 members of the General Assembly and to other individuals. What other individuals did you mail this to?
A. Well, I mailed it to some other people that I know that have been involved in the -- in the political arena and that know things about what's going on. I sent it to Lieutenant Governor Nick Theodore. And the kind of support that I was looking for, the Lieutenant Governor called me back and said, "Bill, you know, you have to make sure" -- one of the questions that he raised with me, he said that if you're going to go after this office, you're going to have to spend a lot of time in Columbia, you're going to have to do certain things with your business. That's the kind of feedback and that's the kind of thing that I call support.
Q. What other types of support did you seek? I mean if it were not just somebody that you -- was it more than just getting folks to call you back and say, "I think you're a good man and I think you ought to run?" Were you looking for financial support at all in your race?
A. Not financial support, but I was also looking for negative feedback in terms of, well, I don't think that you're going to be able to make it. I'd like somebody to wrote back or call me back and say you need to know about, make sure that you're looking at who all is going to be in the race, how you're going to come to vote after this screening and those kind of things. That's the kind of education that I need.
Q. Did you say that of all the letters that you received back from members of the General Assembly, no one offered a pledge of their vote?
A. No, sir.

We've made some bad mistakes and -- but also have done some good and I'm hoping that the screening committee at least have an -- at least take a look when this is over at how do you do to ensure that people -- everybody is getting a fair shake and those kinds of things.
Q. Is there anything that you would recommend that would give -- have given you a fairer shake in this process?
A. That would give me a fair shake?
Q. Have given you a fairer shake in this process today?
A. Well, I -- you know, the jury is still out on that. I don't know. But I just -- for the future, that's what I would be concerned about, how these things work because I think that they -- it seems to be the mood in our country today that anybody that has been semi successful or been near doing good are being criticized by everybody.

I watched Admiral Inman and a lot of other people are getting out of the process simply because of all of the negatives. If something is negative, you want it. If it's positive, you don't want it.
Q. Is there anything else that you would like to share with the committee in terms of that you've not been allowed to share in terms of qualifications?

Is it your opinion or is it your belief that this letter served as a formal notification to legislators as well as friends that you are or that your plans are or were at that time to enter this race, so it was a formal notification as opposed to a letter asking for a committed vote?
A. Yes, that's what -- that's what it was. That was -- I'm not asking for a vote at that particular point. I try not to ask anybody for anything unless I -- but what they going to do? And most of the people -- understand the people don't know me, that I want to make sure that they know me before I got to that, so I would have need to have met them face to face before I asked for a vote.
Q. So the word formal was probably more in line of formally saying that you plan to be a candidate for this position considering the fact that you said earlier that there was talk of you not being a candidate in this?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Okay. Thank you.
SENATOR COURTNEY: Mr. Chairman?
REPRESENTATIVE WILKES: Yes.
EXAMINATION BY SENATOR COURTNEY:
Q. Mr. Saunders, I want to thank you for being willing to answer questions that I know have to be embarrassing to you. It's certainly not easy to ask some of these questions, but you have been involved in the political process over the years it appears.

I think you ran for the State Senate in 1980. And in that you went into a primary race and a run off and then ran in the general election, I believe. And I understand somebody makes mistakes and especially pertaining to the ethics law. Even a lot of legislators, they still don't know exactly how it applies to them and I certainly respect someone who is willing to say that they made a mistake because they didn't understand the law.

My problem is with the letter asking for support and not knowing what support means and you being a former candidate and so forth, I would

I think you said earlier that you meant feedback when you said support in your letter, but no where in your letter do you ask anyone to call you and advise you about any procedures for you to use, what you should do toward helping to obtain this hearing and like that and just using the words -- or the word "solicit your support" twice in the letter. And, again, you still stand on it that you didn't simply make a mistake and that actually you thought you could go ahead and ask for a pledge, so to speak, at the time that you wrote the letter?
A. No. What you're saying to me and somebody else has said that our definition of what I felt within myself and still feel, I don't mind going on and saying that it was wrong, if you feel that it was wrong.

I did not feel that it was and I didn't do it with the only intent for it to be wrong and that's -- that's the key thing to me. It had no intention of doing anything against the law and I don't want to do that. I have not been in the habit of doing that and I will not do that. That was not my intent.
Q. I believe that and I'm -- that's what I'm trying to ask, were you really just confused as to what the law was at the time and maybe were seeking pledges and you just simply made a mistake because you didn't understand the law?

Are you still saying that by asking for support, you weren't asking -- actually asking for pledges?
A. I was not asking for votes, but I did not understand that. I didn't even know the law in the beginning, but still when I went back and read -- I don't want to get into an argument about the definition because people seem to have different definitions for what it is and what -- I come from a part of the country that we even speak a different language altogether. Something called Gullah (phonetic).

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