Bush's Failed To File SEC Forms In Three Other Harken Transactions

FEATURE STORY | Special Report

Bush and Harken
by Jason Leopold

Last week, while Bush spoke to Wall Street about corporate malfeasance, he was beset by questions about the timing of his sale of stock twelve years ago while he served as a director of Harken Energy. Bush sold the Harken stock about two months before the company reported huge losses and shortly before Iraq invaded Kuwait, leaving many asking whether the President had benefited from inside information. In addition, Bush was tardy in filing the appropriate sale-related forms with the SEC. Bush has said he filed the proper documents with the SEC on time--even though it arrived thirty-four weeks late--and suggested the agency must have lost the file. Last week, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said there had been a "mix-up" by the Bush lawyers who handled the paperwork.

While SEC reporting requirements may seem like a minor issue, it's crucial information for the average investor because it allows them to determine whether insiders have received undisclosed information about the company's financial condition. The Securities and Exchange Act of 1934 requires company insiders to disclose publicly, in a report called a Form 4, all stock purchases and sales by the tenth day of the month following the transaction.

This week, as President Bush's own business acumen is being called into question, additional SEC documents show that Bush violated federal securities laws on three other occasions during his tenure at Harken by missing the deadline for filing documents about his stock transactions with the SEC.