Inauguration crowd estimates in doubt

WASHINGTON - Officials are casting doubt on an early projection that 4 million to 5 million people could jam downtown Washington on Inauguration Day, saying it is more likely that the crowd will be about half that size.

D.C. authorities said the earlier estimates, provided by Mayor Adrian M. Fenty were based on speculation surrounding the historic nature of the swearing-in of Barack Obama as the nation's first African-American president. After weeks of checking with charter bus companies, airlines, and other sources, they're reassessing.

"It's more of an art than a science," City Administrator Dan Tangherlini said. "The fact is, earlier it was speculation. Now, we're beginning to flesh it out and what the physical capacities of the system are."

The Secret Service has dismissed the high-end estimates. But there is universal agreement among security officials and planners that massive numbers of people will flock to the swearing-in of Obama, who had drawn huge campaign crowds.

Turnout could easily reach 2 million, officials said, far outstripping the 400,000 who attended the 2005 inauguration of President Bush. Although it is possible that 5 million people will descend on the area in the days leading up to the inauguration, it appears unlikely that trains and local roads could get them all to the Mall and parade route Jan. 20, officials said.

Jawauna Greene, a spokeswoman for the Maryland Transit Administration, said that inaugural planning committees had initially considered up to 6 million attendees. Lately, she said, D.C. officials had scaled back their estimates to about 2 million. "But there's no telling," she said.

WASHINGTON POST

NEW YORK - Hillary Clinton has written off $13.1 million in personal funds she lent her failed presidential campaign, new disclosure reports filed with the Federal Election Commission show.

Clinton loaned the money to her campaign in several installments last spring as she fought Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination, a battle she ultimately lost.

The former first lady and New York senator has been working to pay down that debt to clear the way for confirmation as President-elect Barack Obama's secretary of state. Federal ethics rules prohibit Cabinet officials from actively soliciting campaign contributions.

Since suspending her campaign last June, Clinton has told donors she would absorb the personal loan and would not be raising money to pay it down. The campaign's latest FEC report, filed Dec. 20, was the first to reflect that she had formally forgiven the loan.

The new report showed the campaign still owes $6.3 million to vendors, down from about $7.4 million in November. The largest obligation - $5.3 million - is owed to the polling firm of Clinton's senior strategist, Mark Penn.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

NEW YORK - The New York Times admitted yesterday it published a fake letter purportedly from the mayor of Paris criticizing Caroline Kennedy's Senate bid as "appalling" and "not very democratic."

"What title has Ms. Kennedy to pretend to Hillary Clinton's seat?" the letter in yesterday's editions said. "We French can only see a dynastic move of the vanishing Kennedy clan in the very country of the Bill of Rights. It is both surprising and appalling."

In an editor's note posted yesterday on its website, the Times said the letter signed by Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe should not have been published because it violated the paper's standards and procedures.

"We have already expressed our regrets to Mr. Delanoe's office, and we are now doing the same to you, our readers," the Times said.

ASSOCIATED PRESS