The Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- Attorney General-designate John Ashcroft increased his Senate travel to religious gatherings as he considered entering last year's presidential campaign. Watchdog groups are suggesting the visits amounted to official trips for political purposes.

Once Ashcroft abandoned his 2000 presidential ambitions as a candidate aligned with the religious right, Senate-authorized appearances before religious groups dropped dramatically, Senate records show.

The religious institutions and organizations Ashcroft visited, mostly to make speeches and participate in church services, paid more than $23,000 for Ashcroft's travel, meals and lodging from 1996 to the present. Such payments are permitted under Senate rules, provided trips are connected with official duties and do not create the appearance of using public office for private gain.

"This record does appear to raise the question of whether then-Sen. Ashcroft was using these trips for presidential campaign purposes," said Fred Wertheimer, president of Democracy 21, a group advocating overhaul of campaign finance.

A spokeswoman for President-elect Bush, Mindy Tucker, said Ashcroft has visited and spoken to religious groups "throughout his career."

"He considered these opportunities to learn about people and programs throughout the country that are having a positive impact on people's lives. I don't think it would surprise anyone that as his national profile increased, so did the interest in having him visit," she said.

"I also don't think it would surprise anyone to see that in the year 2000, when he was involved in a tight Senate race, there was very little out-of-state travel."

Ashcroft, a Missouri Republican, lost his Senate re-election bid last year even though his opponent, Gov. Mel Carnahan, died in a plane crash before the election. Carnahan's widow, Jean, was named to the seat.

Despite Ashcroft's lifetime religious commitment, the records clearly show a pattern linking the official travel to the 18 months that he was a presidential hopeful. According to the documents, reviewed by The Associated Press:

--Ashcroft made four privately financed trips to religious groups or organizations in all of 1996 and one in January 1997.

--From July 1997, when news reports surfaced that Ashcroft might run for president, through the end of that year, he made eight religious-oriented appearances and nine more in 1998.

--After Ashcroft abandoned his presidential bid in January 1999, such trips dropped to three for that year, then to one last year.

The trip sponsors paid expenses of $2,883 in 1996, $8,633 in 1997, $10,560 in 1998, $1,108 in 1999 and $158 last year. The payments officially are called reimbursements, but the organizations usually buy the plane tickets, meals and lodging and present the traveling lawmaker with the value of each expense so it can be reported officially.

One of the early trips that coincided with Ashcroft's presidential test came in late July 1997, when he traveled to Colorado Springs, Colo., to appear on a radio program of the conservative Christian ministry, Focus on the Family.

Other trips included appearances before the Christian Coalition of Florida in December 1997; Louisiana Baptist University in Shreveport, La., and Regent University in Virginia Beach, Va., both in May 1998; a meeting of the Georgia Baptist Convention in Columbus, Ga., in November 1998; and the Assemblies of God North Carolina District Council, in Orlando, Fla., the following month.

Liberal senators and interest groups have attacked Ashcroft's record including his opposition to abortion and gun control, his successful fight to keep a black Missouri judge from confirmation to the federal bench, the rental of his fund-raising lists to President Clinton's foes and comments that Southern leaders of the Civil War were patriots.

Republicans and conservative legal organizations have staunchly backed Ashcroft for his strong support of crime victims, his anti-abortion position and his opposition to activist judges.

Larry Makinson, senior fellow at the private Center For Responsive Politics, said Ashcroft's actions were "fairly typical" of lawmakers bitten by "the travel bug" when contemplating a presidential run.

He said the Senate rules "allow maximum discretion for the member. Some use discretion as far as they can stretch it."

Charles Lewis, director of the Center for Public Integrity, a congressional watchdog, questioned just how official the trips were. He noted the religious right has a congressional agenda, as do special interests with a profit-making purpose.

"If there is a separation between church and state, what is his official duty in talking to all these religious groups?" Lewis said, referring to the rule that the trips be linked to official duties.

Lewis said some would say Ashcroft's appearances "make him a fine American and a good Christian, and there's nothing wrong with that. To others, it shows he's in the pocket of a group that has an agenda in the Justice Department and elsewhere."