WASHINGTON – Name-dropping is a coin of the realm for lobbyists. It's whom you know, or claim to. Throwing money around helps, too.

But there are lines, and Houston-based lobbyist Stephen Payne – a big-dollar fundraiser for President Bush's campaigns– seemed to cross them in a recent pitch caught by hidden camera. As reported by The Sunday Times of London last weekend, Mr. Payne suggested that $200,000 to the Bush library in Dallas would open doors in Washington for a deposed Central Asian leader.

That's a lot of quid, as the Brits say. But Mr. Payne insists he made clear to his would-be clients that in America, there's no quid pro quo. He also says he was framed – and the newspaper acknowledged it was a set-up. Bush aides quickly pointed out that Mr. Payne had no connection to the library.

Little noticed in the furor, though, were Mr. Payne's connections to another high-profile Texas Republican, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison.

In the company marketing materials he provided his would-be clients at their meeting at a posh London hotel, Mr. Payne boasted that as part of a campaign to bolster the public image of Azerbaijan, he had "developed a series of op-ed's [sic] written by influential U.S. officials," including Ms. Hutchison.

Mr. Payne spent nearly three years as her deputy regional director in Houston, leaving a dozen years ago.

Her current aides said they weren't sure if Mr. Payne suggested the pro-Azerbaijan column she published in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in November 2005. They concede that he had some input.

"This happens all the time. You reach out to people you know have some expertise in an area," said spokesman and strategist Rich Galen, adding that Ms. Hutchison "will stand behind every semicolon" in that column.

Mr. Galen asserted that Mr. Payne could be expected to puff up his role. "This is the currency of people that do this kind of work – overstating your influence on a sheet of paper."

Mr. Payne also boasted that he'd been a "vice chairman" in Ms. Hutchison's last two Senate races. Campaign aides say they don't remember him. The 2006 campaign manager doesn't recall any conversations with Mr. Payne.

"He did not have a substantive role in the campaigns," Mr. Galen said.

A House committee has demanded answers by Wednesday from Mr. Payne about his relationship with the Bush library. The Justice Department may be looking at his assertions that he could arrange meetings for an exiled Kazakh politician with Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other top officials.

"Mr. Payne has never arranged any meeting for the vice president," said a Cheney spokeswoman, Megan Mitchell. A Rice spokesman said the statement wasn't based in reality.

But Mr. Payne – like hundreds of donors and other well-connected volunteers – had performed advance work, helping organize overseas events for Mr. Cheney, including a May 2006 visit to Kazakhstan, an oil-rich Central Asian giant. The visit made headlines because Mr. Cheney expressed "admiration" for his "friend" President Nursultan Nazarbayev – glossing over his dismal human-rights record just days after making a point to criticize Russia at another stop.

Four months later, the Kazakh leader dined in Washington with Mr. Bush. That visit drew headlines for an entirely different reason – the arrival of "Borat," the un-PC Kazakh journalist character created by a British comedian, outside the White House.