ASHINGTON - Immersed in a tough battle for the US Senate, Hillary Rodham Clinton dodged another political bullet yesterday as independent counsel Robert Ray announced he would not seek to indict her in the long-running Travelgate investigation.
While Ray said there was substantial evidence that Mrs. Clinton had a role in the 1993 firings of White House travel office employees, he said he would not bring criminal charges against her. The decision spares Mrs. Clinton from what could have been a blow to her campaign for the Senate seat in New York.
''The evidence was insufficient to prove to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that any of Mrs. Clinton's statements and testimony ... were knowingly false,'' Ray said in a statement released by his office.
Although Ray derided the White House for what he called its substantial resistance to providing relevant evidence to his office, he said he had declined prosecution of Mrs. Clinton.
White House press secretary Joe Lockhart said last night, ''The independent counsel confirms what we have said all along. There is no evidence that the First Lady did anything wrong.''
Lockhart criticized Ray for ''inappropriately characterizing the results of a legally sealed report through innuendo'' by being skeptical of Mrs. Clinton's statements.
''The Office of the Independent Counsel has further politicized an investigation that has gone on far too long,'' Lockhart said.
Mrs. Clinton was in Detroit yesterday at private fund-raisers and was not available for comment.
The impact of yesterday's decision on Mrs. Clinton's campaign will be minimal, said John Zogby, an upstate New York pollster.
''It amounts to a net zero,'' Zogby said. ''Those who hate her guts are going to say, `This is why we hate her.' Those who love her are going to say, `Why don't they leave her alone?' And those who don't know her are going to say, `What? Didn't we already know about this?'''
Mrs. Clinton is in a dead heat with US Representative Rick Lazio, a Long Island Republican, for the seat of retiring Senator Daniel P. Moynihan, a Democrat.
Republicans on Capitol Hill charge Mrs. Clinton orchestrated the abrupt firing of seven career travel office workers so the work could go to family friends Harry Thomason and Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, who are Hollywood producers. The White House accused the fired employees of financial mismanagement.
Ray, who replaced independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr last year, did find that a conversation Mrs. Clinton had with David Watkins, the former White House chief of administration, ''ultimately influenced Watkins' decision to fire the travel office employees.'' But, Ray said, there still was not enough evidence for a jury to conclude Mrs. Clinton's testimony on the firings was ''knowingly false.''
The travel office makes arrangements for the press to accompany the president on official trips. The cost is paid by news organizations.
Presidents are free to appoint whomever they want to the travel office, but Clinton critics say the White House tarnished the workers' reputations to justify firing them.
After the firings, a Clinton cousin, Catherine Cornelius, was put in charge of the office but was soon removed.
The House Government Reform and Oversight Committee accused the White House of an ''enormous and elaborate coverup operation'' and concluded that Mrs. Clinton orchestrated the dismissals.
Mrs. Clinton has long denied the charges, saying she was concerned about alleged mishandling of travel office funds but never ordered the firings.
Ray's announcement disappointed Clinton detractors.
''The decision, frankly, is an outrage,'' said Larry Klayman, chairman and general counsel of the Washington-based Judicial Watch. The group represented the former head of the travel office, Billy Dale, who was among those fired in May 1993. Dale was prosecuted and acquitted in 1995 of embezzling travel-office funds.
Klayman said the independent counsel should have made his decision based on whether there was enough evidence to indict, not on whether a jury would convict.
''Ray broke the law, and probably for political purposes,'' Klayman said. Dale feels abandoned by the judicial system, Klayman said.
The announcement is another display of the political survival record of the first couple. Despite relentless congressional hearings and a seven-year independent counsel investigation that has cost more than $50 million, the Clintons have emerged politically alive, if bruised.
The House impeached President Clinton on charges related to his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. The Senate acquited him, and Clinton now has high approval ratings.
Earlier this year, Ray closed the book on the Filegate episode, concluding that neither Mrs. Clinton nor any senior White House official had broken the law when the White House obtained hundreds of FBI personnel files early in the Clinton administration.
Ray still must decide whether to seek indictments in the Whitewater case, considered the most serious and potentially damaging case to the Clintons.
