- Huffington Post: Clintons Bagged at Least $3.4 Million for 18 Speeches Funded by Keystone Pipeline Banks
Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and TD Bank—two of the Keystone XL pipeline’s largest investors—fully or partially bankrolled eight Hillary Clinton speeches that “put more than $1.6 million in the Democratic candidate’s pocket,” reports the Huffington Post.
WASHINGTON — Two Canadian banks tightly connected to promoting the controversial Keystone XL pipeline in the United States either fully or partially paid for eight speeches made by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the period not long before she announced her campaign for president. Those speeches put more than $1.6 million in the Democratic candidate’s pocket.
Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and TD Bank were both primary sponsors of paid Clinton speeches in 2014 and early 2015, although only the former appears onthe financial disclosure form she filed May 15. According to that document, CIBC paid Clinton $150,000 for a speech she gave in Whistler, British Columbia, on Jan. 22, 2015.
Clinton reported that another five speeches she gave across Canada were paid for by tinePublic Inc., a promotional company known for hosting speeches by world leaders and celebrities. Another speech was reported as paid for by the think tank Canada 2020, while yet another speech was reportedly funded by the Vancouver Board of Trade. But a review of invitations, press releases and media reports for those seven other speeches reveals that they, too, were either sponsored by or directly involved the two banks.
Both banks have financial ties to TransCanada, the company behind the Keystone XL pipeline, and have advocated for a massive increase in pipeline capacity, including construction of Keystone. Further, Gordon Giffin, a CIBC board member and onetime U.S. ambassador to Canada, is a former lobbyist for TransCanada and was a contributions bundler for Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.
It is not immediately clear what the sponsorship of speeches by the two banks entailed. Did they pay upfront costs to tinePublic to cover Clinton’s fees? Did they purchase a large number of tickets to underwrite the event? The banks themselves were not helpful on that score.
Ali Duncan Martin, a TD Bank spokeswoman, told The Huffington Post in an email that the bank sponsored a series of speeches by both Hillary Clinton and former President Bill Clinton starting in 2008. (Bill Clinton received more than $1.6 million for speeches sponsored by TD Bank, according to past financial disclosures.) The bank was the “title sponsor or a co-sponsor of the events, with most events having a number of sponsors participating,” according to Martin. She declined to say how much the bank spent in sponsoring the speeches.
Spokespeople from CIBC did not respond to a request for comment. One event invite, however, indicated that CIBC provided tickets the company had purchased to others. “Kindly RSVP to your CIBC Advisor and advise of any dietary restrictions,”the invite stated.
Some details of Hillary Clinton’s Canadian speechifying were first reported byindependent journalist Ron Brynaert. The Clinton campaign did not respond to The Huffington Post’s request for comment.
Clinton’s first swing through Canada started on March 5, 2014, with a speech that cost the Vancouver Board of Trade $275,500. While Clinton’s financial disclosure form reported the board as the payer, an invite to the event also lists “presenting sponsors” as TD Bank and Vancouver City Savings Credit Union. Following her speech, Clinton participated in a question-and-answer session hosted by TD Bank Deputy Chairman Frank McKenna.
The next day in Calgary, Clinton gave another speech reportedly paid for by tinePublic at a cost of $225,500. McKenna also came along to interview her after the speech. Martin confirmed that TD Bank also sponsored this speech.
In June, Clinton gave a speech in Toronto for a price of $150,000. The primary sponsor was TD Bank, according to an invite. Other sponsors included the Canadian Club of Toronto, Blakes Lawyers, KPMG and the Real Estate Investment Network. For the third time, McKenna interviewed Clinton after the speech.
Clinton went west to the city of Edmonton on June 18 to give another tinePublic-paid speech for a $100,000 price. The chief sponsor of this speech, according tothe Edmonton Chamber of Commerce, was CIBC. Victor Dodig, then senior executive vice president at CIBC, interviewed Clinton on stage after her remarks.
On Oct. 6, 2014, Clinton traveled up north again to speak at a meeting hosted by the liberal think tank Canada 2020. CIBC, which is also a funder of Canada 2020, was the primary sponsor of this $215,500 speech, according to a Canada 2020 web page for the event. Lesser sponsors included Air Canada, the Canadian Real Estate Association, Johnson & Johnson, Ernst & Young, Stampede Group and Telus. Again, Dodig, by then promoted to president and CEO, handled the Q&A session.
Over a span of two days in January, Clinton gave three more speeches — one directly paid for by CIBC and two paid by tinePublic, but sponsored by CIBC. On Jan. 21, she spoke in Winnipeg for $262,000 and then Saskatoon for $262,500. The next day she spoke at that CIBC event in Whistler for $150,000 — the only speech directly reported on her financial disclosure form as having been paid for by a Canadian bank. Dodig pitched questions to Clinton after each of these three speeches.
CIBC and TD Bank both have large energy portfolios and have pushed for the U.S. government to approve final construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would link the Canadian oil sands in Alberta through the middle of the United States to Texas and the Gulf of Mexico.
Since the Keystone pipeline is being built across national boundaries by a foreign company, TransCanada, it requires approval from the U.S. State Department. While serving as secretary of state, Clinton said that she was “inclined” to approve the pipeline. Since then, she has been mum on the issue, even as environmentalists — with their major grassroots and money sway in the Democratic Party — have made stopping the pipeline a priority.
“Like all major banks, institutional investors, and pensions, we invest in the energy sector. On Keystone we are one of many financing partners,” TD Bank’s Martin said, adding that the bank is “not a fundamental shareholder in TransCanada.”
Whether the U.S. government will approve further construction of the pipeline was a hot topic in each of the Q&A sessions hosted by the bank executives. And at every turn, Clinton refused to answer.
“No comment,” she told TD Bank’s McKenna during that first speech in Vancouver. She further explained that it would not be right for her to comment while the State Department was still debating the project.
McKenna returned to the topic the next day in Calgary, asking Clinton whether the delay in the approval process was driven by domestic politics. She answered that the review process is “very comprehensive” and that “it’s important not to let whatever that decision is on one pipeline color the potential for co-operation across the board between the United States and Canada on energy production and climate change.”
In Toronto, McKenna continued to push Clinton on the pipeline, which she said should not “be a proxy for the relationship” between the two countries.
CIBC’s Dodig also asked Clinton about Keystone at each of her five CIBC-sponsored speeches. In Winnipeg, she replied to Dodig’s question on the subject, “You won’t get me to talk about Keystone because I have steadily made clear that I’m not going to express an opinion.”
She did, however, express an opinion when asked whether the U.S. and Canada could work together to harmonize energy and environmental regulations. That idea has been pursued by Canadian energy companies and other Keystone backers as a possible trade-off for approval of pipeline construction.
In Vancouver, Clinton told McKenna that she would consider the possibility of creating a group to work on regulatory harmonization and would “personally convey” the idea to those in power in Washington. She also noted the need for “greater symmetry” in the electrical grids and oil and gas supply lines of the two countries.
TD Bank and CIBC’s interest in the energy sector is not limited to the construction of Keystone XL. The two banks also support the construction of pipelines in Canada heading west to the Pacific and east to the Atlantic as alternative means of getting the country’s crude oil into the international market. In 2012, they both published reports calling the construction of these pipelines a “national priority.”
One of those alternatives is the construction of the Energy East pipeline, which would move oil from Alberta to ports in Quebec. But that plan by TransCanada is opposed by Gaz Metro, a Quebec-based natural gas company.
It just so happens that Clinton’s only recent Canadian speech not involving TD Bank or CIBC was sponsored by Gaz Metro. According to her financial disclosure form, the Board of Trade of Metropolitan Montreal paid her $275,000 for a March 18, 2014, speech. An invite for the event lists Gaz Metro as a sponsor, along with La Presse, CJAD radio, Loto Quebec, Osler Lawyers and the Montreal Gazette. The Q&A session was hosted by Gaz Metro President and CEO Sophie Brochu.
The Gaz Metro-sponsored speech was the only such event at which Clinton wasnot directly asked about the Keystone pipeline.
If President Barack Obama neglects to make a final decision on the pipeline in his last year and a half, the question would fall to the next president and his or her secretary of state.
Moreover, according to Clinton Cash, during Hillary Clinton’s tenure as Sec. of State, Bill Clinton delivered 10 speeches from Nov. 2008 to mid-2011 totaling $1.8 million paid for by TD Bank, which held a $1.6 billion investment in the Keystone XL pipeline.
The Clintons’ speaking fees windfall, which has infuriated environmental groups, have yet to be addressed by Hillary Clinton.
- New York Times: Clinton Foundation Shook Down a Tiny Tsunami Relief Nonprofit for a $500,000 Speaking Fee
Bill Clinton refused to give a speech for a tiny nonprofit seeking to raise money for tsunami victims until the group agreed to pay a $500,000 speaking fee to the Clinton Foundation. The Times reported that the Clinton Foundation “sent the charity an invoice,” which “amounted to almost a quarter of the evening’s net proceeds—enough to build 10 preschools in Indonesia.”
- New York Magazine: Clinton Foundation “Strong-Armed” Charity Watchdog Group
When “the Clinton Foundation wound up on a ‘watch list’ maintained by the Charity Navigator, dubbed the ‘most prominent’ nonprofit watchdog,” reported New York Magazine writer Gabriel Sherman, “the Foundation attempted to strong-arm them by calling a Navigator board member.”
Last Wednesday, Bill Clinton ratcheted up Clintonworld’s counter assault on Clinton Cash, the book by conservative author Peter Schweizer that ignited the latest media frenzy over the former First Couple’s $2 billion foundation. “There's just no evidence," Clinton defiantly told CNN's Christiane Amanpour during an interview at the Foundation’s confab in Morocco. "Even the guy that wrote the book apparently had to admit under questioning that we didn't have a shred of evidence for this, we just sort of thought we would throw it out there and see if it flies, and it won't fly."
Clinton’s analysis is flawed in at least one regard. As my colleagueJonathan Chait recently wrote, the Clintons’ web of murky relationships and opaque finances exacts a political cost whether or not their critics ever find a there there. The Clintons, more than anyone, should know that negative press — true or not — can have potentially catastrophic consequences. Remember, it was David Brock’s 1993 American Spectatorarticle alleging that Arkansas state troopers arranged Bill’s trysts, which sparked Paula Jones’s sexual harassment lawsuit, which led to the Supreme Court case, which led to Monica Lewinsky lying under oath about the affair, which led Linda Tripp to turn the tapes over to Ken Starr, which led to impeachment.
The Clinton Foundation scandal cycle is already spinning off new complications. A case in point: After being the subject of a spate of negative newspaper accounts about potential conflicts of interest and management dysfunction this winter — long before Clinton Cash — the Clinton Foundation wound up on a "watch list" maintained by the Charity Navigator, the New Jersey–based nonprofit watchdog. The Navigator, dubbed the "most prominent" nonprofit watchdog by the Chronicle of Philanthropy, is a powerful and feared player in the nonprofit world. Founded in 2002, it ranks more than 8,000 charities and is known for its independence. For a while, the Clinton Foundation was happy to promote Charity Navigator’s work (back when they were awarded its highest ranking). In September 2014, in fact, the Navigator's then-CEO, Ken Berger, was invited to speak at the Clinton Global Initiative. Of course that was before the Foundation was placed on a list with scandal-plagued charities like Al Sharpton's National Action Network and the Red Cross.
Since March, the Foundation has embarked on an aggressive behind-the-scenes campaign to get removed from the list. Clinton Foundation officials accuse the Navigator of unfairly targeting them, lacking credible evidence of wrongdoing, and blowing off numerous requests for a meeting to present their case. "They're not only punishing us for being transparent but are not being transparent themselves," Maura Pally, the Foundation's acting CEO, told me by phone from Morocco last week. "Charity Navigator doesn't disclose its donors, but we do and yet that means we're suffering the consequences."
Navigator executives counter that the Foundation has demanded they extend the Clintons special treatment. They also allege the Foundation attempted to strong-arm them by calling a Navigator board member. "They felt they were of such importance that we should deviate from our normal process. They were irritated by that," says Berger.
The feud is a microcosm of all that is exhausting about the Clintons' endless public battles. Generally, it goes like this: bad press about their lack of transparency sparks some real-world consequence or censure, the Clintons complain that they’re being held to an unfair standard while their critics contend that they expect to be able to write their own rules, and the resulting flare-up leads to more bad press.
The trouble with Navigator started on Wednesday morning, March 11. Foundation officials became alarmed when they received an anonymous email from the watchdog's Donor Advisory committee informing them they would be added to the list on Friday, March 13, unless they could provide answers to questions raised in newspaper accounts. Among the press controversies the Navigator cited: A Wall Street Journal report that noted "at least 60 companies that lobbied the State Department during [Hillary Clinton's] tenure donated a total of more than $26 million to the Clinton Foundation.” Politico, meanwhile, revealed that the Foundation failed to report to the State Department a $500,000 donation from the Algerian government, a violation of the ethics agreement the Clintons had arranged with the Obama White House. Politico also reported that the Foundation’s former CEO, Eric Braverman, quit after a “power struggle” with “the coterie of Clinton loyalists who have surrounded the former president for decades.”
With the publication of Clinton Cash on the horizon, Clintonworld surely knew landing on the Navigator’s watch list would be a public-relations debacle. By early March, Clinton campaign officials were holding regular war-room meetings to orchestrate their defense against the book. Over the next few days, Foundation officials desperately attempted to contact Navigator executives to rebut their claims but, inexplicably, couldn’t get through to anyone on the phone. On the evening of Friday, March 13, Pally sent a detailed email rebuttal. "All of the other organizations on your watch list have had substantiated allegations of financial, fiscal or other impropriety,” she wrote, according to an email the Foundation provided toNew York. “The stories you cite about the Clinton Foundation merely point to donations, or gossip around our operations, none of which constitute any wrongdoing.”
It didn't work. During a tense phone conversation on the afternoon of March 17, Pally and Berger argued over the merits of the media's claims about the Foundation. Pally said they were without substance; Berger insisted that since the newspapers published the articles, they were relevant. "Our whole thing is, if major media outlets say there's something here that you should be aware of, we're not going to be judge and jury on what the media says," Berger later told me. "We felt there had been enough questions." As a matter of practice, the Navigator doesn’t conduct its own investigations. On its website, they state: “Charity Navigator … takes no position on allegations made or issues raised by third parties, nor does Charity Navigator seek to confirm or verify the accuracy of allegations made or the merits of issues raised by third parties that may be referred to in the CN Watchlist.”
The Navigator invited the Foundation to respond publicly on their website. Instead, Pally asked Berger to meet and review confidential copies of the Foundation's handbook, “Global Code of Conduct,” and board bylaws. Berger declined, feeling it was another effort of backroom dealing and spin. "We were not opposed to having a sit-down meeting. The point was, what is it that we're going to cover? We've already been around the block. What's the value of this?"
Last week, after I contacted the Foundation about being on the watch list, Pally rekindled talks with the Navigator. "I remain at a loss as to what information we can provide to address Charity Navigator’s concerns and be removed from the Watchlist," she wrote Tim Gamory, the Navigator's acting CEO. (Berger left the group last month to start his own consulting business.)
Sure enough, the watch list designation has provided Clinton’s antagonists with more ammunition with which to attack Hillary’s campaign. Already, critics are citing Charity Navigator’s list as a reason to open a federal investigation into the Clintons’ finances. For its part, the Clinton camp sees the episode as another reason to feel aggrieved. But even some Clinton advisers have been frustrated that they don’t appear to have learned from past self-inflicted wounds. One source told me that last year, a senior adviser lobbied the Foundation to appoint a Republican co-chairman to its board, which was stacked with Clinton loyalists. The adviser submitted a list of GOP names. “It was to shield [the Clintons] from the things they’re reading about now,” the source said. “It didn’t happen.”
Unfortunately for Hillary’s campaign, the Navigator’s policy is that charities that land on the list stay there for a minimum of six months. Sandra Miniutti, the Navigator’s spokesperson, told me that, in order to get off the list, the Clintons need to publicly address each of the controversies raised by the media with a convincing response.
The clock is ticking.
- International Business Times: Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. Gave Clinton Foundation Donors Weapons Deals
“Under Clinton’s leadership, the State Department approved $165 billion worth of commercial arms sales to 20 nations whose governments have given money to the Clinton Foundation, according to an IBTimes analysis of State Department and foundation data,”reports IBT. “That figure—derived from the three full fiscal years of Clinton’s term as Secretary of State (from October 2010 to September 2012)—represented nearly double the value of American arms sales made to the those countries and approved by the State Department during the same period of President George W. Bush’s second term.”
Salon, MotherJones, HuffingtonPost, Slate, and several other liberal publications reported on IBT’s findings.
- Washington Post: Clintons Hid 1,100 Foreign Donor Names in Violation of Ethics Agreement with Obama Admin.
Clinton Cash revealed five hidden foreign donations. On the heels of the book’s publication, the Washington Post uncovered another 1,100 foreign donor names hidden in the Canada-based Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership—a Clinton Foundation initiative Bill Clinton erected with controversial billionaire mining executive Frank Giustra.
“A charity affiliated with the Clinton Foundation failed to reveal the identities of its 1,100 donors, creating a broad exception to the foundation’s promise to disclose funding sources as part of an ethics agreement with the Obama administration,” reports the Washington Post. “The number of undisclosed contributors to the charity, the Canada-based Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, signals a larger zone of secrecy around foundation donors than was previously known.”
In a follow-up story, the Post reports that only 21 of Frank Giustra and Bill Clinton’s secret 1,100 foreign donors have subsequently been revealed. If and when the other 1,079 hidden donors names will be revealed is presently unclear—and will be the subject of forthcoming investigative reports by Breitbart News.
- Vox: At Least 181 Clinton Foundation Donors Lobbied Hillary’s State Dept.
“Public records alone reveal a nearly limitless supply of cozy relationships between the Clintons and companies with interests before the government,” reports Vox. “There’s a household name at the nexus of the foundation and the State Department for every letter of the alphabet but “X” (often more than one): Anheuser-Busch, Boeing, Chevron, (John) Deere, Eli Lilly, FedEx, Goldman Sachs, HBO, Intel, JP Morgan, Lockheed Martin, Monsanto, NBC Universal, Oracle, Procter & Gamble, Qualcomm, Rotary International, Siemens, Target, Unilever, Verizon, Walmart, Yahoo, and Ze-gen.”
- BuzzFeed: Two of Hillary Clinton’s Top Donors Were Major Felons
When Hillary Clinton ran for president in 2008, two of her biggest fundraisers were conducting massive Ponzi schemes. One was Hsu, who posed as a garment tycoon, and is now serving a 24-year sentence in federal prison in Milan, Michigan. The other, Hassan Nemazee, is serving a 12-year sentence in Otisville, New York, for bank fraud. He used fake documents and nonexistent loans to trick bankers into extending him more credit,”reports Ben Smith of BuzFeed. “Those two convictions cast light on a central perplexity of the 2016 presidential cycle, and its ‘Clinton Cash‘ phase: Why are shady people with murky interests always hanging around political superstars, and particularly Bill and Hillary Clinton?”
- Daily Beast: Clintons’ Charity Scored Millions from Qatar and Donations from Corrupt FIFA Soccer Organization
“The Clinton global charity has received between $50,000 and $100,000 from soccer’s governing body and has partnered with the Fédération Internationale de Football Association on several occasions, according to donor listings on the foundation’s website,”reports The Daily Beast. “Qatar 2022 committee gave the foundation between $250,000 and $500,000 in 2014 and the State of Qatar gave between $1 million and $5 million in previous, unspecified years.”
- Associated Press: The Clintons’ Have a Secret “Pass-Through” Company—WJC, LLC
“The newly released financial files on Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton’s growing fortune omit a company with no apparent employees or assets that the former president has legally used to provide consulting and other services, but which demonstrates the complexity of the family’s finances,” reported the AP. “The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to provide private details of the former president’s finances on the record, said the entity was a ‘pass-through’ company designed to channel payments to the former president.”
Bill Clinton company shows complexity of family finances
WASHINGTON (AP) — The newly released financial files on Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton's growing fortune omit a company with no apparent employees or assets that the former president has legally used to provide consulting and other services, but which demonstrates the complexity of the family's finances.
Because the company, WJC, LLC, has no financial assets, Hillary Clinton's campaign was not obligated to report its existence in her recent financial disclosure report, officials with Bill Clinton's private office and the Clinton campaign said. They were responding to questions by The Associated Press, which reviewed corporate documents.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to provide private details of the former president's finances on the record, said the entity was a "pass-through" company designed to channel payments to the former president.
Under federal ethics disclosure rules, declared candidates do not have to report assets worth less than $1,000. But the company's existence demonstrates the complexity of tracking the Clintons' finances as Hillary Clinton ramps up her presidential bid.
While Bill Clinton's lucrative speeches have provided the bulk of the couple's income, earning as much as $50 million during his wife's four-year term as secretary of state in the Obama administration, the former president has also sought to branch out into other business activities in recent years. Little is known about the exact nature and financial worth of Bill Clinton's non-speech business interests.
The identities of several U.S and foreign-based companies and foundations that Bill Clinton worked for have been disclosed in Hillary Clinton's recent financial report as well as in earlier reports during her stint as secretary of state.
Under federal disclosure rules for spouses' earned income, Hillary Clinton was only obligated to identify the source of her spouse's income and confirm that he received more than $1,000. As a result, the precise amounts of Bill Clinton's earned income from consulting have not been disclosed, and it's not known how much was routed through WJC, LLC.
WJC, LLC was set up in Delaware in 2008 and again in 2013 and in New York in 2009, according to documents obtained by The AP. The company did not appear among holdings in the Clintons' financial disclosure released last week or in previous Hillary Clinton disclosure reports between 2008 and 2013, when she resigned as secretary of state. Bill Clinton signed a document as its "authorizing person" in a corporate filing in Delaware in 2013.
A limited liability company is a commonly used business structure that provides tax advantages and limited legal protection for the assets of company owners and partners.
The purpose of Bill Clinton's U.S.-based company was not disclosed in any of the corporate filings in Delaware and New York, but State Department files recently reviewed by the AP show that WJC, LLC surfaced in emails from Bill Clinton's aides to the department's ethics officials.
In February 2009, Clinton's counselor, Douglas Band, asked State Department ethics officials to clear Bill Clinton's consulting work for three companies owned by influential Democratic party donors. Memos sent by Band proposed that Bill Clinton would provide "consulting services regarding geopolitical, economic and social trends affecting the entity and philanthropic opportunities" through the WJC, LLC entity.
State Department officials approved Bill Clinton's consulting work for longtime friend Steve Bing's Shangri-La Industries and another with Wasserman Investments, GP, a firm run by entertainment executive and Democratic party donor Casey Wasserman. The ethics officials turned down Bill Clinton's proposed work with a firm run by entertainment magnate and Democratic donor Haim Saban because of Saban's active role in Mideast political affairs.
WJC, LLC was also cited by Band in a June 2011 memo sent to State Department ethics officials asking for clearance to allow Bill Clinton to advise Band's international consulting company, Teneo Strategy LLC. Band's request said Teneo would use "consulting services provided by President Clinton through WJC, LLC." State Department officials approved the three-year contract between the two companies.
None of the proposals detailed how much Bill Clinton would be paid.
While Hillary Clinton's 2011 federal disclosure report did not mention WJC, LLC, it reported that Bill Clinton received "non-employee compensation over $1,000 from Teneo," but did not disclose a more precise amount. Federal disclosure rules require the spouses of filers to disclose the identity of any income sources over $1,000, but they do not have to provide exact figures.
Pass-through, or shell, companies became an issue in the 2012 presidential campaign when Republican candidate Mitt Romney disclosed a private equity entity worth $1.9 million despite failing to report the company on his previous federal disclosure. Romney aides said the company previously held no assets but then received the $1.9 million "true up" payment — a catch-up payment to make up for private equity fees from defunct investment advisory businesses that had not been previously paid.
Hillary Clinton has yet to release the names and amounts of the payments that flowed through the hidden WJC, LLC, company.
- New York Times: Hillary Funneled $10K Monthly Payments to Sidney Blumenthal Through Clinton Foundation
“An examination by The Times suggests that Mr. Blumenthal’s involvement was more wide-ranging and more complicated than previously known, embodying the blurry lines between business, politics and philanthropy that have enriched and vexed the Clintons and their inner circle for years,” reports the Times. “While advising Mrs. Clinton on Libya, Mr. Blumenthal, who had been barred from a State Department job by aides to President Obama, was also employed by her family’s philanthropy, the Clinton Foundation…and worked on and off as a paid consultant to Media Matters and American Bridge, organizations that helped lay the groundwork for Mrs. Clinton’s 2016 campaign.”
- New Yorker: Bill Clinton Scored a $500,000 Speech in Moscow Paid for by a Kremlin-backed Bank
The New Yorker confirms Clinton Cash’s reporting that Bill Clinton bagged $500,000 for a Moscow speech paid for by “a Russian investment bank that had ties to the Kremlin.”
“Why was Bill Clinton taking any money from a bank linked to the Kremlin while his wife was Secretary of State?” asks the New Yorker. To date, Hillary Clinton nor her campaign have answered that question.
- Washington Post: Hillary Clinton’s Brother Sits on the Board of a Mining Co. that Received a Coveted Haitian “Gold Exploitation Permit” that Has Only Twice Been Awarded in 50 Years. Rodham Met the Mining Executive in Charge of the Company at a Clinton Foundation Event.
“In interviews with The Washington Post, both Rodham and the chief executive of Delaware-based VCS Mining said they were introduced at a meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative—an offshoot of the Clinton Foundation that critics have long alleged invites a blurring of its charitable mission with the business interests of Bill and Hillary Clinton and their corporate donors.”
“Asked whether he attends CGI meetings to explore personal business opportunities, Rodham responded, ‘No, I go to see old friends. But you never know what can happen.’”
- New York Times: Court Proceedings Reveal Hillary’s Brother Claimed Admits Clinton Foundation and the Clintons Are Key to His Haiti Connections
“I deal through the Clinton Foundation,” Tony Rodham said according to a transcript of his testimony obtained by The Times. “That gets me in touch with the Haitian officials. I hound my brother-in-law [Bill Clinton], because it’s his fund that we’re going to get our money from. And he can’t do it until the Haitian government does it.”
- Wall Street Journal: Clinton Foundation Violated Memorandum of Understanding with the Obama Admin. By Keeping Secret a Foreign Donation of Two Million Shares of Stock from a Foreign Executive with Business Before Hillary’s State Dept.
Clinton Cash revealed that Canadian mining tycoon Stephen Dattels scored an “open pit mining” concession at the Phulbari Mines in Bangladesh where his Polo Resources had investments. The coveted perk came just two months after Polo Resources gave the Clinton Foundation 2,000,000 shares of stock—a donation the Clinton Foundation kept hidden.
- New York Times: Hillary Clinton’s Campaign Claims She Had No Idea Her State Dept. Was Considering Approving the Transfer of 20% of U.S. Uranium to the Russian Govt.—Even as the Clinton Foundation Bagged $145 Million in Donations from Investors in the Deal
In a 4,000-word front-page New York Times investigation, the Times confirmed in granular detail Clinton Cash’s reporting that Hillary’s State Dept. was one of nine agencies approving the sale of Uranium One to the Russian government. “The sale gave the Russians control of one-fifth of all uranium production capacity in the United States,” reports the Times.
The Times then published a detailed table and infographic cataloging the $145 million in donations to the Clinton Foundation made by uranium executives involved in the Russian transfer of 20% of all U.S. uranium.
- Bloomberg: A For-Profit University Put Bill Clinton on Its Payroll and Scored a Jump in Funding from Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. WhenClinton Cash Revealed the Scheme, Bill Clinton Quickly Resigned.
Even as Hillary Clinton and Democrats continue to blast for-profit colleges and universities, Hillary Clinton’s campaign continues to stonewall questions about how much Bill Clinton was paid by Laureate International Universities, one of the largest for-profit education companies in the world—and an organization that has underwritten Clinton Foundation events. As soon as Clinton Cash revealed Bill Clinton spent years on Laureate’s payroll, the former president quickly resigned.
According to an analysis by Bloomberg: “in 2009, the year before Bill Clinton joined Laureate, the nonprofit received 11 grants worth $9 million from the State Department or the affiliated USAID. In 2010, the group received 14 grants worth $15.1 million. In 2011, 13 grants added up to $14.6 million. The following year, those numbers jumped: IYF received 21 grants worth $25.5 million, including a direct grant from the State Department.”
Hillary Clinton has refused to answer questions about the Clintons’ income from the for-profit education company.
- New York Times: The Head of the Russian Govt’s Uranium Company Ian Telfer Made Secret Donations Totaling $2.35 Million to the Clinton Foundation—as Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. Approved the Transfer of 20% of All U.S. Uranium to the Russians
Ian Telfer, the former head of the Russian-owned uranium company, Uranium One, funneled $2.35 million to the Clinton Foundation—donations that were never revealed until Clinton Cash reported them and the New York Times confirmed them.
Hillary Clinton has yet to answer a single question about Uranium One.
- Washington Post: Bill and Hillary Clinton Have Made at Least $26 Million in Speaking Fees from Entities Who Are Top Clinton Foundation Donors
According to the Post’s independent analysis, “Bill Clinton was paid more than $100 million for speeches between 2001 and 2013, according to federal financial disclosure forms filed by Hillary Clinton during her years as a senator and as secretary of state.”
The Post added: “Bill Clinton was paid at least $26 million in speaking fees by companies and organizations that are also major donors to the foundation he created after leaving the White House, according to a Washington Post analysis of public records and foundation date.”
- Washington Free Beacon: Former Clinton Campaign Operative-Turned-ABC News Host George Stephanopoulos Failed to Disclose His $75,000 Donation and Deep Involvement in the Clinton Foundation Before Launching an Attack Interview Against Clinton Cash Author
Clinton political operative-turned-ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos infamously hid his $75,000 Clinton Foundation donation from ABC News viewers before launching a partisan attack “interview” with Clinton Cash author Peter Schweizer.
Roundly condemned by numerous journalists, Stephanopoulos apologized and received zero punishment from ABC News. Hillary Clinton’s campaign then used footage from the Stephanopoulos’ attack “interview” with Schweizer in its political campaign videos.
“It was outrageous,” said former ABC News anchor Carole Simpson.
Hillary Clinton has yet to answer whether her campaign coordinated with Clinton Foundation donor George Stephanopoulos.
- CNBC: Clinton Foundation Mega Donor Frank Holmes Claimed He Sold Uranium One Before Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. Approved the Russian Transfer—Despite His Company’s Own SEC Filings Proving Otherwise
In a highly embarrassing CNBC grilling, Clinton mega donor and uranium executive Frank Holmes claimed he sold his Uranium One stock well before Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. greenlit the transfer of 20% of all U.S. uranium to the Russian government in 2010.
However, according to his company’s, U.S. Global Investors, own 2011 SEC filing, Holmes’ company did, in fact, still hold Uranium One stock, a point he later conceded.
- Politico: Hillary’s Foundation Accepted $1 Million from Human Rights Violator Morocco for a Lavish Event
“The event is being funded largely by a contribution of at least $1 million from OCP, a phosphate exporter owned by Morocco’s constitutional monarchy, according to multiple sources with direct knowledge of the event,” reports Politico. “But in 2011, Clinton’s State Department had accused the Moroccan government of ‘arbitrary arrests and corruption in all branches of government.’”
ABC News similarly confirmed the Clinton Foundation’s acceptance of the unseemly funds.
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Hillary Clinton has refused to substantively answer a single question related to the above 21 revelations, or the scores of others not reflected above.
In answer to a question about Clinton Cash, Bill Clinton said the book “won’t fly.” The book has remained on the New York Times bestseller list three weeks in a row after debuting at number two.
Now, with Hillary Clinton’s poll ratings at all-time lows, Americans and the nation’s journalists eagerly await the chance to hear Hillary Clinton’s answers to the growing mountain of Clinton Cash-related revelations, investigative findings that have consumed and imperiled her candidacy.
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