Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation

Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation

Overview

* Assets: $323,470,879 (2017)
* Grants Received: $26,566,825 (2017)
* Grants Awarded: $2,420,380 (2017)


See also:  Bill Clinton   Hillary Rodham Clinton

Originally based in Little Rock, Arkansas and known as the William J. Clinton Foundation, the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation was established by former U.S. President Bill Clinton in 2001 “to alleviate poverty, improve global health, strengthen economies, and protect the environment.” Claiming to be politically nonpartisan, the Foundation administers several major programs, of which the best-known is the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI).

The Clinton Global Initiative

Incorporated in 2005 as an independent nonprofit, CGI aims to persuade wealthy businesspeople to pledge money to Clinton Foundation programs. Former World Wildlife Fund president David Sandalow, who served as a senior environmental official in the Clinton administration, chairs the CGI Working Group. The Working Group’s advisory board is composed of such luminaries as Natural Resources Defense Council president Frances Beinecke; President Clinton’s former Environmental Protection Agency administrator Carol Browner; Pew Center on Global Climate Change president Eileen Claussen; Environmental Defense president Fred Krupp; and Sun Microsystems co-founder Vinod Khosla, an ethanol advocate who supported California’s failed Proposition 87, which would have imposed new taxes on that state’s oil producers. Other key CGI working groups are headed by senior fellows at the Center for American Progress who previously worked for the Clinton administration: Clinton economic advisor Gene Sperling chairs the CGI Education Working Group; Clinton National Security Council staffer Gayle Smith chairs the CGI Poverty-Alleviation Working Group; and Thomas Kalil, deputy director of Clinton’s National Economic Council, chairs the CGI Global Health Working Group.

CGI hosts annual Clinton Global Summits where affluent business moguls, who pay $15,000 apiece to attend, pledge money to CGI programs. Among those who attended in 2007 were high-ranking officials of Wal-Mart, PepsiCo, Duke Energy, Starbucks, the Carnegie Corporation, and the NoVo Foundation. Also on hand were former Vice President Al Gore, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Evangelical Environmental Network president Jim Ball, actors Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Afghan president Hamid Karzai, and media giants Rupert Murdoch and Ted Turner. At this 2007 Summit, Bill Clinton advocated a form of Cap-and-Trade that would raise energy prices while purportedly reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Some CGI activities, such as this greenhouse-gas initiative, are of a highly political nature. Others, however, are not politicized – particularly those that focus their philanthropy on impoverished peoples in Africa.

At the 2009 Clinton Global Summit, attendees included Barack Obama, Jordan’s Queen Rania Al Abdullah, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Al Gore, Wangari Maathai, and actors Brad Pitt and Matt Damon.

Additional Programs of the Clinton Foundation

Additional major initiatives of the Clinton Foundation include the following:

A) The Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI): Established in 2002 as the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative, this program is dedicated to “expanding access to care and treatment for HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis … in developing countries.” In its earliest months, BHCCF brokered price cuts by generic drug producers of AIDS drugs, organizing a cooperative that enabled more than 70 poor nations to purchase those medicines at discounted rates. The driving force behind this initiative is Ira C. Magaziner, a longtime Bill Clinton ally who engineered Hillary Clinton’s failed attempt at a healthcare overhaul in the early 1990s.

B) Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI): Created in 2006 “to create and advance solutions to the core issues driving climate change,” CCI is founded on the premise that human industrial activity, by emitting greenhouse gases (GHG), causes global warming. To address this problem, CCI has created such projects as energy retrofits for homes and businesses, low-GHG-emitting outdoor lighting, and improved waste management for American cities. CCI also promotes clean-energy alternatives to fossil fuels, which it says “account for about 60 percent of greenhouse gas emissions globally.” Moreover, CCI seeks to curtail “deforestation in tropical countries,” which it calls “a major contributor to climate change.”

C) Alliance for a Healthier Generation: Asserting that “in the past 20 years, childhood obesity rates have doubled and are now at epidemic rates,” this initiative supports a Healthy Schools Program that encourages schools to stock their vending machines with non-fattening foods; urges students to “bring in healthy snacks for school parties”; and exhorts parents to “work with your child’s school to organize ‘healthy’ fundraisers like walk-a-thons.”

D) Clinton Economic Opportunity Initiative (CEOI): This Initiative was established in 2002 “to reduce economic inequity and accelerate economic progress in the United States by helping individuals become more financially stable and businesses in underserved communities to grow.” CEOI’s Entrepreneurship Program “promotes business-to-business public service, helping entrepreneurs reach higher levels of success”; the Financial Mainstream Program “helps people access lower-cost, safer financial services, and the support they need to develop and sustain good financial habits.”

E) Clinton Development Initiative (CDI): At the inaugural meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative in 2005, Scottish philanthropist Tom Hunter, the wealthiest man in Scotland, committed “to invest $100 million over ten years to encourage sustainable economic growth in the developing world” – principally Africa. Today, CDI “works to increase farmers’ access to fertilizer, seeds, irrigation, and other farming inputs, and to identify and develop new markets for agricultural outputs.”

An Apparent Quid Pro Quo Donation to the Clinton Foundation

In 2004, New York developer Robert Congel donated $100,000 to the Clinton Foundation. Soon thereafter, Senator Hillary Clinton reportedly helped Congel access millions of dollars in federal assistance for his mall project.

Collecting Donations to Fund the Clinton Presidential Library

The Clinton Foundation has collected many millions of dollars in donations to fund the Clinton Presidential Library. As of 2004, at least 57 separate donors had given $1 million or more. Among these were Hollywood director-producer Steven Spielberg and his actress wife Kate Capshaw; movie producer Stephen Bing; insurance magnate Peter Lewis; and the Soros Foundation, which is the European arm of George Soros’s Open Society Institute. Another notable donor was Denise Rich — ex-wife of Marc Rich, a billionaire fugitive who had fled to Switzerland to avoid prosecution for 51 counts of racketeering, wire fraud, tax fraud, tax evasion, and illegal oil transactions with Iran; Mrs. Rich gave the Clinton Foundation $450,000.

Donation to ACORN

In 2006, the Clinton Foundation gave $250,000 to the famously corrupt, pro-socialist, community organization ACORN.

The Clintons Claim Tax Deductions for Donations They Made to Their Own Foundation

Between 2001 and 2008, the Bill and Hillary Clinton claimed deductions for $10.2 million in charitable contributions, all of which went to their family foundation.

The Foundation Refuses to Reveal Information About Its Lucrative Sale of Stock in a Firm with Ties to the Chinese Government

In January 2009, the Washington Times reported that a secret party had paid an excessive sum for stock donated to the Clinton Foundation:

“Former President Bill Clinton’s foundation, despite identifying more than 200,000 of its donors in recent weeks, will not say who paid it windfall prices for stock in a struggling Internet firm with links to the Chinese government…. Mrs. Clinton’s office and the foundation have declined to answer questions about a lucrative 2006 stock transaction, details of which were reported by The Washington Times in March 2008.

“The Accoona Corp. donated between $250,001 and $500,000 to [the Clinton Foundation] after [Mr. Clinton] spoke at the company’s launch in New York in 2004, according to donor information released by the foundation in December. The foundation sold its Accoona stock for $700,000 two years later, according to the charity’s tax return for 2006.

“Despite what the tax return suggests, Accoona struggled mightily to turn a profit. In 2007, Accoona filed a prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission reporting more than $60 million in losses during three years. In the same prospectus, it listed the China Daily Information Corp., a subsidiary of China Daily, the official English-language newspaper of the Chinese government, as an official partner and 6.9 percent owner of the company…. While the Clinton Foundation voluntarily disclosed the original donation of the stock, it still is unwilling to say who was willing to pay so much for its holdings in the struggling company.”

Financial Mismanagement and Lucrative Sponsorships

In 2007-2008, the Clinton Foundation found itself competing against Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign for donors amid an economic recession. As a result, the Foundation ran a $40 million deficit during those two years. An August 2013 New York Times story provided numerous details about the Foundation’s financial dealings and mismanagement:

It ran multimillion-dollar deficits for several years, despite vast amounts of money flowing in. And concern was rising inside and outside the organization about Douglas J. Band, a onetime personal assistant to Mr. Clinton who had started a lucrative corporate consulting firm — which Mr. Clinton joined as a paid adviser — while overseeing the Clinton Global Initiative, the foundation’s glitzy annual gathering … that draws hundreds of business leaders and heads of state to New York City where attendees are pushed to make specific philanthropic commitments. Today, big-name companies vie to buy sponsorships at prices of $250,000 and up, money that has helped subsidize the foundation’s annual operating costs.

In 2012 the Clinton Foundation and two subsidiaries had revenues of more than $214 million, but still ran a deficit of over $8 million.

Muslim Brotherhood Connection

In the latter half of 2012, a Clinton Foundation employee named Gehad el-Haddad left his job there to take a full-time position with the Muslim Brotherhood. According to the Washington Free Beacon, Haddad’s tenure at the Clinton Foundation actually “overlapped with his official work for the Muslim Brotherhood, which began in Cairo in February 2011 when he assumed control of the Renaissance Project, a Brotherhood-backed economic recovery program.” Egyptian media describe the Renaissance Project as a program designed to implement the radical Islamization of Egyptian society. As the Egypt Independent reported in 2012:

“Renaissance is far more than the electoral program of [Egyptian] President Mohamed Morsi or the Brotherhood’s political wing, the Freedom and Justice Party. It is a 25-year project to reform state, business and civil society, rooted in the Brotherhood’s Islamic values but conditioned by the experiences of the project’s founders in the modern economy…. [Haddad] officially became a senior adviser for foreign affairs in Morsi’s Freedom and Justice Party in May 2011, when he was still claiming to be employed by the Clinton Foundation.”

In Egyptian media during Morsi’s tenure as president, Haddad was a frequent apologist for the Brotherhood’s violent crackdowns on civil liberties throughout the country. In September 2013 Haddad was arrested by Egyptian authorities in an ongoing roundup of seditious Islamist militants. Eric Trager, a Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and an expert on Egyptian affairs, said:

“It was only a matter of time before Gehad el-Haddad was arrested. Many of the other Muslim Brotherhood spokesmen have been apprehended, and in addition to decapitating the organization, the military-backed government has been specifically targeting the Brotherhood’s media wing, including by shutting down its TV stations at the time of [Egyptian President Mohammed] Morsi’s ouster on July 3. It has also gone after those connected to Morsi’s presidential office, and Gehad’s father is Morsi adviser and Muslim Brotherhood Guidance Office member Essam el-Haddad.”

Troubling Donors

In an effort to prevent foreign governments, organizations, and individuals from influencing the policy decisions of American national leaders, campaign-finance laws prohibit U.S. political candidates from accepting money from such sources. But as the Washington Post noted in February 2015, the Clinton Foundation “has given donors a way [i.e., an avenue by which] to potentially gain favor with the Clintons outside the traditional political [donation] limits.” As of February 2015, the Foundation had raised at least $42 million from foreign governments and $170 million from other foreign entities and individuals. Moreover, foreign sources accounted for about one third of all donors who had given the Clinton Foundation more than $1 million, and over half of those who had contributed more than $5 million to the Foundation. Some noteworthy facts:

* In 2002 the government of Brunei gave between $1 million and $5 million to the Clinton Foundation, to help finance the construction of the Clinton Presidential Library in Arkansas.

* As of December 2008, the Clinton Foundation had received between $1 million and $5 million from Issam Fares, an entrepreneur and philanthropist who once served as deputy prime minister of Lebanon. In the United States, Fares is best known as the CEO of the Wedge Foundation, a Houston-based investment firm. But in his native Lebanon, he is better known as an outspoken supporter of Hezbollah and an apologist for the Syrian dictatorship’s previous military occupation of his country:

  • In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, Fares insisted that “it is a mistake to make a comparison between the al-Qaeda network” and Hezbollah. The latter was actually a “resistance party fighting the Israeli occupation,” Fares said, explaining that “Hezbollah did not carry out any resistance operation against American interests in Lebanon or abroad and did not target civilians in its resistance activities as happened on Sept. 11 at the World Trade Center.”
  • During a September 2004 address to the United Nations, Fares again described Hezbollah in positive terms as a “national resistance movement” that “has played an important role in forcing Israeli withdrawal from South Lebanon.” In the same speech, Fares condemned “Israeli forces” for their presence on the Lebanon’s border with the Golan Heights, while excusing Syria’s far more brutal occupation of Lebanon. The Syrian forces in Lebanon, he said, “are on our territory upon the request of the Lebanese government.”

* The United Arab Emirates has been another rich source of revenue for the Clinton Foundation:

  • As of December 2008, the Clinton Foundation had received between $1 million and $5 million from the Dubai Foundation (DF), which was headed by Dubai’s Prime Minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum. Previously, DF had donated at least 1 million United Arab Emirate (UAE) dirhams (approximately $270,000 U.S.) to “the families of the Palestinian martyrs”—that is, Palestinian terrorists killed in action. And in November of 2006, the sheikh sponsored a concert by Lebanese songstress Julia Bourtos in honor of “Lebanese Martyrs” in Hezbollah.
  • Also as of December 2008, the Clinton Foundation had received between $1 million and $5 million from the royal family of Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, who served as president of the United Arab Emirates from 1971-2004. In 1999, this same family established the (now-defunct) Zayed Center for Coordination and Follow-Up, which became a notorious platform for anti-Semites, Holocaust deniers, and supporters of terrorism.

* Another of the Clinton Foundation’s leading donors is the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which, as of 2008, had contributed between $10 million and $25 million to the Foundation.

  • In addition to direct contributions from the Saudi government, the Clinton Foundation had also received between $1 million and $5 million from the pro-Saudi advocacy group, Friends of Saudi Arabia (FSA). Launched in 2005 and supported by the Saudi royal family, this group acts as a kind of public-relations agency, protesting what it views as the U.S. media’s unfair portrayal of the Saudi nation. Prior the release of the 2007 film The Kingdom, for example, FSA executive director Michael Saba wrote a letter to the chairman of Universal Studios expressing his concern “that the movie might present negative stereotypes about the people of Saudi Arabia.” Notably, Saba himself is an anti-Israel zealot and conspiracy theorist. His 1984 book, The Armageddon Network, alleges widespread Israeli espionage at the highest levels of the U.S. government, complete with a Justice Department cover-up. In 2004 he claimed—on the basis of no evidence whatsoever—that Israeli interrogators had played a role in the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2003.

* In August 2016, the Daily Caller reported: “Former President Bill Clinton collected $5.6 million in fees from GEMS Education, a Dubai-based company [incorporated in the Cayman Islands] that teaches Sharia Law through its network of more than 100 schools in the Middle East, Asia and Africa…. The company’s finances strictly adhere to ‘Sharia Finance,’ which includes giving ‘zakat,’ a religious tax of which one-eighth of the proceeds is dedicated to funding Islamic jihad. The company also contributed millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation. The former president served as honorary chairman for GEMS Education from 2011 to 2014.”

* In 2013, Rilin Enterprises—a privately-held Chinese construction and trade conglomerate headed by the Chinese parliament delegate Wang Wenliang—pledged $2 million to the Clinton Foundation’s endowment. According to CBS News: “Public records show the firm has spent $1.4 million since 2012, lobbying Congress and the State Department. The firm owns a strategic port along the border with North Korea and was also one of the contractors that built the Chinese embassy in Washington. That contract is a direct tie to the Chinese government, according to Jim Mann, who has written several books on China’s relationship with the U.S.”

* In 2014 the government of Germany—as a first-time donor—gave the Clinton Foundation between $100,000 and $250,000.

* In 2014 the government of the United Arab Emirates—also a first-time donor—gave the Foundation between $1 million and $5 million.

* In 2013-14 the government of Australia gave the Foundation several million dollars.

* In 2014 a Qatari government committee gave the Foundation between $250,000 and $500,000. Previously, Qatar’s government had donated between $1 million and $5 million to the Foundation.

While all of these donations from foreign sources raise a host of ethical red flags, contributions that were made during Hillary Clinton’s tenure (2009-13) as Secretary of State (SOS) may be even more significant, given the possibility that such funds could be used to buy immediate political influence. During that period, the Clinton Foundation received millions of dollars in donations from seven foreign governments: Australia, Norway, the Dominican Republic, Algeria, Kuwait, Oman, and Qatar (the latter of which spent more than $5.3 million on registered lobbyists while Clinton was SOS).

The government of Saudi Arabia suspended its contributions to the Foundation during Mrs. Clinton’s years as SOS, and then resumed its giving after she stepped down in 2013.

Overlap of Domestic Donors to the Clinton Foundation and Hillary Clinton’s Political Campaigns

A Washington Post review of Clinton Foundation data through 2014, found “substantial overlap between the Clinton political machinery and the [F]oundation.” For example, almost half of the major donors who were supporting Ready for Hillary, an organization promoting Mrs. Clinton’s anticipated 2016 presidential run, and nearly half of the bundlers from Hillary’s 2008 campaign, had given $10,000 or more to the Clinton Foundation, either personally or through foundations or businesses which they themselves headed. As of early 2015, for instance, Clinton friend and fundraiser Susie Tompkins Buell had given the Clinton Foundation some $10 million from her eponymous charitable fund. Another leading Clinton supporter, billionaire Haim Saban, had given an estimated $25 million to the Foundation.

Overlap of Key Personnel Involved with the Clinton Foundation and Clinton Political Campaigns

* The Washington Post noted on February 15, 2015: “The overlap between the Clintons’ political network and their charitable work was apparent [on February 13], when Dennis Cheng stepped down as the [F]oundation’s chief development officer ahead of his expected role as a key fundraiser for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign.”

* Former Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe — who served as manager and chief fundraiser of Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign — sits on the Clinton Foundation’s board of directors and is one of its leading fundraisers.

* Clinton Foundation chief executive officer Bruce Lindsey was a senior advisor in the Bill Clinton White House.

* Clinton Foundation board member Cheryl Mills served not only as deputy White House counsel in the Clinton administration, but also as general counsel for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.

2011-2013

In 2011, John Podesta, who served as chief of staff in Bill Clinton’s White House, stepped in for several months as the Clinton Foundation’s temporary chief executive. Also in 2011, Chelsea Clinton formally joined the Foundation’s board.

In 2013 the Clinton Foundation, with its 350 employees in 180 countries, adopted its new name and relocated its headquarters to Midtown Manhattan, occupying two floors of the Time-Life Building. Moreover, the New York Times reported: “Worried that the foundation’s operating revenues depend too heavily on Mr. Clinton’s nonstop fund-raising, the three Clintons are embarking on a drive to raise an endowment of as much as $250 million.”

Donors to the Clinton Foundation Receive Prestigious State Department Awards

During Hillary Clinton’s tenure (2009-13) as Secretary of State, 22 of the 37 corporations nominated for the State Department’s prestigious Award for Corporate Excellence—and 6 of the 8 ultimate winners of that award—were also donors to the Clinton Foundation. As the Washington Examiner reports:

  • “Silicon Valley giant Cisco was the biggest foundation contributor nominated in 2009, giving the Clinton charity between $1 million and $5 million. The company then won the award in 2010 when eight of the 12 finalists and two of the three winners had donated to the foundation.”
  • “The other Clinton contributor to win that year, candy-maker Mars, Inc., had given between $25,000 and $50,000. Coca-Cola was the most generous foundation donor to be honored as a finalist in 2010, giving a $5-10 million donation.”
  • “TOM’s Shoes, a 2009 winner for its work in Argentina, donated between $100,000 and $250,000. The other 2009 winner, Trilogy International Partners, gave between $50,000 and $100,000 to the Clinton Foundation. Overall, seven of the 10 finalists in 2009 were foundation donors.”
  • Seven of the 12 finalists for the award in 2011 gave to the charity. One of the winners, Procter & Gamble, had contributed $1-5 million.”
  • “Tiger Machinery, a 2011 finalist, is the Russian dealer of Caterpillar, Inc. tractors and other heavy equipment. Caterpillar gave between $1,000 and $5,000 to the Clinton Foundation.
  • “Intel, another Silicon Valley giant, was nominated for an award each year of Clinton’s time in office, winning the award in 2012. The technology company donated between $250,000 and $500,000.”
  • “Five of the eight finalists and one of the two winners were foundation donors in 2012. A finalist that year, Esso Angola, is an international subsidiary of Exxon-Mobil, a prolific contributor to the Clinton Foundation. Exxon-Mobil gave between $1 million and $5 million.”

Clinton Foundation Spends Little of Its Revenues on Direct Aid

According to a review of IRS documents by The Federalist, between 2009-12 the Clinton Foundation raised over $500 million in total. A mere 15% of that, or $75 million, went towards programmatic grants. The other $425 million was allocated as follows: more than $25 million went for travel expenses; almost $110 million for employee salaries and benefits; and $290 million for “other expenses.”

In 2013 the Clinton Foundation took in more than $140 million in grants and pledges, and spent $84.6 million on “functional expenses” including payroll. A mere $9 million (scarcely 6%) went to direct aid. According to the Sunlight Foundation‘s Bill Allison, “It seems like the Clinton Foundation operates as a slush fund for the Clintons.” Charity Navigator, an independent nonprofit corporation that evaluates the financial health, accountability, and transparency of charities in the United States, refused to rate the Clinton Foundation, citing an inability to gauge its “atypical business model.”

In 2014, the Clinton Foundation spent just over $5 million on grants and aid, as compared to: (a) $12.3 million holding “conferences, conventions and meetings”; (b) $6 million on travel expenses; and (c) more than $25 million on employee wages and benefits.

The Clinton Foundation Misreports Tens of Millions of Dollars It Received from Foreign Governments

When it was revealed in early 2015 that the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Health Access Initiative had misreported (on the form 990s that all non-profit organizations must file annually with the IRS to maintain their tax-exempt status) tens of millions of dollars in donations they had received from governments around the world, both charities announced that they would refile at least five years of tax returns.

According to the Daily Mail: “For three years in a row beginning in 2010, the Clinton Foundation reported to the IRS that it received zero in funds from foreign and U.S. governments, a dramatic fall-off from the tens of millions of dollars in foreign government contributions reported in preceding years. Those entries were errors, according to the foundation: several foreign governments continued to give tens of millions of dollars toward the foundation’s work on climate change and economic development through this three-year period.”

Hillary Resigns from the Clinton Foundation Board

Hillary Clinton resigned from the Clinton Foundation’s board when she announced her presidential candidacy in April 2015.

Quid Pro Quo: Donations to the Clinton Foundation, in Exchange for Policy FavorsIn his 2015 book Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich, author Peter Schweizer writes: “During Hillary’s years of public service, the Clintons have conducted or facilitated hundreds of large transactions. Some of these transactions have put millions in their own pockets.”From 2001-13, Bill Clinton earned a total of $105 million from appearance and speaking fees, foreign and domestic. Approximately $48 million of that total came during his wife’s four-year (2009-13) stint as Secretary of State (SOS). More than half of the $48 million was paid by foreign companies, including some based in China, Japan, Canada, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and the Cayman Islands. “Of the 13 Clinton speeches that fetched $500,000 or more,” writes Schweizer, “only two occurred during the years his wife was not secretary of state.”

Schweizer says he found a clear “pattern of financial transactions involving the Clintons that occurred contemporaneous with favorable U.S. policy decisions benefiting those providing the funds.”

One such transaction involved the State Department’s backing of a 2010 free-trade agreement with Colombia that benefited Pacific Rubiales, a Canadian-based petroleum exploration and production company founded by Clinton Foundation donor and board member Frank Giustra. During her presidential campaign just two years earlier, Hillary Clinton had opposed the trade deal because of Colombia’s poor record on workers’ rights. But then Giustra and his company donated millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation, and by 2010 the State Department under Mrs. Clinton was heaping praise upon Colombia’s human rights record. This allowed Pacific Rubiales, whose operations were centered in Colombia and Peru, to reap huge profits.

Also noteworthy is the fact that in the aftermath of the devastating Haitian earthquake of 2010, the U.S. government awarded some highly lucrative development contracts to Clinton Foundation donors. Moreover, Hillary’s brother, Tony Rodham, was a board member of a small North Carolina mining company, VCS Mining, that in 2012 received one of only two highly coveted “gold exploitation permits” from the government of Haiti; it was the first such permit that had been issued in more than half a century.

The Clinton Foundation Rakes in Millions of Dollars, While Helping Russia Gain Control of 20% of U.S. Uranium Reserves
American political campaigns are prohibited from accepting foreign donations, but charitable foundations based in the U.S. are under no such restriction. Nevertheless, before Hillary Clinton could assume her post as President Barack Obama‘s Secretary of State in 2013, the White House—in an effort avoid the appearance of any conflicts of interest—demanded that she sign a memorandum-of-understanding that not only barred the Clinton Foundation from accepting any foreign government donations while Mrs. Clinton was in the State Department, but also required the Foundation to publicly disclose the identity of all its contributors during that time.

But the Clinton Foundation, as well as Bill and Hillary Clinton, egregiously and repeatedly violated these agreements while enriching themselves and compromising American national security. They were assisted in their malfeasance by the Obama administration. The details of what occurred were first uncovered by author Peter Schweizer in his 2015 book, Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich.

The roots of this particular matter go back to 2005, when Clinton Foundation donor and board member Frank Giustra—owner of the Canadian-based uranium mining and development company UrAsia Energy Ltd.—flew aboard his own private jet along with Bill Clinton to Almaty, Kazakhstan, where the pair dined with that nation’s authoritarian president, Nursultan Nazarbayev. In a move that contradicted and undermined American foreign policy and U.S. criticism of Kazakhstan’s poor human-rights record at that time, Mr. Clinton publicly expressed support for Nazarbayev’s bid to head an international elections monitoring group. Nazarbayev was greatly pleased by the propaganda that Clinton issued on his behalf.

Clinton’s appearance in Kazakhstan also proved extremely profitable for Frank Giustra. Just days after he and Clinton met with President Nazarbayev, UrAsia Energy Ltd. signed a preliminary deal that gave it stakes in three uranium mines controlled by Kazakhstan’s state-run uranium agency, Kazatomprom. The Kazakhstan mines have long been among the most lucrative in the world.

And Giustra’s good fortune, in turn, proved to be beneficial for Bill Clinton as well. Indeed, within a few months Giustra donated $31.3 million to the Clinton Foundation.

Fast-forward to 2007, when UrAsia merged with a South African uranium-mining company named Uranium One, which had assets in Africa and Australia. The newly formed entity kept the name Uranium One and was controlled by a number of UrAsia investors. One of those investors was a Canadian named Ian Telfer, who became Uranium One’s chairman.

Meanwhile, Frank Giustra—whose personal stake in the $3.5 billion merger was approximately $45 million—sold his stake in 2007.

Also in 2007, Uranium One—in a bid to become “a powerhouse in the United States uranium sector with the potential to become the domestic supplier of choice for U.S. utilities”—began to purchase mining companies with uranium assets in America. In April 2007, for instance, Uranium One acquired a uranium mill in Utah, as well as 38,000+ acres of uranium exploration properties in four Western states. Soon thereafter, Uranium One purchased the Energy Metals Corporation and its uranium holdings in Wyoming, Texas and Utah.

In 2007 as well, Uranium One chairman Ian Telfer gave the Clinton Foundation a donation in an amount that did not exceed $250,000, though the exact sum is unknown.

Even after Frank Giustra’s involvement with Uranium One was finished, he maintained his close relationship with the Clinton Foundation. In the spring of 2008, Giustra pledged $100 million to the the Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative (CGSGI), a Clinton Foundation project promoting leftist environmental and labor practices in the natural resources industry. To help reach that goal, Giustra on CGSGI’s behalf held a fundraiser that generated $16 million in pledges. Ian Telfer was one of those in attendance at the fundraiser, along with such luminaries as Elton John, Shakira, Tom Cruise, John Travolta, and Robin Williams.

Through his Canadian-based family charity known as the Fernwood Foundation, Telfer also gave the Clinton Foundation millions of additional dollars in donations.

By June 2009, Uranium One had fallen on hard times. Its stock value had declined by some 40% in a year. And Moukhtar Dzhakishev, the head of Kazatomprom, had recently been arrested on charges that he had illegally sold uranium deposits to foreign companies, including some of those belonging to Uranium One. Thus, there were questions as to whether Uranium One’s licenses for the Kazakh mines were even valid anymore. Company officials were afraid that they might lose their rights to mine in Kazakhstan.

American diplomatic cables that were later made public by WikiLeaks indicated concerns that Dzhakishev’s arrest may actually have been part of a Russian scheme to seize control of the Kazakh uranium assets. Those concerns were later buttressed by documents belonging to Rosatom, the Russian atomic energy agency, indicating that Russia was indeed intent on acquiring a stake in Uranium One, given that Russia’s domestic reserves of uranium were insufficient to meet its own industry needs.

On June 10, 2009, Uranium One pressed the American Embassy in Kazakhstan, as well as Canadian diplomats, to provide Kazakh officials with official written confirmation that its mining licenses were still valid. The American Embassy made Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, to whom it ultimately reported, aware of the matter. And on June 10 and 11, the American Embassy’s energy officer met with Kazakh officials to discuss the issue.

A few days later, a wholly owned subsidiary of Rosatom completed a deal in which it acquired 17% ownership of Uranium One.

A year later, in June 2010, the Russian government made an extremely generous offer to Uranium One’s shareholders. If the offer were to be accepted, Russia would have a 51% controlling stake in Uranium One. But because Uranium One now controlled some 20% of all U.S. uranium reserves—and uranium is considered a strategic asset with implications for American national security—the deal with Russia could not be permitted without the approval of the American government. Specifically, that approval could be granted only by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which is composed of several of the most powerful members of the cabinet—the Attorney General as well as the Secretaries of the Treasury, Defense, Homeland Security, Commerce, Energy, and State. The seven Obama cabinet members who constituted the CFIUS at that time were Attorney General Eric Holder as well as the Secretaries of the Treasury (Timothy Geithner), Defense (Robert Gates), Homeland Security (Janet Napolitano), Commerce (Gary Locke), Energy (Steven Chu), and State (Hillary Clinton). Without the approval of these seven Obama administration officials, Russia’s acquisition of Uranium One could not have taken place.

The seriousness of the matter was heightened even further by the fact that the U.S. produces only about one-fifth of all the uranium it needs to run its nuclear energy plants, and most of those plants have only 18 to 36 months of uranium reserves.

Notwithstanding the enormous implications of the proposed Russian acquisition of Uranium One, the CFIUS wasted no time in approving the deal in June 2010.

Meanwhile, Bill Clinton and the Clinton Foundation were collecting millions of dollars from people associated with Uranium One. They had begun collecting these millions a few years earlier, and would continue to collect them for at least another two years thereafter. For example, Uranium One chairman Telfer used his Canadian-based family charity, the Fernwood Foundation, to make four donations to the Clinton Foundation totaling $2.35 million. These included donations of $1 million in 2009; $250,000 in 2010; $600,000 in 2011; and $500,000 in 2012. Notwithstanding Hillary Clinton’s aforementioned pledge that all donors to the Clinton Foundation would be publicly identified, these contributions from Telfer were never disclosed by the Clintons.

Moreover, a number of additional people with ties to Uranium One and the former UrAsia gave the Clinton Foundation between $1.3 million and $5.6 million in contributions.

In June 2010—the very month in which the Russian acquisition of Uranium One was approved by the CFIUS—Bill Clinton was invited to speak in Moscow for the astronomical sum of $500,000. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin personally thanked Mr. Clinton for speaking. Clinton’s half-million-dollar fee was paid by Renaissance Capital, a Russian investment bank with ties to the Kremlin. According to The New York Times: “Renaissance Capital analysts talked up Uranium One’s stock, assigning it a ‘buy’ rating and saying in a July 2010 research report that it was ‘the best play’ in the uranium markets. In addition, Renaissance Capital turned up that same year as a major donor, along with Mr. Telfer and Mr. Giustra, to a small medical charity in Colorado run by a friend of Mr. Giustra’s. In a newsletter to supporters, the friend credited Mr. Giustra with helping get donations from ‘businesses around the world.’”

Uranium One’s shareholders were alarmed by the Russian acquisition of majority control over their company. As Uranium One spokesman Sergei Novikov put it, they were “afraid of Rosatom as a Russian state giant.” In an effort to calm those investors, Rosatom chief executive Sergei Kiriyenko promised that Rosatom would not break up the company and would keep in place the same management team, including Chairman Telfer. Another Rosatom official stated publicly that the agency had no intention of increasing its investment beyond the 51% level, and that Uranium One would remain a public company. But this pledge was soon broken. Uranium One was delisted from the Toronto Stock Exchange and taken private.

In short, the Russian government—with the blessing of the Obama administration and its Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States—now controlled fully 20% of all uranium production capacity in the United States.

Four members of the House of Representatives signed a letter expressing concern about this development. Two additional House members pushed legislation designed to invalidate the deal. In a letter to President Obama, Republican Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming said the transaction “would give the Russian government control over a sizable portion of America’s uranium production capacity.” “Equally alarming,” Mr. Barrasso added, “this sale gives ARMZ”—a Russian uranium mining company that is wholly owned by Atomenergoprom, a part of Rosatom—“a significant stake in uranium mines in Kazakhstan.”

In January 2013, a Pravda headline proclaimed: “Russian Nuclear Energy Conquers the World.” As The New York Times puts it, the accompanying article The article “detailed how the Russian atomic energy agency, Rosatom, had … [become] one of the world’s largest uranium producers and brought Mr. Putin closer to his goal of controlling much of the global uranium supply chain.”

Michael McFaul, who served under Hillary Clinton as the American ambassador to Russia, says of the Russian acquisition of Uranium One: “Should we be concerned? Absolutely. Do we want Putin to have a monopoly on this? Of course we don’t. We don’t want to be dependent on Putin for anything in this climate.”

Marin Katusa, author of The Colder War: How the Global Energy Trade Slipped From America’s Grasp, has warned: “The Russians are easily winning the uranium war, and nobody’s talking about it. It’s not just a domestic issue but a foreign policy issue, too.”

Overlap Between the Clinton Foundation and Hillary Clinton’s Political CampaignsIn February 2015, it was learned that Dennis Cheng, who had raised money for Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign before becoming the Clinton Foundation’s chief development officer (a role in which he raised some $248 million for the Foundation), would now be leading the fundraising operation for Mrs. Clinton’s 2016 White House bid._

Criminals on the Clinton Foundation’s Board of Trustees
_

According to Peter Schweizer’s 2015 book, Clinton Cash, at least four members of the Clinton Foundation’s Board of Trustees have either been charged with or convicted of serious crimes, including bribery and fraud. Following is a discussion of each of these four individuals and their transgressions_.

(A) The most prominent of the four is former Clinton Foundation board member Vinod Gupta, founder and chairman of the database firm InfoUSA. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission alleges that Gupta “improperly used” such things as: “corporate funds for over $3 million of personal jet travel for Gupta and his family and friends to such destinations as South Africa, Italy, and Cancun; $2.8 million of costs associated with Gupta’s yacht; $1.3 million of personal credit card expenses; and costs associated with 28 club memberships, 20 automobiles, his homes around the country, and premiums for three personal life insurance policies.” Further, the Commission charges that Gupta “failed to inform Info’s other board members of the material fact that he had purchased shares of an Info acquisition target for his own benefit from which he obtained realized and unrealized ill-gotten gains.”In addition, Gupta paid Bill Clinton a $3 million “consulting fee,” which constituted an abuse of corporate funds that led to a shareholder lawsuit against Gupta. Eventually the company settled, agreeing to give some $13 million to shareholders. Gupta settled the civil charges without admitting or denying wrongdoing. According to an SEC press release, he agreed to pay $4,045,000 plus prejudgment interest of $1,145,400, along with a $2,240,700 civil money penalty. He was also barred “from serving as an officer or director of a public company,” and restrictions were placed “on Gupta’s voting of his Info common stock.”[1] Another former board member, the wealthy hotelier and Democratic fundraiser Sant Singh Chatwal, is a longtime friend of the Clintons who in 2014 was convicted of illegal campaign financing (including contributions to a Hillary Clinton campaign), obstruction of justice, and witness tampering. As part of his plea bargain, Chatwal agreed to pay the U.S. government $1 million.(C) Still another former board member, the Jordanian-born billionaire Victor Dahdaleh, “was charged by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) in Great Britain with paying more than 35 million pounds in bribes to executives in Bahrain to win contracts of more than 2 billion pounds,” according to _Clinton Cash. The SFO’s case against Dahdaleh, who worked for the U.S. company Alcoa as a “super-agent,” fell apart when a key witness refused to testify. Alcoa entered a guilty plea in a U.S. case related to the bribery saga and agreed to pay the Department of Justice $384 million.(D) Current Clinton Foundation board member (and energy tycoon) Rolando Gonzalez Bunster has been named in a fraud case in the Dominican Republic involving his power-generation/fuel-distribution company InterEnergy. In 2013, an anti-corruption agency within the Dominican government charged Bunster and others in relation to allegations about “ballooned” fees that they had charged to the government.

Donations from George Stephanopoulos, Longtime Clinton Ally-Turned-Newsman

In May 2015, it was learned that ABC News chief anchor George Stephanopoulos, who formerly served as communications director and senior adviser for policy and strategy to President Bill Clinton, had donated $75,000 to the Clinton Foundation during 2012-14. As Politico.com reported in May 2015, “Stephanopoulos never disclosed this information to viewers, even when interviewing author Peter Schweizer last month about his book Clinton Cash, which alleges that donations to the foundation may have influenced some of Hillary Clinton’s actions as secretary of state.”

A few days after the aforementioned interview, Schweizer reported that Stephanopoulos had been “a featured attendee and panel moderator at the annual meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI)” in 2006; “a featured attendee at the CGI annual meeting” in 2007; a panelist at the CGI annual meeting in 2008; “a panel moderator at CGI’s annual meeting” in 2009; “an official CGI member” in 2010 and 2011; and a CGI contest judge in 2013 and 2014.

Donations from Numerous Media Organizations and Individuals

On May 15, 2015, Politico.com reported that more than a dozen media organizations had made charitable contributions to the Clinton Foundation in recent years. Among them were NBC Universal, News Corporation, Turner Broadcasting, Thomson Reuters, Comcast, HBO, The Washington Post Company, Newsmax Media, Time Warner, Viacom, PBS, and the AOL Huffington Post Media Group.

Several notable individuals from the media industry also, like the aforementioned George Stephanopoulos, had given money to the Clinton Foundation. These included Carlos Slim (Mexican telecom magnate and the largest shareholder of The New York Times Company), James Murdoch (chief operating officer of 21st Century Fox), Mort Zuckerman (owner of the New York Daily News and U.S. News & World Report), Robert Allbritton (owner of Politico), Abigail Disney (documentary filmmaker), Judy Woodruff (co-anchor and managing editor of PBS NewsHour), and Richard Mellon Scaife (owner of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review).

$26 Million in Previously Undisclosed Income

Amid questions over whether it had fully complied with a 2008 ethics agreement to reveal all of its donors — and whether any of those donors might present conflicts of interest for presidential candidate Hillary Clinton — the Clinton Foundation reported on May 21, 2015 that it had received as much as $26.4 million in previously undisclosed speaking fees collected by Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton. According to The Washington Post: “Foundation officials said the funds were tallied internally as ‘revenue’ rather than donations, which is why they had not been included in the public listings of its contributors published as part of the 2008 agreement.”

Clinton State Department Awarded Billions in Arms Deals to Human-Rights-Violating Governments That Donated to the Clinton Foundation

In May 2015, the International Business Times (IBT) reported that the Clinton State Department had approved billions of dollars in arms deals with governments that donated to the Clinton Foundation even as they were infamous for their appalling human-rights records. Said IBT:

“Under Clinton’s leadership, [from October 2010 to September 2012] the State Department approved $165 billion worth of commercial arms sales to 20 nations whose governments have given money to the Clinton Foundation…. That figure … 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.

“The Clinton-led State Department also authorized $151 billion of separate Pentagon-brokered deals for 16 of the countries that donated to the Clinton Foundation, resulting in a 143 percent increase in completed sales to those nations over the same time frame during the Bush administration. These extra sales were part of a broad increase in American military exports that accompanied Obama’s arrival in the White House.

“American defense contractors also donated to the Clinton Foundation while Hillary Clinton was secretary of state and in some cases made personal payments to Bill Clinton for speaking engagements. Such firms and their subsidiaries were listed as contractors in $163 billion worth of Pentagon-negotiated deals that were authorized by the Clinton State Department between 2009 and 2012.

“The State Department formally approved these arms sales even as many of the deals enhanced the military power of countries ruled by authoritarian regimes whose human rights abuses had been criticized by the department. Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Qatar all donated to the Clinton Foundation and also gained State Department clearance to buy caches of American-made weapons even as the department singled them out for a range of alleged ills, from corruption to restrictions on civil liberties to violent crackdowns against political opponents….

“In all, governments and corporations involved in the arms deals approved by Clinton’s State Department have delivered between $54 million and $141 million to the Clinton Foundation as well as hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments to the Clinton family, according to foundation and State Department records. The Clinton Foundation publishes only a rough range of individual contributors’ donations, making a more precise accounting impossible.

“Under federal law, foreign governments seeking State Department clearance to buy American-made arms are barred from making campaign contributions — a prohibition aimed at preventing foreign interests from using cash to influence national security policy. But nothing prevents them from contributing to a philanthropic foundation controlled by policymakers….

“’The word was out to these groups that one of the best ways to gain access and influence with the Clintons was to give to this foundation,’ said Meredith McGehee, policy director at the Campaign Legal Center, an advocacy group that seeks to tighten campaign finance disclosure rules. ‘This shows why having public officials, or even spouses of public officials, connected with these nonprofits is problematic.’”

*
21 Major Revelations in _Clinton Cash_, by Peter Schweizer
*

On June 3, 2015, Breitbart News chronicled 21 major facts that Peter Schweizer’s book Clinton Cash revealed about the Clinton Foundation and the Clintons. Below are excerpts from the Breitbart piece:

  1. 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. 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.
  2. 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 [New York] 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.”
  3. 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.”
  4. 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 [International Business Times] 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.
  5. 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….
  6. 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.”
  7. 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 [Norman] 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?”
  8. 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 [FIFA] 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.” [FIFA’s corruption involved the use of bribery, fraud, and money laundering to corrupt the issuing of media and marketing rights for FIFA games in the Americas. Moreover, bribery was used in an attempt to influence clothing sponsorship contracts, the selection process for the host of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, and FIFA’s 2011 presidential election.]
  9. 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.”
  10. Hillary Funneled $10K Monthly Payments to Sidney Blumenthal Through Clinton Foundation: An examination by The [New York] 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.”
  11. 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.”
  12. 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.’”
  13. 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 [New York] 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.”
  14. 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.
  15. 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.
  16. A For-Profit University Put Bill Clinton on Its Payroll and Scored a Jump in Funding from Hillary Clinton’s State Dept.  When Clinton 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.”
  17. 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.
  18. Bill and Hillary Clinton Have Made at Least $26 Million in Speaking Fees from Entities Who Are Top Clinton Foundation Donors: According to the [Washington] 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.”
  19. 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….
  20. 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.
  21. 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.

As of June 3, 2015, Hillary Clinton had refused to substantively answer even one question related to the foregoing revelations.

Accepting Donations from Anti-Gay African Church

On June 4, 2015, the Daily Mail reported that since 2010 the Clinton Foundation had accepted between $1 million and $10 million in donations from the Cameroon Baptist Convention, an anti-gay African church that has likened homosexuals to the Devil.

The Clinton Foundation’s Secretive Activities in Sweden

In June 2015, the Washington Times reported that the Clinton Foundation had established a fundraising arm in Sweden — known as the William J. Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse (WJFI) — that had never been disclosed to, or cleared by, State Department ethics officials during Hillary Clinton’s tenure as Secretary of State, even though a Swedish government-sanctioned lottery was one of WJFI’s largest sources of revenue. At a time when the U.S. was ostensibly trying to apply economic pressure to force the government of Iran to terminate its nuclear-weapons program, career officials at the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm observed that Sweden was strengthening its economic ties with Tehran — thereby undermining the American effort. For example, U.S. intelligence officials noted that the Swedish telecommunications giant Ericsson AB was pitching cellphone tracking technology to Iran, for use by the latter’s government security services. Notwithstanding such developments, (a) the Clinton State Department elected not to blacklist any Swedish firms, and (b) WJFI collected some $26 million in donations from Swedish sources. When the Times published its June 2015 report, a WJFI spokesman told the paper that the Swedish entity was heavily involved in fighting climate change and disease in various places around the world. But the Clinton Foundation declined repeated requests from the Times to identify the names of the specific donors that had given money through its Swedish arm. A spokesman for Mrs. Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign likewise declined comment.

“This Charity Is a Fraud”

In May 2015, Wall Street analyst and longtime financial adviser Charles Ortel reported having found—after 15 months of digging into the Clinton Foundation’s public records, tax filings, and donor disclosures—that the contribution disclosures from the Foundation did not match up with individual donors’ records. He also stated that the Foundation was not in compliance with a number of state laws regarding fundraising registration, disclosure requirements, and auditing rules. “This is a charity fraud,” said Ortel. “Starting almost 20 years ago in 1997,” he added, “the Clinton Foundation spread its activities from Little Rock, Arkansas, to all U.S. states and to numerous foreign countries without taking legally required steps to function and solicit as a duly constituted public charity. I decided it would be fun to cross-check what their donors thought they did when they donated to the Clinton Foundation, and that’s when I got really irritated. There are massive discrepancies between what some of the major donors say they gave to the Clinton Foundation to do, and what the Clinton Foundation said they got from the donors and what they did with it.” For comprehensive details of Ortel’s findings, click here.

Hacked DNC Memo Reveals Multitude of Clinton Foundation Scandals

On June 20, 2016, the hacker known as “Guccifer2.0” released a hacked, 42-page, 22,000-word Democrat National Committee memo that listed a multitude of scandal-related facts that the DNC viewed as “vulnerabilities” for the presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton. According to Breitbart.com: “The document chronicles hundreds of news reports of Clinton Foundation malfeasance featured under devastating headings created by DNC staffers themselves…. The DNC’s own descriptive headings, which are backed up by mainstream media reports, demonstrate how politically toxic the DNC considers the Clinton Foundation’s acceptance of foreign donations during Hillary Clinton’s tenure as Sec. of State.”

To view Guccifer2.0’s entire dossier on Hillary Clinton, click here.

Clinton Foundation’s Canadian Affiliate Spends More Than 70% on Overhead

The Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership (CGEP) — founded by the Canadian philanthropist and mining financier Frank Giustra — is a Vancouver-based charity that serves as the Clinton Foundation’s Canadian affiliate. In 2014, CGEP devoted $737,441 — 78% of its expenditures — to management and administration costs for things like office expenses, salaries, and professional and consulting fees. That same year, the organization gave $205,419 — 22% of its expenditures — to charitable programs. In 2013, the figures were similar: 72% was devoted to management and administration costs, and 28% was given to charitable programs. When asked to explain these facts, CGEP issued a statement saying “[i]t is incorrect to look at one-year expenditures in a vacuum,” and claiming that the aggregate numbers for the period from 2010-14 were more significant, because the charity’s work involved projects whose funding was spread out over several years.

How Bill Clinton Used the Clinton Foundation to Enrich Himself Personally

In October 2016, WikiLeaks revealed that in a 2011 email memo that was circulated to John Podesta (who worked with the Clinton Foundation at that time) and others in Bill Clinton’s inner circle, longtime Bill Clinton aide Doug Band made reference to a number of occasions when he and his consulting company, Teneo Holdings, had helped Mr. Clinton secure for-profit contracts. Wrote Band: “Independent of our fundraising and decision-making activities on behalf of the Foundation, we have dedicated ourselves to helping the President secure and engage in for-profit activities — including speeches, books, and advisory service engagements. In that context, we have in effect served as agents, lawyers, managers and implementers to secure speaking, business and advisory service deals. In support of the President’s for-profit activity, we also have solicited and obtained, as appropriate, in-kind services for the President and his family — for personal travel, hospitality, vacation and the like.”

At one point in the memo, Band referred to the former president’s money-making activities as “Bill Clinton, Inc.” Band also boasted of “the more than $50 million in for-profit activity we have personally helped to secure for President Clinton to date,” and “the $66 million in future contracts, should he [Clinton] choose to continue with those engagements.”

Citing some specific examples of Clinton Foundation donors who also had given money privately to Mr. Clinton, Bard made mention that Laureate International Universities had donated $1.4 million to the Foundation, and also was paying the former president “$3.5 million annually to provide advice and serve as their Honorary Chairman.”

Band also referenced another Teneo client, GEMS Education, which had donated some $780,000 to the Clinton Foundation. “Gems approached President Clinton in 2009 to seek his personal services as an advisor to the company,” Band wrote. “Justin [Cooper, another longtime Clinton aide] and I convinced them to initiate a relationship to the Foundation, which they did; that relationship has grown into a business relationship for President Clinton and a donor relationship for CGI [Clinton Global Initiative].” In an email to Podesta, Band noted that Mr. Clinton “is personally paid by 3 cgi (Clinton Global Initiative) sponsors, gets many expensive gifts from them, some that are at home etc. I could add 500 different examples of things like this.”

One New York Times piece explains that Band “was selling his clients on the idea that giving to [the] foundation was, in essence, a way to bolster their influence”; that “Clinton & Band built a platform for executives to bolster their companies’ images, bathe in BC’s praise, and do some good, while Teneo [which paid Mr. Clinton until late 2011] extracted earnings for Band and, depending on what you see in these e-mails, Clinton himself.”

Judge Orders IRS to Reveal if Clinton Foundation Was Under Criminal Investigation

On May 12, 2021, U.S. Tax Court judge David Gustafson ordered the Internal Revenue Service to reveal whether or not it had criminally investigated the Clinton Foundation, instructing the agency to fill in a mysterious “gap” in its records involving the Foundation. According to JustTheNews.com:

“Most of the proceedings in the case involving the Clinton Foundation and the whistleblowers Lawrence W. Doyle and John F. Moynihan have been sealed, but … Gustafson authorized the release of an April 22 ruling to Just The News this week. In it, Gustafson remanded the case back to the IRS Whistleblower Office (WO), saying the agency’s claim there was no criminal investigation against the Clinton Foundation ‘was not supported by the administrative record and thus constituted an abuse of discretion.’ ‘The WO must further investigate to determine whether CI [criminal investigative division] proceeded with an investigation based on petitioners’ information and collected proceeds,’ the judge ruled. ‘… It seems clear we should remand the case to the WO so that it can explore this gap.’ […]

“Moynihan and Doyle testified to a House committee in December 2018 that the Foundation wrongly operated as a foreign lobbyist by accepting overseas donations and then trying to influence U.S. policy. The foundation ‘began acting as an agent of foreign governments early in its life and throughout its existence,’ Moynihan testified at the time. ‘As such, the foundation should’ve registered under FARA (Foreign Agents Registration Act). Ultimately, the Foundation and its auditors conceded in formal submissions that it did operate as a (foreign) agent, therefore the foundation is not entitled to its 501c3 tax-exempt privileges as outlined in IRS 170 (c)2.’”

WIKILEAKS INFORMATION ABOUT THE CLINTON FOUNDATION

Below is information that was learned as a result of private emails that were hacked and made public by WikiLeaks in 2016.

Foundation Resources Were Used to Pay for Chelsea Clinton’s Wedding
• In a November 6, 2016 [email][145], top Bill Clinton aid Doug Band made reference to “Chelsea Clinton using Clinton Foundation resources for her wedding.”

Bill Clinton Used the Clinton Foundation to Sell Influence and to Profit Personally
In a 2011 email memo that was circulated to John Podesta (who worked with the Clinton Foundation at that time) and others in Bill Clinton‘s inner circle, longtime Clinton aide Doug Band made reference to a number of occasions when he and his consulting company, Teneo Holdings, had helped Mr. Clinton secure for-profit contracts. Wrote Band: “Independent of our fundraising and decision-making activities on behalf of the Foundation, we have dedicated ourselves to helping the President secure and engage in for-profit activities — including speeches, books, and advisory service engagements. In that context, we have in effect served as agents, lawyers, managers and implementers to secure speaking, business and advisory service deals. In support of the President’s for-profit activity, we also have solicited and obtained, as appropriate, in-kind services for the President and his family — for personal travel, hospitality, vacation and the like.”

At one point in the memo, Band referred to the former president’s money-making activities as “Bill Clinton, Inc.” Band also boasted of “the more than $50 million in for-profit activity we have personally helped to secure for President Clinton to date,” and “the $66 million in future contracts, should he [Clinton] choose to continue with those engagements.”

Citing some specific examples of Clinton Foundation donors who also had given money privately to Mr. Clinton, Bard made mention that Laureate International Universities had donated $1.4 million to the Foundation, and also was paying the former president “$3.5 million annually to provide advice and serve as their Honorary Chairman.”

Band also referenced another Teneo client, GEMS Education, which had donated some $780,000 to the Clinton Foundation. “Gems approached President Clinton in 2009 to seek his personal services as an advisor to the company,” Band wrote. “Justin [Cooper, another longtime Clinton aide] and I convinced them to initiate a relationship to the Foundation, which they did; that relationship has grown into a business relationship for President Clinton and a donor relationship for CGI [Clinton Global Initiative].” In an email to Podesta, Band noted that Mr. Clinton “is personally paid by 3 cgi (Clinton Global Initiative) sponsors, gets many expensive gifts from them, some that are at home etc. I could add 500 different examples of things like this.”

One New York Times piece explains that Band “was selling his clients on idea that giving to [the] foundation was, in essence, a way to bolster their influence”; that “Clinton & Band built a platform for executives to bolster their companies’ images, bathe in BC’s praise, and do some good, while Teneo [which paid Mr. Clinton until late 2011] extracted earnings for Band and, depending on what you see in these e-mails, Clinton himself.”

NOTE:

[1] It appears that two of Gupta’s projects in India that were to be named after Hillary Clinton, failed to materialize: (a) According to the Clinton Foundation’s website, Gupta’s charity, the Vinod Gupta Charitable Foundation, committed to underwrite the “Hillary Clinton School of Journalism” with a $6 million pledge in 2007. The school was to be established in India, but web searches conducted in May 2015 by investigative journalist Matthew Vadum failed to locate the educational institution. (b) While it was unclear whether the school project had ever gone forward, another project bearing Mrs. Clinton’s name was now referenced on the Gupta charity’s website: the “Hillary Rodham Clinton Nursing School,” slated for construction in “Rampur Maniharan, Saharanpur (Uttar Pradesh).” However, the link which the website provided to the “Hillary Rodham Clinton Nursing School,” led to a placeholder page of an Internet domain name broker that read, “Click here to buy womenspolytechnic.in for your website name!”

(Information on grantees and monetary amounts courtesy of The Foundation Center, GuideStar, ActivistCash, the Capital Research Center and Undue Influence)

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