A slew of witnesses and whistleblowers came forward in 2017 with hundreds of pages of evidence of alleged wrongdoing by the Clinton Foundation, all turned over to U.S. Attorney John W. Huber.
Those allegations of wrongdoing included investigating alleged bribery, kickbacks, quid-pro-quo promises made to donors during Hillary Clinton’s time as secretary of state, and the infamous Uranium One scandal, sources tell AF-MG.com.
Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) heads the House Freedom Caucus and chairs the House Oversight Subcommittee on Government Operation. His subcommittee will hold an investigative hearing next week with Huber in attendance to hear the status of the Foundation investigation.
The Clinton Foundation, which has a four-star rating from the watchdog service Charity Navigator and maintains that it’s a lawful charity and never traded on Clinton’s position as the nation’s top diplomat, touts its mission “to create economic opportunity, improve public health, and inspire civic engagement and service.”
The Hill reported on Thursday that Huber’s team of federal prosecutors recently requested documents from MDA Analytics LLC, a private investigative firm that has been looking into the foundation for years. The firm has also reportedly contacted the Justice Department, the IRS, and the FBI’s office in Little Rock with evidence of its own.
Additionally, The Hill reported that a whistleblower submission filed with the IRS and FBI in August of 2017 included internal legal reviews that the Foundation conducted between 2008 and 2011. Those internal documents raised serious concerns about legal compliance and improper mingling of personal and charity business.
According to the report, MDA investigators met with Andrew Kessel, the Foundation’s CFO in November, 2016. During the meeting, Kessel said that “one of the biggest problems was [former President Bill] Clinton’s commingling and use of business and donated funds and his personal expenses.” A separate memo of the interview said that Bill Clinton “mixes and matches his personal business with that of the foundation. Many people within the foundation have tried to caution him about this, but he does not listen, and there really is no talking to him.”
Fox News reported last week that newly filed tax documents showed that donations to the Foundation plunged following Hillary Clinton’s loss to Donald Trump in the 2016 election. The filings showed that the foundation took in $26.6 million in 2017, a 58 percent drop from the $62.9 million it received in 2016.
A spokesman for the foundation told The New York Post that the drop was “largely attributable to the absence of sponsorship and membership contributions for [the Clinton Global Initiative]”, which ended in 2016. Meadows, however, said that the drop “raises grave concerns their operations were not above board as the American people were led to believe.”
“Whenever we look at the possibility of ‘pay to play’ by government officials, current or former, it demands answers,” Meadows continued, adding “and anyone who uses public office to sell access for their own financial benefit must be held accountable.”
