https://apnews.com/389f03e40e874bbe9d1687925e517d05hey guys you remember that thing a few weeks ago about how Giuliani's associates were straw donors for a Ukrainian guy to give campaign donations to a Trump super-PAC and that would be the big new story that takes down Trump, and then it kind of got totally forgotten or whatever (?)
well lookie here
new guilty plea from Imaad Zuberi, who admits to being a straw donor who funneled money from the saudi Sheikh Mohammed Al Rahbani into Obama's inaugural committee in 2012, in order to get his picture taken with Obama and lobby on behalf of him, and other foreign clients. Its unclear how many times he's been a straw donor and for how many foreign donors, but he's a very well connected donor who has served as a top fundraiser for Obama, Hillary Clinton
and Donald Trump as well as other congressmen like Lindsey Graham, organizing large donations to all of them. He was caught because it turns out he was very sloppily funneling the money (using names of dead relatives or completely made up people, and even using Rahbani's name directly on one donation) and because he was cheating his foreign donors and embezzling the money, skimming $750,000 out of a $850,000 donation he was supposed to make on Rahbani's behalf to Obama.
/e also it appears Obama and Biden both did take that picture with Rahbani, and the middleman was trying to shake down and extort Rahbani which probably made this easier to discover;
Quote
Rahbani, in a few past interviews, has talked about his support of Obama. He posted pictures on his website of himself and his wife standing with Obama, former Vice President Joe Biden and their spouses at a 2013 inaugural event. The website was taken down shortly after Zuberi’s plea was made public.
Prosecutors said $100,000 from Rahbani’s company meant for the inaugural committee was earmarked for “photos.”
It isn’t unusual for political fundraisers to offer photo sessions with candidates in exchange for donations and such practices are legal — although the ban on donations from foreign nationals would apply.
Zuberi, however, tried to get Rahbani and one of his business associates to donate even more money by falsely claiming they had taken too many people to a photo session with Obama and Biden and owed more money as a result, prosecutors said.
This post was edited by Goomshill on Oct 29 2019 01:16pm