Posted on 04/30/2015 3:13:06 PM PDT by Liz
A handful of deep-pocketed donors are reconsidering their gifts to the $2 billion Clinton Foundation amid mounting questions about how it’s spending their money and suggestions of influence peddling. One major donor who contributed at least $500,000 last year said a 2015 donation is less likely because of revelations about sloppy record-keeping and huge payments for travel and administrative costs. “There are a lot of factors and the reputational is among them,” said the donor, who did not want to be identified discussing philanthropic plans that have not been finalized. “We had some questions about how the money was being spent — and that was long before the problems were in the press.”
At least three other major donors also are re-evaluating whether to continue giving to the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation. They say increasing financial pressures and escalating outside scrutiny have sparked sometimes intense internal debates about the priorities and future of a pioneering charitable vehicle that was supposed to cement the family’s legacy.
The uncertainty comes at the beginning of what was supposed to have been a four-month victory lap of sorts — starting with Bill and Chelsea Clinton’s trip to Africa with major donors this week. Next week’s splashy Clinton Global Initiative conference in Marrakesh was originally supposed to have been followed by a lavish reception and conference in Athens in June, and finally a September extravaganza in Manhattan featuring an appearance by Elton John.
Instead, it’s turned into heartburn for Hillary Clinton’s campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination and for the foundation, which has been under increasing pressure to distance itself from its more controversial partners.
It scrapped early internal conversations about borrowing a private plane owned by Canadian billionaire donor Frank Giustra — whose business ties to Russia have brought recent scrutiny — to fly the delegation to Africa, according to sources with knowledge of the foundation’s planning (the foundation would not say who owns the plane that was ultimately used, which suffered engine problems Wednesday and was forced to make an unscheduled landing).
And it canceled the Athens conference amid what foundation sources describe as concerns about damaging Hillary Clinton’s campaign by collaborating with a Greek government that is increasingly close to Russia’s combative president Vladimir Putin.
Bill Clinton did not want to cancel the meeting, the sources said. They said the foundation had already booked a hotel and secured more than $1 million in funding from former Greek parliamentarian Gianna Angelopoulos, a major foundation donor who is friendly with the former president.
Meanwhile, the Clintons’ daughter, Chelsea Clinton, objected to a suggestion that a high-profile program she spearheads, the Clinton Global Initiative University, be scaled back because it is as much as $700,000 in the red, say the sources. At a foundation staff meeting this month the day after her mother stepped down from the foundation board and announced her campaign for president, Chelsea Clinton defended CGI U’s value, calling the program, which holds free college events to encourage student participation in service projects, the most “pure” platform at CGI, according to the foundation sources familiar with the meeting.
This story is based on interviews with more than a dozen donors, staffers and operatives who have interacted with the foundation or continue to do so. Taken together, their accounts portray an organization scrambling to address concerns about its budgeting, fundraising and donor-vetting while being buffeted by a raging political storm.
The paradox is that Bill Clinton’s unparalleled fundraising ability — the secret to the foundation’s extraordinary global growth and programmatic successes — is now fueling the very questions and allegations complicating both the foundation’s efforts and his wife’s presidential campaign. Critics — emboldened by frenzied media scrutiny of the Clinton’s personal and charitable finances and a new book on the subject from a conservative author — are alleging without hard evidence that deep-pocketed individuals, companies and foreign governments wrote checks to the foundation or paid speaking fees to the former president to win favorable treatment from Hillary Clinton’s State Department.
Some Clinton allies argue that the former president should dial back his foundation role — even his appearances at CGI meetings, which he has embraced as his signature showcase — during the presidential campaign and any subsequent Clinton presidential administration.
The worst case scenario for the foundation, its allies say privately, would be if Clinton lost her presidential campaign in a manner similar to the way she lost her 2008 race to then-Sen. Barack Obama, which at least temporarily tarnished the family’s political brand. Unlike 2008, a losing 2016 campaign would effectively end the political ambitions of Bill or Hillary Clinton. That would thrust responsibility for the foundation’s future squarely into the hands of their daughter. While she is being groomed to take over the family’s political dynasty, thus far she has not demonstrated her parents’ fundraising prowess or leadership ability, say foundation sources.
In response to questions from POLITICO, Clinton Foundation officials disputed that the foundation is in turmoil or suffering from a budget crunch. They also rejected suggestions that Bill Clinton might limit his CGI role after the September meeting, pointing out he “has publicly said many times he wants to continue his work with CGI and the Clinton Foundation.” They pointed out that Elton John was invited to the New York meeting not to perform, but to collect an award for his two decades of work fighting AIDS.
Additionally, they rejected the idea that concerns about the Greek government played any role in the cancellation of CGI Athens, and said CGI U will continue at college campuses across the country. It “has never been an event designed to generate profit,” they said. “We don’t charge admission fees for students, and sponsors underwrite the ability for over 1,000 students from all 50 states and around the world to attend,” they said, explaining that “through the CGI University Network, the Resolution Project Social Venture Challenge, and other opportunities, more than $900,000 in funding opportunities were made available directly to select CGI U 2015 student commitment makers to help them turn their ideas into action.”
--SNIP--
Put a stake in the vampire’s heart.
Clinton Foundation = Money Laundering Foundation
Translation: she has not mastered the fine art of Clinton corruption.
Yeah, but she’s got the Clinton lying down pat-—her bald-faced lie about Foundation “transparency” was quickly outed.
Heh-—that about sums it up.
The legacy should be cemented or in bill's case semented.
Bill is brilliant with what he can do. Hillary is ham-fisted but ruthless. Chelsea is just not in the same league. A bit dim in fact.
Did the author expect that the payer would have put "Bribe money for Hillary" on the check's memo line?
And it wasn't just for Secretary of State Clinton. The bribes were also for Senator Clinton and future President Clinton.
So Bill Clinton is flying over Africa with his donors and the plane develops engine problems ? There are no coincidences in the Clinton World.
Pinchuk’s foundation has donated $8.6 million to the Clinton Foundation and pledged a further $1.5 million or more to Ukrainian projects facilitated through CGI. It has sponsored CGI’s annual meetings in past years, though it was not listed as a 2014 sponsor and will not be among the sponsors this year.
Pinchuk's spokesman, said the organization has no plans to end its relationship with the Clinton Foundation.
Now that was funny
Chelsea's a slacker. When her dad was her age, he had already grifted his way through the Arkansas Attorney General's office and into the Governor's mansion.
She has some catching up to do.
Chlesea is a natural. Her smile is magnetic.
The Clintons, the go to folks for foreign influence since WH coffees and chinagate.
If her smile is magnetic, then she and I must share polarity because I’m repelled.
Clinton Floundering - instead of the Clinton Foundation.
The day after her mother stepped down from the foundation board and announced for president, Chelsea defended CGI U’s value, calling the program, which holds free college events to encourage student participation in service projects, the most “pure” platform at CGI.
The word is CGI Univ will continue at college campuses across the country. It “has never been an event designed to generate profit,” they said. “We don’t charge admission fees for students, and sponsors underwrite the ability for over 1,000 students from all 50 states and around the world to atten."
“Through the CGI University Network, the Resolution Project Social Venture Challenge, and other opportunities, more than $900,000 in funding opportunities were made available directly to select CGI U 2015 student commitment makers to help them turn their ideas into action.” (Politico)
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