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abdel fattah el sisi
Dems Want to Know If Trump DOJ Covered Up Alleged $10 Million Egyptian Bribe
"Surely you would agree that the American people deserve to know whether a former president—and a current candidate for president—took an illegal campaign contribution from a brutal foreign dictator."
Sep 03, 2024
Congressional Democrats on Tuesday launched an investigation in response to recent Washington Postreporting on a closed federal probe into whether Egyptian President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi gave former U.S. President Donald Trump $10 million to illegally help his 2016 campaign.
House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Ranking Member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) and Congressman Robert Garcia (Calif.), a leader on the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, revealed their investigation in a letter to Trump, the Republican nominee for the November presidential election.
In addition to generating suspicion about a cash bribe from el-Sisi, Raskin and Garcia wrote to Trump, "this detailed news report has also triggered serious speculation that your handpicked political appointees at the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), including Attorney General William Barr, subsequently blocked efforts by career prosecutors and agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to investigate the political and financial corruption that has been described."
"Surely you would agree that the American people deserve to know whether a former president—and a current candidate for president—took an illegal campaign contribution from a brutal foreign dictator," the pair continued, requesting that Trump turn over information necessary to assure the panel and the public that he never took money from the Egyptian leader or government.
"We are certain you can see how significant troubling questions still haunt our country about the origins of your $10 million campaign contribution."
The letter summarizes the Post's early August reporting, which was based on thousands of pages of government records and interviews with over two dozen people who spoke on the condition of anonymity and shared emails, texts, and other documents.
As the newspaper detailed: "Investigators identified a cash withdrawal in Cairo of $9,998,000—nearly identical to the amount described in the intelligence, as well as to the amount Trump had given his campaign weeks earlier. A key theory investigators pursued, based on intelligence and on international money transfers, was that Trump was willing to provide the fundsto his campaign in October 2016 because he expected to be repaid by Sisi, according to people familiar with the probe."
Michael Sherwin, the then-acting U.S. attorney who closed the case, told the Post that he stands by the decision. The Egyptian government, Trump campaign, Central Intelligence Agency, DOJ, FBI, U.S. attorney's office in Washington, D.C., and key individuals including Barr declined to answer the newspaper's questions, though some sent statements.
Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung called the story "textbook Fake News," while Ayman Walash of Egypt's Foreign Press Center stressed that the DOJ probe ended without charges and said that "it is inappropriate to comment or refer to rulings issued by the judiciary system or procedures and reports taken by Justice Departments" in other nations.
Both the Post and the congressmen highlighted Trump's remarks and policies regarding Egypt and its leader, who seized power in 2013. Noting the Republican's meeting with el-Sisi shortly before the 2016 U.S. election, Raskin and Garcia wrote:
While others at the time "emphasized the importance of respect for rule of law and human rights to Egypt's future progress," you called President el-Sisi a "fantastic guy" and praised his tactics for taking "control" of Egypt. As president, you continued to praise President el-Sisi and drastically shifted U.S. policy in ways to benefit the reviled Egyptian leader. While calling President el-Sisi your "favorite dictator," you released $195 million in military aid in 2018 that the United States had previously withheld because of human rights abuses committed by the Egyptian government, and later released an additional $1.2 billion in military assistance.
"We are certain you can see how significant troubling questions still haunt our country about the origins of your $10 million campaign contribution, the source of any repayment, and the credible allegations that it was all funded with cash provided by President el-Sisi through his grim intelligence services," they added. "These questions are especially alarming given that the allegations appearing in The Washington Post are silhouetted against several proven patterns of corrupt practices exhibited by both the Egyptian government and by you, of course, as a convicted felon, fraudster, and corrupt politician."
As an example, the congressmen cited the corruption case of U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.). The Post reporting was published just weeks after a federal jury found the senator guilty of accepting bribes from three businessmen and acting as a foreign agent for the Egyptian government. He finally resigned in mid-August.
Trump, in May, was convicted of 34 felony charges in New York over the falsification of business records related to hush money payments to cover up sex scandals during the 2016 election. He also faces cases at the federal level and in Georgia for his efforts to overturn his 2020 loss. Although a Trump-appointed judge recently dismissed another federal case related to his handling of classified materials, it could soon be revived by an appellate court.
Raskin is a longtime critic of Trump. He led the historic second impeachment of the ex-president and earlier this year launched a probe into the Republican's quid pro quo offer to Big Oil executives: $1 billion in campaign cash for killing climate policies. Some have even floated Raskin for U.S. attorney general if Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris beats Trump in November.
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The US Must Stand For Democracy in the Middle East
It appears the U.S. has been interested in maintaining short-term stability and allyships more than long-term stability that benefits people of the region.
Oct 28, 2023
As global attention zeroes in on the Israel war on Gaza following Hamas attacks earlier this month, and corruption charges face a U.S. senator and his ties to Egypt, it is noteworthy that for many decades, the region has been synonymous with instability and violence.
I grew up in Cairo, Egypt, and have been teaching in the U.S. about that region at the university level for more than a decade, nine years after I arrived to the U.S. where I am a citizen.
The U.S. government has been ineffective at stopping the discord in the region directly and indirectly by what some see as inaction and silence.
U.S. leaders and policymakers must stand up for democratic values in the Middle East and stand against corruptions, wars, and military and colonialist regimes in the region.
President Joe Biden is standing in support of Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, as he launches war on Gaza, issuing a brief joint statement with the leaders of Canada, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom for the “protection of civilians.” Biden also announced $100 million in aid to Palestine.
The consensus among many observers is that the U.S.’s main concern is to stabilize the region at any cost.
There have been so many reasons for the longstanding and ongoing turbulence in the Middle East, which goes back in its modern version to regimes of post-independence in 1950s. These reasons include colonial wars or invasions of neighboring countries.
Other complications are the presence of corrupt dictatorships such as Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Bashar al-Assad and Hafiz al-Assad in Syria, as well as military dictatorships in Egypt.
The Arab-Israeli conflict goes back to 1948, starting with a war between five Arab countries and Israel after the establishment of the state of Israel in the same year. After that, many wars took place and United Nations resolutions have been discarded by the parties involved.
The Arab Spring uprisings in 2011 represented a great opportunity to establish democracy in the region. But reactionary political elites, tyrannical old regimes, as well as regional and superpowers worked together to contain the change.
Many media observers focus on a singular reason for the turmoil in the Middle East. But the truth is that many factors have contributed to making this region a site of human losses, killing, and violence.
It appears the U.S. has been interested in maintaining short-term stability and allyships more than long-term stability that benefits people of the region. Israel’s security and the flow of oil are often cited as determinants for U.S. foreign policy in the region.
There is also evidence of corruption and influence by at least one U.S. policymaker.
Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and his wife, Nadine Menendez, are facing charges in court this week of bribery and conspiracy to act as a foreign agent for Egypt by the Justice Department. At the time Menendez was chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Menendez is pleading not guilty to the charge that he and his wife accepted cash, gold bars, and a luxury car from three New Jersey businessmen who wanted the senator’s help and influence over foreign affairs.
The problem is much deeper than this case.
Bribery is defined legally as a corrupt solicitation, acceptance, or transfer of value in exchange for official action. There are also oil and arms sales used for allyship with Saudi Arabia, military bases used for protection, and silence on human rights records in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar as well as military sales and aid for maintaining influence in Egypt.
The logic of bribery is the opposite of transparency and accountability, which are significant parts of democracy. The logic of democracy stands on the foundation of equality, people’s power, and people’s rule and presumes the right of representative governments to deliberate and the people’s right to hold officials accountable.
In his 2012 book, Democracy Prevention: The Politics of the U.S.-Egyptian Alliance, author Jason Brownlee writes, the U.S. has impeded democraticchange and reinforced authoritarianism over time.
The government of Egypt punishes Egyptian artists and activists who speak the truth in the U.S.
After his participation in series of Congressional meetings in 2019 to discuss Egypt’s dictator Abdel Fattah Saeed Hussein Khalil el-Sisi’s human rights violations and the constitutional amendments to extend the dictator’s power, actors AmrAmr Waked and Khaled Abol Nagawere expelled from their union for “conspiring against Egypt’s security and stability.”
Waked was sentenced to eight years in prison in a military trial. According to Human Rights Watch, there is a strong evidence that Egyptian intelligence officials trained the Tiger Team squad that killed Washington Post journalist and Saudi Arabia resident Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 and provided the drugs that were used to sedate him.
At the time in 2018 Menendez was allegedly trying to help Egyptian officials ensure weapons continued to flow, Egypt was detaining and torturing U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents—including Mustafa Kassem, who would later die in prison in January 2020.
To be sure, one corrupt Senator does not damn the entire U.S. government.
For the U.S., a solution to dealing with the region can be to work for long-term stability based on supporting genuinely representative, inclusive, and democratic regimes.
U.S. leaders and policymakers must stand up for democratic values in the Middle East and stand against corruptions, wars, and military and colonialist regimes in the region.
It is the right thing to do.
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10 Years After Egypt Massacre, US Breaking Promise to Defend Human Rights: Report
"The Biden administration has not meaningfully changed the U.S. approach of providing military and political support to President Sisi's brutal and dictatorial regime," the report's author asserted.
Aug 11, 2023
A decade after Egyptian security forces led by then-Deputy Prime Minister Abdel Fattah el-Sisi massacred over 1,000 people protesting the general's 2013 military coup, a rights group on Friday released a report decrying the Biden administration's failure to support human rights in the key Middle Eastern ally.
The Human Rights First report asserts that "local activists say the United States government has failed human rights defenders in Egypt for the last 10 years."
"I don't feel the U.S. has in any way done enough to support human rights in Egypt since the Rabaa massacre."
Aya Hijazi, an Egyptian-American human rights defender featured in the report who was jailed for three years after the 2013 coup, said that "I don't feel the U.S. has in any way done enough to support human rights in Egypt since the Rabaa massacre."
Hijazi asserted that the Biden administration, Congress, and the U.S. media have failed Egyptians being repressed under el-Sisi.
"Rabaa was the worst massacre in modern Egyptian history and in no way has it got the attention it deserved," she said. "I read somewhere the numbers are equivalent to the Tiananmen Square massacre and yet within American common knowledge almost everyone knows about Tiananmen Square and almost no one knows about Rabaa," she added, referring to the deadly 1989 Chinese government crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in central Beijing.
Brian Dooley, a senior adviser at Human Rights First and the report's author, said in a statement that "as they struggle to stay out of prison for their defense of human rights, Egyptian activists know that the United States is not keeping its promise to support human rights in Egypt."
"The U.S government has a legacy of ignoring human rights in allied countries like Egypt, and contrary to campaign promises, the Biden administration has not meaningfully changed the U.S. approach of providing military and political support to President Sisi's brutal and dictatorial regime," Dooley added.
The report offers recommendations from Egyptian activists on how the U.S. government can support human rights in the country, which is allocated $1.3 billion in annual military assistance from Washington. Of that amount, more than $300 million is subject to human rights certification. Last year, the Biden administration refused $130 million of the designated aid on human rights grounds, even as the U.S. State Department approved a sprawling $2.5 billion arms sale.
"The U.S government has a legacy of ignoring human rights in allied countries like Egypt."
On Thursday, a group of 11 U.S. House Democrats led by Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York sent a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken asking the Biden administration to withhold $320 million in foreign military assistance meant for Egypt. Their request comes weeks after 11 U.S. senators—10 Democrats plus Vermont Independent Bernie Sanders—also called on Biden to hold back the military aid "absent improvements on human rights," a demand previously made by dozens of advocacy groups.
The senators' letter states that the Egyptian government "has not only failed to investigate allegations of human rights abuses, it has also continued to commit 'significant human rights' violations such as extrajudicial killings; enforced disappearance; torture and life-threatening prison conditions; and severe restrictions on freedoms of expression, assembly, and association as documented in the State Department's latest human rights report."
"The Egyptian government's track record on these criteria has not improved," the senators noted, adding that el-Sisi's administration "has detained supporters and family members of a challenger" while forcing NGOs "to register under a draconian law that prohibits any activities it deems political."
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