Mid-November, 2011 – December 2, 2011: In a rare event, the State Department refuses to support a paid speech offer to Bill Clinton

“Less than a year after Hillary Clinton became secretary of state, former President Bill Clinton asked the State Department to approve a paid, videotaped speech he was asked to make at a gala in Shanghai, sponsored by a Chinese sports foundation.

Wealthy hedge fund manager Kai Jiang wanted to pay the former president an undisclosed amount through a charity fund set up by his wife, Crystal Huang, a Chinese TV and film star who regularly serves as fodder for the Chinese tabloids.

But unlike hundreds of big-dollar Bill Clinton speeches that sailed through a State Department ethics approval process while Hillary Clinton served as America’s top diplomat, this one raised a note of caution that the Chinese government might actually be funding the speech or planning to profit from it.

The inconclusive bureaucratic back and forth — with weeks of emails asking for greater detail — made clear the difficulties the government faced getting information about Bill Clinton’s far-flung moneymaking efforts through an ethics review process Hillary Clinton agreed to when she joined President Barack Obama’s Cabinet.

(…) “In hundreds of documents released to POLITICO under the Freedom of Information Act, not a single case appears where the State Department explicitly rejected a Bill Clinton speech. Instead, the records show State Department lawyers acted on sparse information about business proposals and speech requests and were under the gun to approve the proposals promptly. The ethics agreement did not require that Clinton provide the estimated income from his private arrangements, making it difficult for ethics officials to tell whether his services were properly valued.

The proposed China speech and one consulting deal with a major player in Middle East policy are the only examples in the released documents where serious concerns were registered. The records include requests to speak to investment groups, colleges and foreign entities.” (Read more: Politico, 2/25/2015)

November 16, 2011 – A memo from Bill Clinton aide, Doug Band, describes how Teneo Holdings raises money for Clinton interests and reinforces ethics concerns

“A 2011 confidential memo written by a longtime Bill Clinton aide during Hillary Clinton’s State Department tenure describes the overlap between the former president’s business ventures and fundraising for the family’s charities. The former aide also described free travel and vacations arranged for the Clintons by corporations, reinforcing ethics concerns about the Democratic presidential nominee.

The 13-page memo, by Doug Band, was included in hacked emails from the private account of Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta that were released by WikiLeaks. Band, describing the former president’s management of “Bill Clinton Inc.,” laid out the “unorthodox nature” of how he and other aides navigated between Bill Clinton’s dual interests in seeking out speaking and consulting ventures around the world while he raised funds for the Clinton Foundation.

In the November 2011 memo, Band described “more than $50 million in for-profit activity we have personally helped to secure for President Clinton to date.”

(…) Band wrote the memo to lawyers hired by the Clinton Foundation to audit the organization’s structure and operations. It did not specifically cite ethics concerns, and in a new statement, Thursday Band told The Associated Press that his firm, Teneo, “never received any financial benefit or benefit of any kind” for its work for the Clinton Foundation. Band did not elaborate on what gifts Bill Clinton obtained from his speech and consulting clients.

Hillary Clinton met with or spoke to representatives of at least 15 companies and organizations that paid her husband for speaking engagements during her tenure as secretary of state, according to a review of her planning schedules from the State Department.

(…) Band’s memo described how he and Justin Cooper, another long-time Bill Clinton aide, helped the former president and his family obtain gifts of “personal travel, hospitality, vacation” and air travel arrangements. Financial records Hillary Clinton filed between 2009 and 2013 listed speeches and limited business income that Bill Clinton earned during her government service but did not list any travel, vacation or other gifts that Band cited in his memo.

(…) Under federal disclosure rules overseen by the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, federal officials and office seekers are not required to list gifts provided to a spouse if the gifts are “independent of their relationship to you.”

(…) Richard Painter, the top ethics official during the administration of President George W. Bush, said he was concerned with Bill Clinton’s use of aides who dealt with his private business clients as well as Clinton Foundation donors. In cases Band outlined in the memo, Clinton’s speech clients ended up as donors to his family’s charity.

“The two should not be conflated because the Clinton Foundation cannot be used for the personal enrichment of anybody including the former president,” Painter said.

Critics have raised concerns about the multiple roles of Clinton aides.

Hillary Clinton’s top aides at the State Department – among them her chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, and long-time aide Huma Abedin – at times held multiple roles, according to congressional investigators and the State Department. Abedin worked for the foundation, Teneo and Hillary Clinton after stepping down from her full-time job at the State Department. Mills received permission in early 2009 to work as a “special government employee” for the State Department while she also held a position with the Clinton Foundation. Tech specialist Bryan Pagliano performed private tasks overseeing Hillary Clinton’s private computer server at the same time he worked for the State Department. (Read more: Washington Times, 10/28/2016)  (Memo PDF)   (Memo Archived Copy)

November 22, 2011: An aide says Bill Clinton won’t call a donor unless that person gives millions to the Clinton Foundation

“Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) CEO Ira Magaziner sends an email to Clinton campaign chair John Podesta, Clinton Foundation foreign policy director Amitabh Desai, Douglas Band (an aide to former US President Bill Clinton), and two others, regarding Saudi Arabian and Ethiopian billionaire Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Ali Al-‘Amoud. Magaziner writes: “CHAI would like to request that President Clinton call Sheikh Mohammed to thank him for offering his plane to the conference in Ethiopia and expressing regrets that President Clinton’s schedule does not permit him to attend the conference.”

Desai replies, “Unless Sheikh Mo has sent us a $6 million check, this sounds crazy to do.“

Band then comments, “If he doesn’t do it CHAI will say he didn’t give the money [because] of wjc [Bill Clinton].”

Podesta writes, “I agree with Doug and this seems rather easy and harmless and not a big time sink.”(Wikileaks 10/12/16)

Thus it can be seen Sheikh Mohammed is giving some money to the foundation, though the amount is unknown. Also, the exchange shows Podesta, who has no position in the foundation, helping make foundation decisions.