Revealed: Hillary got Morocco's king to pay for $12m Clinton Foundation summit by offering herself as a quid-pro-quo (and her fundraisers were on the

[superbeets]

Revealed: Hillary got Morocco's king to pay for $12m Clinton Foundation summit by offering herself as a quid-pro-quo (and her fundraisers were on the guest list)

• Wikileaks trove of emails from her campaign chairman's Gmail account reveal how Clinton approached the Moroccan king to host summit
• Foundation staff did not push the idea for Global Imitative meeting - she did, before she decided to run for president
• But event in May 2015 became enmeshed in controversy over $1m from controversial mining company and she backed out
• Clinton decided she had to back out and emails show how Huma Abedin said: 'She created this mess and she knows it.'
• Abedin revealed: 'The condition upon which the Moroccans agreed to host the meeting was her participation.'
• Clinton making herself the object of pay to play is new insight into how Foundation and Global Initiative operated
• Series of Clinton fundraisers turned up for the event in Marrakesh - in a country with patchy human rights record

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
PUBLISHED: 19:51, 20 October 2016 | UPDATED: 00:45, 21 October 2016

 

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Hillary Clinton approached the king of Morocco to host a Clinton Global Initiative summit - and gained a $12 million pledge to fund the lavish event, which was packed with her fundraisers.
Hacked internal emails reveal the extraordinary series of events which led to Bill and Chelsea Clinton spending days at a five-star hotel in Marrakesh in May 2015 holding their Clinton Global Initiative Middle East and Africa summit.
They show how Clinton pitched the idea to the King of Morocco that he host the summit - an idea not backed by Clinton Foundation staff - by offering herself as a quid-pro-quo.
And then they disclose how she pulled out only after a row over the human rights record of a mining company which paid $1 million to take part.
The quid-pro-quo offer was never made public in any form and only emerged because of the emails.

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$12 million get-together: Bill Clinton was the star turn at the Clinton Foundation's Clinton Global Initiative summit in Marrakesh in May 2015. It was his wife who solicited the cash from the country's king using her own presence as a quid-pro-quo, then did not go herself

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Revelation: Huma Abedin's frank email emerged in Wikileaks and shows her disclosing that her boss Hillary Clinton was entirely responsible for the Marrakesh mess

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Existing relationship: Hillary Clinton had met King Mohammed VI of Morocco a number of times, including in December 2013. The next year appears to be when she solicited the money from him

They show that Clinton aide Huma Abedin bluntly wrote in the January 2015 email that 'if HRC was not part of it, meeting was a non-starter' and then warned: 'She created this mess and she knows it.'
It was an uncharacteristic remark from a confidant known for her abiding loyalty to Clinton over the years.

The hacked email was among more than 4,000 messages posted Thursday on the website of the WikiLeaks organization. The emails were stolen from the accounts of John Podesta, Clinton's campaign chairman.
Podesta has warned that some emails may have been edited or altered by the hackers prior to release, though the Clinton campaign has yet to publicly identify an instance of that happening.
In her email, Abedin told Podesta and current Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook that the lavish May 2015 meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative was based on a $12 million pledge from Moroccan King Mohammed VI to host the event.
'The King has personally committed approx. $12 million both for the endowment and to support the meeting,' Abedin wrote.

 

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Clinton Foundation records do not show any direct pledge of funding from the king or government of Morocco to the charity. Commitments to the charity's CGI program are agreements only to aid the program's international projects, not to directly fund the Clinton Foundation itself.
Clinton was no longer serving as secretary of State at the time of the meeting in Marrakesh. Sponsor donations have sometimes been used to defray the costs of meetings for CGI, the foundation's program of worldwide charity and development projects.
Politico has reported that the meeting was partly supported by a pledge of at least $1 million from OCP, a Moroccan phosphate export firm whose directors at the time included several top Moroccan government ministers, including the heads of the nation's foreign affairs and interior ministries.
Among the other listed attendees were several corporate figures who had met with Clinton when she was secretary of state or were long-time political fundraisers.
They included entertainment magnate Haim Saban and his psychologist wife, Cheryl, who are bundlers for Clinton's presidential campaign and met with her several times during her State Department tenure. Other philanthropic attendees included political backers Jay Snyder and Steven Wozencraft.
The internal email exchange between Abedin, Mook and Podesta reveals that there was internal disagreement ahead of time over Clinton's push for the Moroccan meeting.

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Royal audience: The wealthy scion of a powerful dynasty met Princess Lalla Salma, wife of the queen of Morocco at the royal palace in Marrakesh

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Venue: The event was held in the Palais des Congrès, in Marrakesh and saw a series of Clinton fundraisers turn up as guests

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Big donor: King Mohammad VI personally gave $12 million to host the event. The State Department's latest Report on Human Rights Practices says his country imprisons 'persons for political activities or beliefs under the cover of criminal charges'

 

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[h=3]HUMAN RIGHTS QUESTIONS[/h]Morocco's human rights records is not the worst in the Middle East, by far.
But the latest State Department Report on Human Rights raises significant concerns - none of which seem to have affected Hillary Clinton when she solicited the country's king.
It warns about there are political prisoners, that the government uses laws 'to restrict independent human rights groups and the press and social media' and that journalists have been subject to harassment and intimidation.
Days after the CGI, it reported how police 'police forcibly dispersed a May 16 event organized by prominent lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex advocacy organization Aswat'.
Corruption, it noted, is a serious problem in the police and judiciary.
There is 'widespread disregard for the rule of law by security forces', it said.

 

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'Came up on our call with HRC. John flagged the same issues we discussed, Huma. HRC says she's still considering,' Mook wrote.
The Clinton campaign was not immediately available to comment on the newly released WikiLeaks email.
In her message, Abedin said that Clinton's personal appearance at the planned meeting was a key element in the Moroccan decision to host the event.
'The condition upon which the Moroccans agreed to host the meeting was her participation,' Abedin wrote. She added that 'CGI also wasn't pushing for a meeting in Morocco and it wasn't their first choice.'
But days after OCP's role in the Marrakesh meeting was publicized, Clinton decided not to attend. Her decision came despite a November 2014 email in which Abedin insisted 'no matter what happens, she will be in Morocco hosting CGI on May 5-7, 2015. Her presence was a condition for the Moroccans to proceed so there is no going back on this.'
A week after the donation from OCP was revealed in April, the Clinton Foundation announced it was tightening its policy on donations from foreign governments, agreeing to allow financial gifts only from six nations that had previously supported the foundation's health, poverty and climate change programs. Those nations were Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway and the United Kingdom.
In August, former President Bill Clinton said that if his wife is elected, the family's foundation would no longer accept any donations from foreign governments or corporations, or from U.S. companies.

 

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Donald J. TrumpVerified account‏@realDonaldTrump
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Huma calls it a "MESS," the rest of us call it CORRUPT! WikiLeaks catches Crooked in the act - again.#DrainTheSwamp


Donald J. Trump ‏@realDonaldTrump 37m37 minutes ago
Huma calls it a "MESS," the rest of us call it CORRUPT! WikiLeaks catches Crooked in the act - again.#DrainTheSwamp



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