Saudi-Owned USA
The United States’ “special
relationship with the desert kingdom”—extending to U.S. President Franklin D.
Roosevelt’s 1945 shipboard meeting with King Ibn Saud—has grown ever stronger. “The
House of Saud is … happy to sell oil (to the United States) at a consistent and
reasonable price and … increase production if unseemly market forces drive the
world price of a barrel too high for U.S. consumers; in exchange (U.S.
government leadership) arm(s) the Saudis to the teeth and turn(s) a blind eye
to (the Saudis) medieval approach to crime and punishment.”
The history of the U.S.-Saudi relationship is “long and corrupt.”
Saudi Arabia “has employed an army of American lobbyists and public relations professionals to cultivate a positive Saudi image in the United States and steer U.S. foreign policy as they see fit.” Saudi “money and influence” are deeply “entrenched in Washington politics” and “are unlikely to disappear.”
Follow the MONEY
Foreign Influence Transparency Initiative reports, “While
investigations into Russian influence in the 2016 U.S. election regularly garner
front-page headlines—
“There is a half-billion-dollar foreign influence industry,” largely unknown to the American public, that is “working every single day to shape U.S. foreign policy.”
Lobbyists
“In the first decade of the 21st century the Saudis paid approximately
$100 million to American firms to lobby the American government.”
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erving Saudis
Hill & Knowlton (1982 - )Qorvis Communications (9/11/2001 - )Hogan Lovells-U.S. LLP (formerly Hogan & Harston, in 2009), decade from Saudis: $60.3 millionLoeffler Group LLP/The 21st century 1st decade from Saudis: $10.5 millionSandler Innocenzi Inc: $8.9 millionPatton Boggs LLP 21st century 1st decade from Saudis: $3 million+Middle East Policy Council’s take from Saudis in 2007 alone: $1 million
145 registered lobbyists paid by
Saudi Arabia (215) “to influence U.S. government”: “$18 million”— some of the
Takers:
Akin
Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP: $220,770
Boland
& Madigan, Inc: $420,000
Burson-Marsteller:
$3,619,286.85
Cambridge
Associates, Ltd.: $8,505
Cassidy
& Associates, Inc: $720,000
DNX
Partners, LLC: $225,000
Dutton
& Dutton, PC: $3,694,350
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Fleishman-Hillard:
$6,400,000
Gallagher
Group, LLC: $612,337.37
Iler
Interests, LP: $388,231.14
Loeffler
Tuggey Pauerstein Rosenthal, LLP: $2,350,457.12
Loeffler,
Jonas & Tuggey, LLP: $1,260,000
MPD
Consultants, LLP: $1,447,267.13
Powell
Tate, Inc: $900,732.77
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op Ten Firms in Terms of Political Activities Reported on Behalf of
Saudi Clients in 2017
(Name – Contacts)
1.
MSLGROUP: Specialists in strategic
communications and engagement, part of the French multinational Publicis
Groupe (fifth largest PR conglomerate in the world); Contacts 555
2.
Podesta Group: Washington, D.C.-based lobbying
and public affairs firm based founded by John and Tony Podesta; Contacts 491
3.
The Glover Park Group: Washington, D.C.-headquartered
communications consulting firm founded by former White House and Democratic
campaign officials Carter Eskew, Michael Feldman, Joe Lockhart and Chip Smith;
Contacts 325
4.
Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck LLP:
U.S.-based lobbying and law firm (250 attorneys and policy consultants, 11
offices across western U.S. and Washington. D.C.: Contacts 294
5.
Hogan Lovells: London-Washington, D.C. co-headquartered
international law firm (est. 2,800 lawyers in 40+ offices the United States,
Europe, Latin America, and Asia including Middle East) Contacts 272
6.
Squire Patton Boggs: an international law firm,
third-largest lobbying firm in the U.S. (long managed by Thomas Hale Boggs,
Jr., later by former U. S. Senators John Breaux, Trent Lott), with 47 offices
in 20 countries with diverse base of legal clients ranging from Fortune 100
and FTSE Index 100 corporations to newly emerging companies, private clients
and local and national governmental entities; Contacts 224
7.
DLA Piper: multinational law firm (2014 total
revenues $2.48 billion, average profit per equity partner $1.490 million) located
in more than 40 countries throughout the Americas, Asia Pacific, Europe,
Africa, and the Middle East; Contacts 202
8.
McKeon Group LLC: consulting firm providing strategic
analysis, advocacy, and comprehensive government relations. Contacts 77 (Bloomberg
McKeon Group Inc/The Washington, D.C.)
9.
Flywheel Government Solutions: consultants offering
multidisciplinary strategic business management consulting in federal and state
government affairs, public affairs, business intelligence, market research
& analysis and M&A (mergers and acquisitions), support services to
leading innovative companies”; Contacts 63
10. CGCN
Group (formerly known as Clark Geduldig Cranford & Nielsen): Washington,
D.C.-based issue advocacy and lobbying firm whose clients include banks,
finance, and oil companies, 21st Century Fox, Microsoft, MasterCard, and
Boeing; Contacts 52
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audis in U.S. Universities
Over the past decade U.S. colleges
and universities have reportedly received “more than $350 million from the
government of Saudi Arabia.”
Since 2011, according to
Associated Press findings these hundreds of millions have flowed from “the
Saudi government or organizations it controls to 37 American schools.”
Saudi Aramco, the Saudis national oil company, “has given $20 million to U.S. colleges and universities” $9 million of which went to Texas A&M University (College Station, Texas); $4 million to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (or MIT in Boston); another $8 million went from “a national chemical company known as SABIC” to U.S. schools.
The biggest takers in contracts from Saudi research center King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology were: Northwestern University (Evanston, Illinois): $14 million; and University of California (Los Angeles): $6 million
The largest amounts in Saudi monies through a scholarship program in the years 2011-2017 reportedly went to George Washington University (Washington, D.C.): $73 million; and George Mason University (Fairfax/Northern Virginia outside Washington, D.C.): $63 million (U.S. Department of Education’s Foreign Gift and Contracts Report).
Through its scholarship program the Saudi Kingdom, after September 11, 2001, “has sent tens of thousands of Saudis to study” in U.S. colleges and universities. By 2015, their numbers had reached “more than 120,000.” Their numbers then fell after 2016 “when Saudi Arabia cut back on the program.”
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audis in US art world 2017 -
The Saudi Kingdom’s rebranding campaign through major U.S. arts venues
King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture (known as Ithra), a 400-million dollar project funded by Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, calls leaders at influential arts organizations, powerful curators and art directors from the United States to visit the Kingdom and then become “collaborators,” officially called “coalition members,” in an “Arab Art Education Initiative (AAEI) in New York.”
The fully implemented the AAEI program would include “exhibitions,
openings, invitation-only events, residencies, and public programs at
prestigious venues” organized across New York City including the Metropolitan
Museum of Art, the New York Museum of Modern Art, and the Brooklyn Museum, all
aimed at “connecting contemporary Arab culture with diverse audiences across
the five boroughs of New York City.” The opening reportedly occurred in January
2018.
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audi in U.S. Think Tanks
Saudi money reaches far and wide and its full extent is not known. Think
Tank Watch reports many U.S. based think tanks are “distancing themselves from
Saudi Arabia” following the alleged killing of Jamal Khashoggi. But their Saudi
connection record stands. Among the takers of Saudi money are reportedly:
BGR Group (Republican-aligned, monthly contract: $80,000)The Brookings InstitutionGlover Park Group (founded by former Bill Clinton and Al Gore staffers, monthly contract with Saudi Kingdom: US$150,000/S$206,000The Middle East Institute (MEI)The Wilson CenterThe Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
Reporting non-acceptance of Saudi money: Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, the Cato
Institute; Council on Foreign Relations
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onsequences of a nation’s selling itself to external forces or entities,
essentially enslaving itself, compromising essential principles are terminal loss—
Loss of credibility all at home and abroadLoss of moral standing among nations and leaders; and, no matter how persistently public officials promulgate a delusional sense of superiorityUltimate loss of all worth, significance
Sources
Wikipedia Saudi Arabia Lobby in
the United States citing a Harper’s Magazine article by journalist John R.
MacArthur “The Vast Power of the Saudi Lobby” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saudi_Arabia_lobby_in_the_United_States
Foreign Influence Transparency
Initiative, a program of the Center for International Policy, analyzed records
filed by firms registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) to
represent Saudi clients in 2017.
The Saudi Lobby: How the Kingdom wins in Washington Center for International Policy: Advancing a peaceful, Just and Sustainable World https://www.ciponline.org/images/uploads/actions/Saudi_Lobby_How_the_Kingdom_Wins_in_Washington.pdf
Saudi Arabia “has employed an
army of American lobbyists and public relations professionals to cultivate a
positive Saudi image in the United States and steer U.S. foreign policy as they
see fit.” Saudi “money and influence” are deeply “entrenched in Washington
politics” and “are unlikely to disappear.”
Top Ten
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSLGROUP
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podesta_Group
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Glover_Park_Group
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownstein_Hyatt_Farber_Schreck
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hogan_Lovells
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squire_Patton_Boggs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DLA_Piper
https://www.bloomberg.com/profiles/companies/1267542D:US-mckeon-group-inc/the
https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/firmlbs.php?id=F223752
http://www.flywheelgs.com/about.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CGCN_Group
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CGCN_Group
Voice of America (VOA) Learning
English: Education “US Universities Reconsider Ties with Saudi Arabia” Collin
Binkley, Chad Day AP November 3, 2018, Pete Musto adapted their report for VOA
Learning English; editor, George Grow https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/us-universities-reconsider-ties-with-saudi-arabia/4638856.html
Hyperallergic Media Inc. “A Coalition of The Willing: How Saudi Arabia
and US Arts Institutions Partnered on a Cultural Diplomacy Offensive” Rijin Sahakian
November 1, 2018
https://hyperallergic.com/468850/saudi-arabia-and-us-art-institutions/
Founded in 2009, Brooklyn, New York-headquartered Hyperallergic defines
itself as “a forum for serious, playful, and radical thinking about art in the
world today.”
Think Tank Watch “The World’s Top Source for Think Tank News &
Information” October 15, 2018 http://www.thinktankwatch.com/2018/10/think-tanks-continuing-to-weigh-whether.html
The Straits Times (Singapore) “Saudi
Arabia's influence-buying in Washington under the spotlight following Khashoggi
affair” Nirmal Ghosh, US Bureau Chief October 18, 2018 https://www.straitstimes.com/world/middle-east/saudi-arabias-influence-buying-in-washington-under-the-spotlight-following
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