Quote: Newly released State Department emails help reveal how a major Clinton Foundation donor was placed on a sensitive government intelligence advisory board even though he had no obvious experience in the field, a decision that appeared to baffle the department’s professional staff.
The emails further reveal how, after inquiries from ABC News, the Clinton staff sought to “protect the name” of the Secretary, “stall” the ABC News reporter and ultimately accept the resignation of the donor just two days later.
Copies of dozens of internal emails were provided to ABC News by the conservative political group Citizens United, which obtained them under the Freedom of Information Act after more the two years of litigation with the government.
A prolific fundraiser for Democratic candidates and contributor to the Clinton Foundation, who later traveled with Bill Clinton on a trip to Africa, Rajiv K. Fernando’s only known qualification for a seat on the International Security Advisory Board (ISAB) was his technological know-how. The Chicago securities trader, who specialized in electronic investing, sat alongside an august collection of nuclear scientists, former cabinet secretaries and members of Congress to advise Hillary Clinton on the use of tactical nuclear weapons and on other crucial arms control issues.
“We had no idea who he was,” one board member told ABC News.
Fernando’s lack of any known background in nuclear security caught the attention of several board members, and when ABC News first contacted the State Department in August 2011 seeking a copy of his resume, the emails show that confusion ensued among the career government officials who work with the advisory panel.
“I have spoken to [State Department official and ISAB Executive Director Richard Hartman] privately, and it appears there is much more to this story that we’re unaware of,” wrote Jamie Mannina, the press aide who fielded the ABC News request. “We must protect the Secretary’s and Under Secretary’s name, as well as the integrity of the Board. I think it’s important to get down to the bottom of this before there’s any response.
“As you can see from the attached, it’s natural to ask how he got onto the board when compared to the rest of the esteemed list of members,” Mannina wrote, referring to an attachment that was not included in the recent document release.
Fernando himself would not answer questions from ABC News in 2011 about what qualified him for a seat on the board or led to his appointment. When ABC News finally caught up with Fernando at the 2012 Democratic convention, he became upset and said he was "not at liberty" to speak about it. Security threatened to have the ABC News reporter arrested.
Fernando's expertise appeared to be in the arena of high-frequency trading -- a form of computer-generated stock trading. At the time of his appointment, he headed a firm, Chopper Trading, that was a leader in that field.
Fernando's history of campaign giving dated back at least to 2003 and was prolific -- and almost exclusively to Democrats. He was an early supporter of Hillary Clinton's 2008 bid for president, giving maximum contributions to her campaign, and to HillPAC, in 2007 and 2008. He also served as a fundraising bundler for Clinton, gathering more than $100,000 from others for her White House bid. After Barack Obama bested Clinton for the 2008 nomination, Fernando became a major fundraiser for the Obama campaign. Prior to his State Department appointment, Fernando had given between $100,000 and $250,000 to the William J. Clinton Foundation, and another $30,000 to a political advocacy group, WomenCount, that indirectly helped Hillary Clinton retire her lingering 2008 campaign debts by renting her campaign email list.
The appointment qualified Fernando for one of the highest levels of top secret access, the emails show. Among those with whom Fernando served on the International Security Advisory Board was David A. Kay, the former head of the Iraq Survey Group and United Nations Chief Weapons Inspector; Lt. Gen. Brent Scowcroft, a former National Security Advisor to two presidents; two former congressmen; and former Sen. Chuck Robb. William Perry, the former Secretary of Defense, chaired the panel.
“It is certainly a serious, knowledgeable and experienced group of experts,” said Bruce Blair, a Princeton professor whose principal research covers the technical and policy steps on the path toward the verifiable elimination of nuclear weapons. “Much of the focus has been on questions of nuclear stability and the risks of nuclear weapons use by Russia and Pakistan.”
The newly released emails reveal that after ABC News started asking questions in August 2011, a State Department official who worked with the advisory board couldn’t immediately come up with a justification for Fernando serving on the panel. His and other emails make repeated references to “S”; ABC News has been told this is a common way to refer to the Secretary of State.
“The true answer is simply that S staff (Cheryl Mills) added him,” wrote Wade Boese, who was Chief of Staff for the Office of the Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, in an email to Mannina, the press aide. “Raj was not on the list sent to S; he was added at their insistence.”
Quote: And he continued to donate to Democrats, and to Clinton. He emerged as one of the first “bundlers” to raise money for Clinton’s 2016 bid. And in July 2015, he hosted a fundraiser for Clinton at his Chicago home. Fernando has also continued to donate to the Clinton Foundation. He now is listed on the charity’s website as having given between $1 million and $5 million.
About six months after Fernando resigned from the State Department advisory board, he was invited to attend a White House State Dinner, honoring the British Prime Minister. And this summer Fernando will serve as a super delegate at the Democratic National Convention. According to Chicago media reports, he has committed to supporting Clinton.
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(06-13-2016 04:21 PM)Canopus Wrote: Assange may have just signed his own death warrant but fuck it, GET HER JULIAN!
Quote:Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, has said his organisation is preparing to publish more emails Hillary Clinton sent and received while US secretary of state.
Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, is under FBI investigation to determine whether she broke federal law by using her private email in sending classified information. A new WikiLeaks release of Clinton emails is likely to fan a controversy that has bedevilled her campaign and provide further ammunition for Donald Trump, her Republican presidential rival, who has used the issue to attack her.
Assange’s comments came in an interview on ITV’s Peston on Sunday. “We have upcoming leaks in relation to Hillary Clinton … We have emails pending publication, that is correct,” Assange said.He did not specify when or how many emails would be published.
WikiLeaks launched a searchable archive in March of 30,322 emails and email attachments sent to and from Clinton’s private email server while she was secretary of state. The 50,547 pages of documents are from 30 June 2010 to 12 August 2014, and 7,570 of the documents were sent by Clinton, who served as secretary of state from 2009 to 2013.
Assange, a trenchant Clinton critic, said she was receiving constant personal updates on his situation. The WikiLeaks founder has been confined to the Ecuadorian embassy in London since July 2012, when he sought asylum to avoid extradition. Assange is wanted in Sweden over allegations of rape dating from 2010, which he denies, but he has not been charged.
A Stockholm district court upheld an arrest warrant against the Australian last month, saying there was still “probable cause for suspicion” against him.
Assange said it was highly unlikely that the US attorney general, Loretta Lynch, would indict Clinton. “She’s not going to indict Hillary Clinton, that’s not possible. It’s not going to happen. But the FBI can push for concessions from a Clinton government,” he said.
He has attacked Clinton as a “liberal war hawk”, claiming that WikiLeaks had published emails showing her to be the leading champion in office to push for the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, despite Pentagon reluctance.
“They predicted that the postwar outcome would be something like it is … she has a long history of being a liberal war hawk,” he said.
He also accused Google last week of helping Clinton in her presidential campaign, lumping together two of his bugbears.
Google “is intensely aligned with US exceptionalism” and its employees will likely be rewarded if Clinton wins the presidential election come November, Assange told an international media forum in Moscow.
His attacks on Clinton may be dismissed as highly partial, but the email controversy continues to dog her. An internal report last month found she had broken several government rules by using a private server rather than more secure official communication systems.
The 78-page investigation by the inspector general of the state department singled out several previously unknown breaches while Clinton was secretary of state, including the use of mobile devices to conduct official business without checking whether they posed a security risk.
(06-13-2016 11:46 PM)WalterBlack Wrote: Assange said it was highly unlikely that the US attorney general, Loretta Lynch, would indict Clinton. “She’s not going to indict Hillary Clinton, that’s not possible. It’s not going to happen. But the FBI can push for concessions from a Clinton government,” he said.
(06-10-2016 08:55 PM)Canopus Wrote:
This is what it's come to: all-out meme warfare.
Bring it on.
(06-11-2016 05:53 AM)Hotwheels Wrote:(06-10-2016 08:55 PM)Canopus Wrote: This is what it's come to: all-out meme warfare.
Bring it on.
I would hit one broad in this pic.
(06-13-2016 04:21 PM)Canopus Wrote: Assange may have just signed his own death warrant but fuck it, GET HER JULIAN!
![[Image: Elisha-Cuthbert-Facebook.jpg]](http://www.rantsports.com/wp-content/slideshow/2013/11/hottest-athlete-wags-to-follow-on-twitter/Elisha-Cuthbert-Facebook.jpg)
Quote:When I went to the White House, all I wanted to do was meet the President’s cat.
I was invited by Hillary Clinton when I was 16 because of the children’s show I was doing at the time (Popular Mechanics For Kids). It was considered the most educational show in the world at that point. Hillary was in charge of educational programming, so she was really excited about what we were doing. It was a great experience, and to this day she invites me to all her charity events. I’m still on the list, which is cool. My job opens the door to some weird, life-altering experiences.
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