Big-bucks seat in the end zzzone
Clinton pal dozed at game but knew the snore
There’s rich — and then there’s sleeping-at-the-SuperBowl rich.
The guy caught on a now-viral video snoozing at Sunday’s Super Bowl is a deep-pocketed Clinton-family crony who once served as a US economic envoy to Northern Ireland — and apparently has no trouble dozing away in a seat worth thousands of dollars.
As the fans around him jumped to their feet and roared during the NFL championship, Declan Kelly, 51, sat in the back row of the coveted first tier of end-zone seats at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami with his legs crossed, hands folded and mouth open, catching flies.
And it was only the first quarter.
“I guess these days, Declan is asleep-at-the-Super-Bowl wealthy,” a source sniffed of the chair and CEO of the ultra-connected consulting outfit Teneo.
The average price for a seat at the Big Game was more than $7,000, according to ticket reseller SeatGeek, but given Kelly’s prime perch, the cost of his would presumably have been considerably higher.
Another source noted, “Kelly’s biggest client for years has been Coke. And what did Coke do [Sunday]? They returned to the Big Game to push the recent launch of their new Coke Energy drink.
“Maybe if Declan were more brand-loyal to his clients, he would have at least made it to halftime!”
Kelly didn’t answer calls and text messages from The Post on Monday.
But the Irish-born businessman was not amused when Sporting News deputy editor Karisa Maxwell, who posted the video of his minutes-long nap, approached him after halftime.
Maxwell tweeted that when she asked Kelly for an interview, “He was clearly annoyed and said ‘absolutely not.’ ”
Hopefully, Kelly stayed awake for the rest of the game, which included a thrilling fourthquarter comeback by the Kansas City Chiefs against the San Francisco 49ers.
Teneo, which refused to take calls about its exec’s Super slumber, boasts former Bill Clinton White House aide Doug Band as its president.
As The Post previously reported, it has made big bucks providing access to the Clintons and their contacts.
“Declan is a trusted adviser to several of the world’s leading CEOs and corporations,” reads Kelly’s bio on Teneo’s Web site.
Teneo bills itself as a onestop shop for “C-suite consulting,” a mix of advice for CEOs and investor-relations work.
It has employed numerous Hillary Clinton associates, including her longtime aide Huma Abedin. It has also counted Bill Clinton himself as an “honorary chairman.”
Before Teneo, Kelly served as the State Department’s economic envoy to Northern Ireland, appointed by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in September 2009.
Kelly also was a big Clinton fundraiser, as well as executive vice president of FTI Consulting, best known as the firm that published the report on the alleged hacking of Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos’ phone.
Kelly graduated from the National University of Ireland in Galway, worked as a journalist for more than a decade and is on the board of the anti-poverty organization Global Citizen.
He also produced the 2018 Global Citizen Festival: Mandela 100, a celebration of the legacy of Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg, South Africa, which featured Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Ed Sheeran, Eddie Vedder, Pharrell Williams, Chris Martin and Usher, among others.
The Post reported last year that Kelly and his wife, Julia, had filed a lawsuit in Manhattan Supreme Court claiming a faulty home inspection led them to spend $19 million to buy an East Hampton house that ended up being a million-dollar money pit.