GOP FUNDRAISER CHARGED IN COVERT LOBBYING CASE
Broidy expected to plead guilty to conspiracy charge
Longtime GOP fundraiser Elliott Broidy has been charged in a criminal information with conspiring to act as a foreign agent as he lobbied the Trump administration on behalf of Malaysian and Chinese government interests, an indication he is likely to soon plead guilty in the case to resolve the allegations against him.
Prosecutors unsealed the 31-page information against Broidy on Thursday, outlining how they believe he took millions in undisclosed money to end a U.S. investigation into a billion-dollar embezzlement of a Malaysian state investment fund and, separately, to return outspoken Chinese exile Guo Wengui to his home country. A criminal information is a type of charging document typically reserved for those who have agreed to plead guilty in a case. A lawyer for Broidy declined to comment.
The allegations mark the culmination of a sprawling, yearslong investigation that became focused in part on a man who helped raise millions for President Donald Trump’s election and the Republican Party.
Last month, The Washington Post reported that federal prosecutors were zeroing in on Broidy, after one of his business associates, Nickie Mali Lum Davis, pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate in the case. The allegations against Broidy are very similar to those against Davis. Prosecutors said in the charges against Broidy that he and others orchestrated “back-channel, unregistered campaigns” to inf luence the administration, though their efforts were ultimately unsuccessful.
Broidy — according to the information, previous court documents and people familiar with the matter — directly made entreaties to high-level people in the Trump administration or others close to it, including Trump’s thenchief of staff, Reince Priebus; his former deputy campaign chairman, Rick Gates; and the president himself.
During the 2016 campaign, Broidy, a Los Angelesbased investor, helped corral big donors to support Trump’s campaign. After the election, he was appointed to serve as a national deputy finance chairman for the Republican National Committee. Broidy resigned from that post in April 2018 in the wake of a report that he had paid a former Playboy model $1.6 million in exchange for her silence about a sexual affair. Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen — another RNC fundraiser — helped arrange the settlement, Broidy acknowledged at the time.
The charges against Broidy are the latest blow to the RNC’s fundraising leadership under Trump. Cohen, who also served as a deputy finance chair of the RNC, resigned his party position in June 2018, several months before he pleaded guilty to bank fraud, tax evasion and campaign finance violations committed on Trump’s behalf.
The investigation of Broidy is tied to a massive probe of theft from a Malaysian government development fund that has come to be known by the shorthand “1MDB.” In previous civil and criminal cases, federal prosecutors have alleged that stolen money that made its way into the United States was used to buy pricey real estate.
At the center of the case is a Malaysian businessman named Low Taek Jho, who was indicted in 2018 and accused of funneling tens of millions of dollars into the United States in part to get the investigation dropped. Low, who is facing multiple federal indictments, is believed to be in China, outside the reach of U.S. authorities. He has denied the allegations and said they are politically motivated.