Daily Archives: July 16, 2019

Several Democrat Presidential Nominees Hire Perkins Coie

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You know that law firm, the one that hired Fusion GPS. Swell huh….

Okay let’s review where they are so far shall we?

As a primer: Hillary was on the Daily Show with Trevor Noah. She defended Marc Elias and hiring Fusion GPS.

Clinton defended the approach that her campaign lawyer, Marc Elias, took to the work of Fusion GPS, a research firm that compiled a dossier about Trump before recruiting former British spy Christopher Steele to conduct more research. (Politico barely reported this and the substance is thin)

Image result for hillary clinton trevor noah

Senator(s) Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren were first to hire Perkins Coie. Campaign disclosures so far show Elizabeth Warren has paid two invoices to date totaling $320,000. Kamala Harris has paid Perkins Coie $90,000 but the top lawyer over there is Marc Elias and he has assumed the role of Harr’s campaign general counsel. Pssst, Elias was general counsel to Hillary’s campaign.

Okay there is more. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and amy Klobuchar have each spent $85,000 for legal services to Perkins Coie. Jay Inslee and John Hickenlooper also paid for legal services as has Julian Castro.

A few other law firms of interest and being paid for legal services include Senator Michael Bennet as well as Inslee and Castro are also using the law firms of Wilmer Cutler Pickering, Hale and Door while Joe Biden has hired Covington & Burling. One of the partners at C & V is Robert Lenhard, a former Federal Election Commission chairman is also advising Biden.

Hey, we cant leave out Mayor Pete Buttigieg. He so far appears to have spent the most ($320,000) of legal services for his campaign. He hired Jenner & Block. What about Bernie Sanders? He has spent $260,000 in legal fees to Garvey Schubert Barer.

The rest of the candidates such as Beto, Tulsi Gabbard, de Blasio have not spent all that much. Why, their respective campaigns have little campaign money in their war chests.

Anyway back to Perkins Coie and Mr. Elais. Campaign officials for the Hillary camp did not do any oversight on the money Elias was allowed to spend and where. As Fusion GPS produced opposition research on Trump via the dossier, it appears that the Hillary operation and Perkins Coie did not hesitate to publish unverified claims. You gotta wonder if the top floor of the FBI collaborated with Perkins Coie on the whole matter. Seems the FBI trusted Christopher Steele not to question his work and perhaps the same can be said of Perkins Coie…maybe due to Hillary herself…

Image result for hillary clinton marc elias

Oh, remember when Facebook terminated thousands of accounts due to they claim they were the product of Russian actors? Facebook was forced to disclose some of this information and guess who provided some of that legal work for Facebook? Yuppers, Marc Elias. Another sidebar to all of this is John Podesta. In September of last year, Podesta provided a closed door interview before the Senate Intelligence Committee staffers. Who sat next to Podesta? Right again, Marc Elias. Podesta claimed at the time he had no knowledge of payments to Fusion GPS. Next question is did Perkins Coie offer some office space to Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS? That answer appears to be yes. Oh, another item of interest is Marc Elias has as part of his resume voting rights cases. These cases were funded by George Soros where election recounts resulted in highly contested states and districts.

Remember that Senator Robert Menendez case on federal bribery and financial disclosures that the senator paid to a good buddy doctor friend? Who provided the legal services to Senator Menendez? Ding ding ding, you would be right, Marc Elias. Add in the fact that John Kerry hired Elias for his 2004 presidential campaign as did Harry Reid in his 1998 contested senate election.

Imagine the discussions that Marc Elias has with his newest politician, Kamala Harris….just imagine the campaign roadmap Mr. Elias has crafted for Kamala. Consider, she does sound a lot like Hillary on the campaign trail.

 

Whoa, Meet Eric Kessler and Arabella

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Who you ask?

Eric Kessler is founder, principal, and senior managing director of Arabella Advisors, a Washington, D.C.-based philanthropic consultancy that caters to left-leaning clients. Arabella Advisors also manages a number of center-left funding and fiscal sponsorship organizations, including 501(c)(4) Sixteen Thirty Fund, 501(c)(3) New Venture Fund, 501(c)(3) Hopewell Fund, and 501(c)(3) Windward Fund. Kessler himself is closely involved with these organizations, often serving as the founder, principal officer, or board member in them.

Kessler is closely involved in Democratic Party and left-wing politics. He is a former Clinton administration White House appointee and previously served as national field director for the League of Conservation Voters. [1] Kessler later served as a member of the now-defunct Clinton Global Initiative. [2]

Kessler chairs a committee on culinary advocacy for the center-left James Beard Foundation and is co-founder of the Chef Action Network. He also serves on the board of directors of the National Democratic Institute. [3]

Image result for eric kessler

Okay so what?

Well, when it came to the paid choreographed operation against Brett Kavanaugh, enter Arabella Advisors. While there were other well funded organizations, Kessler is someone to continue to watch. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse spoke often about the dark money supporting the Kavanaugh confirmation.

The most visible liberal organization was Demand Justice, formed only a few months before Kennedy’s retirement by veteran Democratic operatives with experience in the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Obama administration. If money given to the Judicial Crisis Network is “dark” because JCN’s annual 990 tax filings don’t disclose its donors, Demand Justice’s bank account is a black hole. “Fiscally sponsored” by the Sixteen Thirty Fund, an under-the-radar liberal intermediary group that passes money from donors to dozens of liberal organizations, Demand Justice doesn’t even file the disclosure forms that “dark money” groups do. Senator Whitehouse couldn’t put it on one of his pie charts if he tried. Both the donors to Demand Justice and the amount of money they contribute are completely invisible.

The Sixteen Thirty Fund does file an annual Form 990, but it does not reveal the identities of its donors. Although its budget dwarfs that of the Judicial Crisis Network and the Federalist Society combined, it has failed to pique Senator Whitehouse’s interest. In 2017 it brought in $79 million and ended the year with $43 million in assets, growing by an astonishing 1,547 percent in only eight years. In pursuit of its cryptically worded mission—“promoting social welfare, including, but not limited to, providing public education on and conducting advocacy regarding key policies”—the fund bankrolls liberal groups focused on everything from judicial appointments, organized labor, and abortion to Senator Whitehouse’s own favorite dark-money heavyweight, the League of Conservation Voters. They also fund Majority Forward, a 501(c)(4) group closely tied to Senator Chuck Schumer’s Senate Majority PAC. Majority Forward alone accounted for one-third of all the dark-money spending in the 2018 election, giving liberals a comfortable dark-money lead over conservatives.

Eric Kessler, a former White House aide to President Bill Clinton, serves as senior managing director of Arabella and as president of Sixteen Thirty. Both groups have the same Washington, D.C., address.

The approach appears typical of the company’s approach to such initiatives. Kessler told Worth magazine in 2017 that Arabella often assumes core management functions for its client charities.

“First and foremost, we support family philanthropists, family foundations, by providing staffing,” Kessler said. “What that means is, there’s a whole bunch of foundations with assets between about $30 million and $300 million whose address is my office. We are their executive director, their program officer, their grant manager.”

But hold on there is more. Where did all this mass incarceration issue come from? Yup, Arabella.

As part of a report on their website:

  • Supporting research to map the network of companies involved in the prison-industrial complex in greater detail. Such mapping can raise awareness of the prison-industrial complex, identify and expose its harmful practices, and empower advocates to counter the influence of those seeking to advance policies tied to profits rather than to preserve and protect communities.
  • Supporting organizations and initiatives that are working to counter the advocacy efforts of politically active corporations that profit from mass incarceration. Various companies within the prison-industrial complex provide money to lobbying groups that strengthen and perpetuate policies that help drive mass incarceration. Those working for better policies need financial support to overcome potential opposition from groups that benefit from the continuation of “business as usual” in the sector.
  • Divesting from egregious actors and investing in positive solutions. As in other sectors, divestment can help isolate and stigmatize entities that are engaged in harmful practices and can potentially motivate other corporations to cease doing business with them unless and until they reform. Meanwhile, investment in positive solutions can begin to help rebuild damaged communities.
  • Using the power of endowment capital to engage in investor activism and capital market strategies targeting companies in the prison-industrial complex. Donors and investors can use their capital and influence to take equity positions in companies that are associated with the prison industry from which they can raise awareness and push companies toward reform from within.

There is also the matter of climate change and the condition of natural disasters so key cities are being pressured to comply with reforms for urban areas. The matter of the hurricanes in Puerto Rico is of particular note.

One notable project is in San Juan where we are part of the effort, led by The Solar Foundation and the Clinton Foundation, for the installation of solar and energy efficiency upgrades of the Plaza del Mercado de Río Piedras in San Juan, the largest produce market on the island, responsible for the livelihoods of 200 small business owners. Since Hurricane Maria, the energy situation has led to an unstable business environment. A $600,000 grant from The Hispanic Foundation and a $500,000 grant from CDP will cover the cost of the purchase and installation of the first phase of solar panels, battery capacity and LED lighting. Our grant also creates an apprenticeship program for local workers to learn skills related to solar installation, roofing and electrical work which will help promote local workforce development. The project is being done at the request of, and in close coordination with, the Municipality of San Juan.

What about this debate on gender equality and internet access (digital divide) for everyone? Yup, that too.

 

 

Stupid Republicans in the House and Senate, Cheap Foreign Labor

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Some of the names in the Republican House and Senate we have reasons to like very much but we should have a problem with this legislation. How about America First to start? You see, Silicon Valley did some very successful Congressional lobbying. The tech companies include Microsoft, Amazon, Equifax, Cisco, Google and Facebook to name a few. In summary, America does not have enough techies to do the jobs of the future, so rather than augmenting education or do career retraining, let’s go to China and India….swell eh? We lift visa quotas, bring in cheaper labor, put Americans out of work and launch another employment crisis, right? This too is fundamentally changing the whole immigration model again and placing foreign workers above American workers. American manufacturers go to China to build stuff because it is cheap labor. H.R. 1044 ends up doing the same thing right here in America.

Trump CANNOT sign this, please tell him so as you read on.

Image result for foreign cheap labor in the united states photo

The House of Representatives has taken a step in the direction of eliminating green card backlogs by passing the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act of 2019 (H.R. 1044) introduced by Representatives Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) and Ken Buck. (R-CO). The support was bi-partisan and passed in a 365 to 65 vote.  The bill would:

  • Increase per country quotas from 7% to 15% in the family-based categories;
  • Establish a “first-come first-served” employment-based visa system (including EB-5 investor visas) by eliminating the “per country” caps;
  • Establish a three-year transition period during which 10-15% of the visas would be set aside for countries other than India or China; and
  • Ensure that immigrants who have approved employment-based immigration visa petitions at the time of enactment do not lose their places “in line.”

Representative Lofgren estimates that it would take a decade for the per country lines to equalize.  The expectation is that if there is no increase in the number of visas available the wait time will even out to roughly seven years for everyone.  Others have suggested that eliminating the quotas will only incentivize more immigration from India and China and thus eliminate any benefit.

Senators Mike Lee (R-UT) and Kamala Harris (D-CA) introduced a companion bill in the Senate (S. 386) back in February.  That bill which also has bi-partisan support was referred to committee on July 9, 2019.

Senator Rand Paul, who opposed the “Fairness” Act, introduced the BELIEVE Act (Backlog Elimination, Legal Immigration and Employment Visa Enhancement Act) (S. 2091) on July 11, 2019.  That bill, like the House bill, would establish a “first-come-first-served” employment-based visa system but would also:

  • Quadruple the number of employment-based visas by doubling the number available annually and then exempting dependents from the “count”;
  • Grant green cards to children of temporary workers who would normally “age-out” as long as they have graduated from a U.S. university and have been in the U.S. for at least ten years;
  • Issue employment authorization to spouses and children of temporary workers in E, H and L status;
  • Provide employment and travel authorization to those waiting in line for employment-based green cards as a safeguard; and (importantly for nurses and physical therapists)
  • Exempt all shortage occupations from green card limits.

Any equalization will eliminate long lines for some employers and industries while adding wait times for others.  Proponents of the new bills believe that the equalization would create economic benefits by, among other things, making the United States more competitive with other countries like Canada that have been able to take advantage of prospective immigrants’ frustrations with the long delays in the U.S. immigrant visa process.