{"id":940891,"date":"2021-10-30T08:44:10","date_gmt":"2021-10-30T12:44:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=940891"},"modified":"2021-10-30T08:44:12","modified_gmt":"2021-10-30T12:44:12","slug":"watchdog-hits-mcauliffe-with-campaign-finance-complaint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/watchdog-hits-mcauliffe-with-campaign-finance-complaint\/","title":{"rendered":"Watchdog Hits McAuliffe With Campaign Finance Complaint"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">14<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fwatchdog-hits-mcauliffe-with-campaign-finance-complaint%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=940891&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div readability=\"31.420689655172\">\n\t\t\t<span class=\"article-category\"><a class href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/democrats\/\">Democrats<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article-excerpt\">McAuliffe took $350,000 donation from a foreign-owned company linked to an overseas money laundering probe<\/p>\n<figure class=\"post-thumbnail-container relative lg:mr-24 w-full my-4 mb-8\">\n\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"736\" height=\"491\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-736x491-1.jpeg\" class=\"w-full lazyload blur-up wp-post-image\" alt srcset=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 736px) 100vw, 736px\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-scaled-e1624913238470.jpeg 736w, https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-300x200.jpeg 300w, https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-1024x683.jpeg 1024w, https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-768x512.jpeg 768w, https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-1536x1024.jpeg 1536w, https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-2048x1365.jpeg 2048w, https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/McAuliffe-1400x933.jpeg 1400w\" data-sizes=\"auto\" \/><figcaption class=\"absolute text-white p-4 w-full text-right text-xs bottom-0 bg-black opacity-75\">\n\t\t\t\tVirginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe (D.) \/ Getty Images\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\t\t\t<span class=\"text-gray text-xs md:text-lg\"><a href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/author\/alana-goodman\/\" title=\"Posts by Alana Goodman\" class=\"author url fn text-red-700\" rel=\"author\">Alana Goodman<\/a> \u2022 October 30, 2021 8:30 am<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n<div readability=\"124.52716021086\">\n<p>A government watchdog group hit Terry McAuliffe with a campaign finance complaint on Friday over a $350,000 donation he received from a foreign-owned company linked to an overseas money laundering probe, according to a copy of the <a href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/NLPC-Complaint-vs-Terry-McAuliffe-Oct.-29-2021.pdf\">filing<\/a> obtained by the <em>Washington Free Beacon<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>The National Legal and Policy Center is asking the FEC to &#8220;promptly investigate&#8221; whether the contribution to the Virginia gubernatorial candidate violated federal laws prohibiting campaigns from accepting political donations from foreign nationals.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Terry McAuliffe has a history of accepting foreign contributions.&nbsp; The FEC must fully investigate these serious charges that he accepted $350,000 in illegal foreign contributions for his current campaign,&#8221; said Washington, D.C. attorney, Paul Kamenar, counsel to NLPC, who drafted and filed the complaint with the FEC.<\/p>\n<p>LycaTel LLC, owned by Sri Lankan-British national Allirajah Subaskaran, gave McAuliffe $350,000 in July, the <em>Free Beacon<\/em> first&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/democrats\/terry-mcauliffe-campaign-took-350k-from-us-based-company-owned-by-british-national\/\">reported<\/a>&nbsp;in early October. The company is a New Jersey subsidiary of Subaskaran\u2019s U.K.-based telecom conglomerate, which boasts a complicated web of offshore businesses and has been the subject of tax-fraud and money-laundering charges in France.<\/p>\n<p>Federal law prohibits campaigns from accepting money from foreign nationals and entities, directly or indirectly, in local, state, and federal elections. While U.S.-based subsidiaries of foreign corporations can contribute, the donation can&#8217;t be made under the direction of the company&#8217;s foreign leadership\u2014which legal experts said can be a murky legal distinction.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is effectively a really easy way to launder foreign money into the U.S. political process and to avoid the FEC prohibition on foreign nationals making contributions in U.S. elections,&#8221; Ben Freeman, director of the Foreign Influence Transparency Initiative at the Center for International Policy, told the <em>Free Beacon<\/em> earlier this month.<\/p>\n<p>LycaTel does not appear to have contributed to previous Virginia campaigns or federal races. In July, the company retained D.C.-based lobbyist Robert Thompson to lobby on &#8220;Telecom&#8221; issues, according to disclosure records. Prior to that, Thompson had registered as a foreign agent representing Subaskaran as part of a &#8220;business expansion within the U.S.A.,&#8221; according to records filed with the Department of Justice.<\/p>\n<p>Thompson was a lobbyist for the Sri Lankan government from 2013 to 2014, according to disclosure records. Thompson did not respond to a request for comment about his lobbying work.<\/p>\n<p>Subaskaran, through his WWW Holding Company and other entities, owns a globe-spanning web of companies in the technology, media, and gaming sectors, many of them with the word &#8220;Lyca&#8221; in the names. The Lyca group has&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/money\/2020\/feb\/02\/major-tory-donor-lycamobile-embroiled-in-three-disputes-with-hmrc\">clashed<\/a>&nbsp;with British authorities over allegations of unpaid taxes. French authorities in 2016&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/news\/article-3649301\/Offices-Conservative-Party-s-biggest-donor-Lycamobile-raided-French-police-nine-people-charged-suspicion-money-laundering-tax-fraud.html\">raided<\/a>&nbsp;LycaMobile&#8217;s Paris headquarters and arrested &#8220;19 people suspected of being involved in a money-laundering system implicating Lycamobile and Lycamobile Services,&#8221; according to a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/news\/article-3649301\/Offices-Conservative-Party-s-biggest-donor-Lycamobile-raided-French-police-nine-people-charged-suspicion-money-laundering-tax-fraud.html\">statement<\/a>&nbsp;from French prosecutors.<\/p>\n<p>LycaMobile couriers in 2015 were photographed transporting tote bags of cash\u2014reportedly as much as $1 million per week\u2014to various post offices around the United Kingdom, according to a series of articles by&nbsp;<em>BuzzFeed<\/em>. LycaMobile denied any wrongdoing related to the deposits and noted that it operates a cash-heavy business.<\/p>\n<p>LycaTel&#8217;s operations in the United States have come under scrutiny as well. The Federal Communications Commission in 2011 fined the company $5 million for &#8220;deceptively marketing prepaid calling cards&#8221; to largely immigrant buyers. The company reportedly claimed the low-cost cards could be used to make &#8220;hundreds of minutes of calls&#8221; overseas, but buyers were only able to use &#8220;a fraction of those minutes for calls, because LycaTel applies a variety of fees and surcharges that quickly deplete the card,&#8221; said the FCC.<\/p>\n<p>LycaTel did not respond to emailed questions. When reached by phone earlier this month, LycaTel&#8217;s general counsel said the company had no comment on the donation and was &#8220;waiting to hear back from management as to what they want to disclose and what they don&#8217;t.&#8221; McAuliffe&#8217;s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n<p>McAuliffe and Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin will face off at the polls on Nov. 2.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Democrats McAuliffe took $350,000 donation from a foreign-owned company linked to an overseas money laundering probe  Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe (D.) \/ Getty Images &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-940891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/940891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=940891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/940891\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=940891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=940891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=940891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}