The McCain-Soros connection: It started after senator got caught in ‘Keating Five’ scandal
Snippets
An institute that launched with $9 million in unspent funds from Sen. John McCain’s failed 2008 presidential campaign has been likened to the Clinton Global Initiative and linked to billionaire leftist George Soros. The organization’s exclusive “Sedona Forum” bears “an uncanny resemblance to the glitzy Clinton Global Initiative that annually co-mingled special interests and powerful political players in alleged pay-to-play schemes,” the Daily Caller report said. The institute accepted a $100,000 contribution from Soros. “McCain and Soros reportedly became friends after the senator was exposed as a member of the ‘Keating Five’ during the savings and loan (S&L) industry scandal during former President George H.W. Bush’s administration,” according to the report.” As the S&L bank chairman, Charles Keating paid $1.3 million to bribe five members of Congress to interfere with government regulators on behalf of the savings bank.”
The institute also accepted a $100,000 contribution from Teneo, a for-profit company co-founded by Doug Band, former President Bill Clinton’s “bag man.”
Bloomberg reported in 2016 on a $1 million Saudi Arabian donation to the institute, a contribution the McCain group has refused to explain publicly.
In addition, the institute has taken at least $100,000 from a Moroccan state-run company tied to repeated charges of worker abuse and exploitation, the Daily Caller report said, adding that the group has also accepted at least $100,000 from the Pivotal Foundation, which was created by Francis Najafi who owns the Pivotal Group, a private equity and real estate firm. The Pivotal Foundation has in the last three years given $205,000 to the National Iranian-American Council (NIAC), which has been a vocal advocate for the Iranian nuclear deal the Obama administration negotiated.
https://www.worldtribune.com/the-mccain-soros-connection-it-started-after-senator-got-caught-in-keating-five-scandal/