Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Clinton Foundation accepts new foreign donations despite campaign promise



A number of foreign donors pledged new support for Clinton Foundation efforts during a conference in Marrakech last week, raising questions about the strength of Hillary Clinton's campaign promise to cut off foreign donations to her family philanthropy while she runs for president.

The Kingdom of Morocco was among the foreign entities that committed to new projects at the Clinton Global Initiative event, which drew dozens of big-ticket donors to the country for a three-day meeting headlined by Bill Clinton. Hillary was slated to attend the Marrakech conference before her name was quietly removed from the schedule earlier this year amid criticism of the foundation's foreign activities.

The Clinton Global Initiative is an arm of the Clinton Foundation that acts a broker between donors and entities that are interested in completing charitable projects. Under the memorandum of understanding that guided the foundation's activities while Hillary Clinton was in office, the Clinton Global Initiative was not allowed to hold major events overseas....

While the State Department spoke out against the Moroccan government in 2011, when Hillary was serving as the nation's top diplomat, her foundation touted Morocco's economic vitality when it announced plans to host the Middle East and North Africa summit in the country.

Hillary's State Department criticized the "lack of citizens' right to change the constitutional provisions establishing the country's monarchical form of government" in 2011 despite the fact that the event was largely funded by a firm owned by the same monarch.

The Clinton Global Initiative conference highlighted a shift in Hillary Clinton's public stance on Morocco, a country whose government she criticized while in office but praised as a "vital hub for economic and cultural exchange" when announcing the event.





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