D21/CREW Complaint Raises Serious Questions About Violations By Bolton Super PAC & Trump Campaign Committee
FRED WERTHEIMER’S WEEKLY NOTE | MARCH 30, 2018
“Very serious questions must be investigated about whether the John Bolton Super PAC and the Trump presidential campaign committee violated criminal law.”
Democracy 21 and CREW sent a complaint yesterday to the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section requesting an investigation of whether Cambridge Analytica, its CEO, Alexander Nix, SCL Elections Ltd., Stephen Bannon, and others engaged in criminal violations of the campaign finance laws in the work they did for the John Bolton Super PAC in 2014 and the Trump for President Committee in 2016.
The complaint also requested an investigation into whether the Bolton Super PAC and Trump presidential campaign committee conspired with or aided and abetted in criminal violations of the laws.
These issues go to the heart of the existing ban on foreign interests working to influence federal campaigns. In the cases of the Bolton Super PAC and the Trump campaign committee, violations of the ban would have occurred if foreign nationals participated in these political committees’ decision-making. The letter presents evidence of such participation.
Very serious questions must be investigated about whether the John Bolton Super PAC and the Trump presidential campaign committee violated criminal law.
In the course of such an investigation, the role that Bolton may have played in these questionable activities will need to be examined.In an op-ed that I wrote with Norm Eisen, White House ethics czar for President Obama, we pointed out that “if Bolton knew or should have known that his super PAC received illegal foreign support, that is highly relevant to the new position he will assume next month as national security adviser.”
We further said: “If an appointee has benefited from illegal foreign support, this creates the risk of more revelations that could worsen that person’s exposure. All of that is, of course, not just relevant to personnel vetting, but to obtaining a security clearance — even an interim one of the kind this administration is known for.”
These issues need to be explored before John Bolton assumes the powerful position of National Security Adviser to President Trump.
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Fred Wertheimer is the Founder and President of Democracy 21, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that works to strengthen our democracy and ensure the integrity and fairness of government decisions and elections.
