Doug Band helped everyone get rich in the post-presidential empire, but his re-emergence in the WikiLeaks hack is another headache for Hillary.
From The Atlantic
Who is Doug Band, and what did he do for Bill Clinton?
A little bit of everything, it turns out.
He helped launch the Clinton Foundation, came up with the idea for the Clinton Global Initiative, brokered deals for paid speeches that enriched Clinton, and then started a private consulting firm called Teneo that made the Foundation, Bill Clinton, and Band himself even wealthier.
All of that became clear in the latest batch of hacked emails released by WikiLeaks, which include messages from Band and a 12-page memo that he wrote both explaining and defending his and his company’s work on Clinton’s behalf. For Hillary Clinton’s campaign, the publication of the Band memo is yet another WikiLeaks-induced headache, as it provides even more detail into the unsavory-if-not-illegal intersection of interests at the heart of her family’s philanthropic work.
Band, now 44, was to Bill Clinton what Huma Abedin has been to Hillary. He started as a junior staffer in the White House straight out of college in the 1990s, and once the Clintons left office in 2001, he never left Bill’s side.
Here’s how one Clinton loyalist describes Band:
Doug turned down a lucrative job at Goldman Sachs to help the President transition into private life, even in the midst of a difficult time when President Clinton’s approval rating was lower than it had ever been, and many had left the President’s side for greener pastures. The decision Doug made to stick with the President was made out of loyalty, and I always admired that.
But in a very short period of time, and at an astonishingly young age, Doug not only helped build and guide the Clinton Foundation, he also traveled the world with the President, came up with the idea for the Clinton Global Initiative, and worked to turn it into an entity that has helped literally hundreds of millions of people across the globe.
Doug turned down a lucrative job at Goldman Sachs to help the President transition into private life, even in the midst of a difficult time when President Clinton’s approval rating was lower than it had ever been, and many had left the President’s side for greener pastures. The decision Doug made to stick with the President was made out of loyalty, and I always admired that.
But in a very short period of time, and at an astonishingly young age, Doug not only helped build and guide the Clinton Foundation, he also traveled the world with the President, came up with the idea for the Clinton Global Initiative, and worked to turn it into an entity that has helped literally hundreds of millions of people across the globe.
Wrote MacGillis:
Bill Clinton now leads a sprawling philanthropic empire like no other. The good it achieves is undeniable. It has formed partnerships with multinationals and wealthy individuals to distribute billions of dollars all over the globe. Its many innovative projects include efforts to lower the costs of medicines in developing nations and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions in major cities. And yet it’s hard to shake the sense that it’s not all about saving the world. There’s an undertow of transactionalism in the glittering annual dinners, the fixation on celebrity, and a certain contingent of donors whose charitable contributions and business interests occupy an uncomfortable proximity. More than anyone else except Clinton himself, Band is responsible for creating this culture. And not only did he create it; he has thrived in it.
MacGillis’s reporting proved prescient, right down to the use of the phrase “Clinton Inc.” Questions about the ethics of the Clinton Foundation have hovered like a cloud around Hillary’s campaign from the start, never quite turning into a storm but never quite going away, either. Did the Clintons trade access to themselves for donations to the charity? Yes. Did Band mix his work raising money for the foundation with his business interests? Yes. But the revelations have thus far stopped at the government’s door. Neither the emails about a deal with the king of Morocco to host a CGI conference nor Band’s memo about Teneo and his work for Bill Clinton suggest that Hillary Clinton took actions as secretary of state to benefit donors to the Clinton Foundation.
The WikiLeaks hack has confirmed tensions between Chelsea Clinton, who stepped into to try to overhaul and “professionalize” the operation of the foundation, and Band, who bristled at her interference and at one point referred to her as “a spoiled brat.” In one email, Band defends himself against accusations of “a conflict of interest” with Teneo by pointing out that Bill Clinton had also received compensation and gifts from donors to the foundation. And in his 12-page memo, Band argues that through his company and his “unique role” in an “unorthodox” arrangement, he has helped both Bill Clinton and the foundation, in part by soliciting donations from his Teneo corporate clients. The section that stands out the most is the one titled, “For-Profit Activity of President Clinton (i.e. Bill Clinton Inc.).”
Read Full Story At The Atlantic
