As her husband is raked over the coals for sexting, a senator is calling for an investigation into the consulting fees Abedin earned while working at the State Department. Josh Rogin reports.
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Abedin, the wife of New York mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner, a.k.a.
Carlos Danger, is facing an ongoing Senate investigation into the
consulting fees she earned while also working as a State Department
employee for then-secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Sen.
Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has been investigating Abedin’s activities as a
paid consultant while she was still working for Clinton toward the end
of her tenure. In June 2012, Abedin changed her employment status at the
State Department from being a full-time employee with the title of
deputy chief of staff to being a “special government employee,” a type
of contractor that allowed her to take on private clients in addition to
her government job that included Hillary Clinton’s post–State
Department transition team, the William J. Clinton Foundation, and Teneo
Holdings, a firm run by Clinton confidant Doug Band.
Abedin’s change in employment status was exposed in a June article
in Politico, which reported that Abedin and Weiner reported income of
$490,000 in calendar year 2012, $360,000 of which represented a
combination of both of their consulting incomes.
Grassley has been pressing the State Department and Abedin to answer a slew of questions over the arrangement ever since.
“It
appears that Teneo may have been compensating Ms. Abedin for gathering
information from government sources for the purpose of informing
investment decisions of her clients—or in other words, political
intelligence,” Grassley wrote in a June 13 letter.
“This raises important questions about whether her dual role was
adequately disclosed to government officials who may have provided her
information without realizing that she was being paid by private
investors to gather information.”
Late night comedians poked fun at Weiner and Abedin following their press conference.
Today, Grassley released responses that the State Department and Abedin provided on July 17 to his inquiries.
The
State Department confirmed that Abedin served as a “special government
employee” from June 3, 2012, until February 1, 2013, which seems to
violate the statutory limit of 130 days that a person is allowed to
serve with that status. Abedin’s duties during that time included
“advising and participating in planning for the secretary’s schedule and
travel.”
In a letter
from Abedin to the State Department dated July 5, Abedin said she chose
to become a consultant so that she could spend more time in New York
with her family following the birth of her son in December 2011.
Abedin
also denied that there was any conflict of interest between her work
with Teneo and her work at the State Department during her time a
“special government employee.”
“I
was not asked, nor did I undertake, any work on Teneo’s behalf before
the department (and I should note that it is my understanding that Teneo
does not conduct business with the Department of State),” she wrote. “I
also was not asked, nor did I provide, insights about the department,
my work with the secretary, or any government information to which I may
have had access.”
Grassley
was not satisfied by the State Department and Abedin’s responses.
Thursday he pledged in a statement to continue to look into the
arrangement, demanded more thorough answers, and said that the use of
“special government employees” needed a full review.
“The
purpose of my inquiry is to shed light on whether the program is being
used as intended, not just by Ms. Abedin, but more broadly, as well. The
State Department and Ms. Abedin should be willing to show the documents
involved in administering the program to demonstrate good stewardship
of tax dollars and the public interest,” he said. “So far, the State
Department and Ms. Abedin haven’t provided a single document that I
requested. Putting up a stone wall raises a lot more questions about how
the program is being used than it answers. I intend to pursue more
complete answers to my questions.”
Josh Rogin is senior correspondent for national security and politics for Newsweek and The Daily Beast. He previously worked at Foreign Policy magazine, Congressional Quarterly, Federal Computer Week magazine, and Japan’s leading daily newspaper, The Asahi Shimbun. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C.
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