Friday, August 28, 2015

Banking executive who contacted Huma Abedin before taking Teneo job was also a State Dept. advisor

Longtime Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin is not the only person who performed work for Teneo and the State Department at the same time.

Emails finally released by Huma Abedin, the former Department of State Deputy Chief of Staff to Hillary Clinton, not only confirm my stories in March (as detailed by Judicial Watch in April) about how she apparently helped coordinate two events in Ireland, while secretly working for the Clinton Foundation and consulting firm Teneo, they also reveal another sketchy relationship that I've been investigating.

"David Bossie, founder of Citizens United, said the e-mails show the 'tangled web that is the State Department, Teneo and the Clinton Foundation,'" Rosalind S. Helderman and Tom Hamburger noted in Thursday's Washington Post.

The story continues, "In a July 2012 e-mail exchange, the assistant to New York banking executive Ken Miller wrote to Abedin on her State Department e-mail account, saying that Miller 'has been in talks with Teneo' and that he 'would appreciate your input on a decision he’s considering.' Over e-mail, Abedin agreed to meet Miller at New York’s Harvard Club. He ultimately accepted a job with Teneo. Miller did not respond to requests for comment."

However, either unnoticed or unreported by The Washington Post, Ken Miller was also a member of the Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy at the time he contacted Huma Abedin, which meant that he was also an advisor to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

As this archived link from the US State Department website shows, Ken Miller was on the Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy going back to at least January, 2012. Before he began working for Teneo, the State Department website stated that he was "President and CEO Ken Miller Capital LLC", but then some time in 2012 it switched to "Senior Advisor, Teneo Holdings, and President & CEO, Ken Miller Capital, LLC", and then, finally, "Senior Advisor, Teneo Holdings".

This is how the US Department of State website would have looked in January of 2013, if Ken Miller's name appeared first alphabetically [Editor's Note: I used photoshop to create this mash-up of what can be viewed at this archived link]:



Basic googling would have revealed to the Washington Post that Ken Miller's own biography on Teneo's website noted that he "acts as advisor to the US State Department through its Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy."

However, Ken Miller's name was scrubbed from the US State Department website quietly in January of 2015, just a few months before Hillary Clinton officially entered the 2016 presidential race.

According to the US Dept. of State website, "The State Department's Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy (ACIEP) serves the U.S. Government in a solely advisory capacity by providing a forum for discussion of issues and problems in international economic policy. Committee membership consists of representatives of U.S. organizations and institutions, including from business, organized labor, environment, state and local government, academia, legal consultancies, and non-governmental organizations."

"The Committee is established under the general authority of the Secretary of State and the Department of State as set forth in Title 22 of the United States Code, in particular Section 2656 of that Title and consistent with Federal Advisory Committee Act (5 U.S.C., Appendix). The Under Secretary for Management's approval of this charter constitutes a determination by the Secretary of State that the establishment and operation of the Committee are in the public’s interest in connection with performance of duties of the Department of State," the Charter of the Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy states.

The ACIEP Charter adds, "The Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs (the Assistant Secretary) shall invite the members to serve for a period of two years or less. Vacancies may be filled as they occur. The Assistant Secretary may remove a member at any time, for any reason." After being unanimously confirmed in 2009 after President Barack Obama named him to the position, Jose W. Fernandez served until October of 2013 as Assistant Secretary of State for Economic and Business Affairs, until he resigned and was immediately hired to join the New York law firm, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, as a partner. Mr. Fernandez was also "the State Department’s principal representative in the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS)", which approved a controversial uranium deal with Russia during Hillary Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State.

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