Obama's Anonymous Foreign Donors and Other Bizarre Illegal Activity

The treasurer must check committee records regularly to make sure that  successive contributions from one contributor remain within the limits.

$50 Limit on Anonymous Contributions

An anonymous contribution is limited to $50. Any amount in excess of $50 may not be used for federal election purposes. 110.4(c)(3).

I have been pouring over docs from Obama's foreign contributions and it's rotten. As I pointed out here, there are way too many overseas contributions and I find it hard to believe they are all American citizens. $500,000 came into the campaign via “not employed” people. How does the FEC monitor that?

Ranging in value from 75 cents to $250 (well over the anonymous limit) there are 81 donations from all the world (and this is just in the document I have been analyzing). It is rather suspicious that all 81 anonymous donations are devoid of any identification information. My file on anonymous donations: Download Atlas-AllAnnonymous.pdf

For example, there are two donations on sequential on the 13th and 14th of February of $250 $250 by anonymous country "information requested" no employer no occupation. Again, over the maximum allowed for anonymous contributions.

Mind this list is not complete. I have no idea how much more there is.  

If one lists by city, there is $223,000 from "information requested" (meaning  no info)  city. Helloooooooooooo. These are some big donations. Download Atlas-Allindividualdonations.pdf

Single Donors from overseas that exceed the legal limit: [UPDATE CORRECTION -$4,600 is the legal limit--$2,300 for primary, $2,300 for general.]

Single amounts from $4,600 from Margaret Vento (homemaker) on the 8th of June 2007 her country and state was unidentified. [Can she donate $4,600 to the primary race?]

There 5 donations of $4,600. There are three individuals Philip Ryan who works for Credit Suisse, London and he gave four separate donations:

On 31st of March 2007, he gave $2,300.

Then on the 29th of September he gave $2,300 which was then "given back" and on the same day gave he gave $4,600.[Again, this esceeds the primary limit]

Philip Ryan of London gave of  total of $6,900 in the year 2007.

The next bizarre donor is Richard Baumann (UK lawyer) has a total of 29, yes folks, 29 transactions. Seven of which are negative. And the balance of which are of course positive.

The total of $4,850 over the legal number. Strangely enough, the all date January, February, May of '08. They range from $25 to $2,125.

What a frickin mess.

How much money was raised from the  phone banks in Gaza (see video)?

From the FEC website.

The ban on political contributions and expenditures by foreign nationals was first enacted in 1966 as part of the amendments to the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), an “internal security” statute. The goal of the FARA was to minimize foreign intervention in U.S. elections by establishing a series of limitations on foreign nationals. These included registration requirements for the agents of foreign principals and a general prohibition on political contributions by foreign nationals. In 1974, the prohibition was incorporated into the Federal Election Campaign Act (the FECA), giving the Federal Election Commission (FEC) jurisdiction over its enforcement and interpretation (more here)

During the current election cycle, individuals may contribute up to $2,300 per election to Federal candidates. Contributions of cash which exceed $100 from     one person are prohibited. If a committee receives a cash contribution exceeding $100, it must promptly return the excess amount to the contributor. If an     anonymous cash contribution over $50 is received, the amount in excess of   $50 must be used for some purpose unrelated to federal elections.

Anonymous donors may not exceed $50

Contributions made by one person in the name of another are prohibited.     No person may knowingly permit the use of his or her name to effect such a contribution. It is also prohibited to knowingly assist someone in making  or to accept a contribution in the name of another. It is also unlawful to knowingly permit the use of one's name to effect a contribution in the name of another or to help someone make or accept such a contribution.

ILLEGAL ACTIVITY

The treasurer of a committee is responsible for ensuring that all contributions     are lawful.     11 CFR 103.3(b). If the treasurer has reason to suspect that a contribution     is excessive or prohibited, he or she must, within 10 days of receiving the     contribution, either return the contribution to the donor or deposit the contribution.         11 CFR 103.3(a).

RELATED: Obama's Foreign Contributions: Who is Ronald Hickel?

Obama, who is Jeanne McCurdy?

UPDATE: Obama's Gazan Contributions

Atlas reader Cathy has been indispensable in helping to track Obama's very questionable campaign donations. She found a one mother of a red flag. There is a large contributor in the 'G's'.  Largest.  Name is Monir Edwan.  City is Rafah and the State is GA.  You'd think GA is for Georgia.  IT'S NOT!  There is no Rafah Georgia.It's Rafah GAZA. Although  election donor data indicate Georgia, USA here: Donation Details: Adwan, Monir | Rafah, Georgia. There ain't no such place in the land of Georgia peaches.

It's a Gaza refugee camp.

The file attached has both Monir & Hosam Edwan.  Both from Rafah.  Both over allowed spending limit. Here is the file: Download EdwanDetail.xls. It details  Edwans's contributions totalling $24,321.41.The contributions are all to Obama the candidate.  Different files for the party or committees.

Cathy's source of the data is from the FEC site.  Presidential download file zip.  Named ALL.  Dated 6/30. She went back to find it today so I could be sure it was legit.  Here is the link Unzipped it is the basis for everything she submitted.

How much money was raised from the  phone banks in Gaza (see video)?

 

*** Copyright © 2005-2008 Pamela Geller | All Rights Reserved ***

Comments

[WRpeach]

Pamela, dig and keep digging on those contributions as I know if anything has been done in an illegal, prohibited manner, Obama would be the first to thank you and point out that things have to be done by the rules. "To my mind, we were just abiding by the rules that had been set up," the senator is quoted as saying in the Tribune. "My conclusion was that if you couldn't run a successful petition drive, then that raised questions in terms of how effective a representative you were going to be." Playing by the rules in his first race, his operatives challenged signatures on nominating petitions of his Democratic opponents, he filed legal challenges and had his four rivals taken off the ballot. He ran unopposed. "That was Chicago politics," said John Kass, a veteran Chicago Tribune columnist. "Knock out your opposition, challenge their petitions, destroy your enemy, right? It is how Barack Obama destroyed his enemies back in 1996 that conflicts with his message today. He may have gotten his start registering thousands of voters. But in that first race, he made sure voters had just one choice." One opponent, Gha-is Askia, said the Obama team challenged every single one of his petitions on "technicalities." So Pamela, keep up your diligent work; highlight even the smallest of the "technicalities," report them to the FEC and maybe Obama’s chickens will comes home to roost.

[I_am_me]

Has any of this been reported to the FEC?

[ginandtacos.com]

You're correct, of course, but I wonder why you're not nitpicking John McCain's contributions with the same eye for detail.

If you're willing to drop the biases for a moment, I think you are intelligent (look! we disagree about almost everything yet I still respect you as an intelligent human being!) enough to understand that picking through any candidate's donations for a long enough period of time is going to turn up enough foreign, illegal, ghost donors, and questionable donations to stretch from here to the moon.

So good work on bringing this information into the light of day, and I look forward to your equally detailed review of McCain's illegal contributions.