[Order Daniel Greenfield’s new book, Domestic Enemies: HERE.]
“Will Doug Emhoff’s Legal Career Be an Issue for the Biden-Harris Ticket?” the New York Times asked four years ago.
The newspaper noted that Emhoff, the husband of Kamala Harris, was a partner at DLA Piper whose “lobbying clients” had included the governments of Afghanistan and Bahrain, as well as the Qatari government-funded Al Jazeera Network and the Palestine Monetary Authority.
DLA Piper was good to the Emhoff-Harris family with the family taking home $2.7 million in 2019 and $1.2 million in 2020. “To aspire to create wealth is a good thing as far as I’m concerned. If that is what one chooses. I, on the other hand, have chosen to live a life of public service,’ Kamala had claimed. But the “life of public service” led to her husband’s role at DLA Piper.
And two DLA Piper clients are connected to a flashpoint in Kamala’s foreign policy.
As vice president, Kamala pursued a harsher line against Israel than Biden, virulently denouncing the Jewish state over its military campaign against Hamas terrorists after Oct 7.
DLA Piper not only represented Qatar through its state-owned Al Jazeeraterrorist propaganda network, but has an office there as part of the Qatar Financial Centre Branch of DLA Piper Middle East. Qatar harbors Hamas and funded it along with other Islamic terrorist groups.
The enemy terrorist outlet hired DLA Piper around the same time that some members of Congress had asked why Al Jazeera was not complying with the Foreign Agents Registration Act and why the Department of Justice had failed to bring the Qatari operation into compliance.
This occurred in 2019 when Emhoff was still a partner at DLA Piper, though he was not involved with that particular case, that was part of a relationship with Qatar that predated his time there.
DLA Piper however also entered into an agreement with the Palestine Monetary Authority for $600,000 to “strengthen its relationship with the American government” signed with PMA boss Jihad Al Wazir. As of 2019, DLA Piper was still representing the ‘banking arm of the PLO and sending out invitations to members of Congress to meet with then PMA head Azzam Shawwa. By 2021, the PMA had become DLA Piper’s largest foreign principal.
The Palestine Monetary Authority came to prominence after a lawsuit by the family of a terror victim. Yaron Ungar, an American, along with his wife were murdered by Islamic terrorists in Israel. The family sued the PLO and Hamas and won a sizable judgment against the terrorists.
Since the terrorist groups aren’t themselves in America, the Palestine Monetary Authority, which manages funds from the terrorist area’s ‘banks’ had its assets frozen leading to an extended legal battle. The PMA claimed to be an independent entity but lawyers representing the terror victim’s surviving son pointed out that initial capital came out of the PLO’s ‘Palestinian Authority’, that its “its shortfall was to be paid by the PA, and its profits were to be paid to the PA. As to management, the PMA’s governor is appointed by the PA chairman as are its board members, their salaries are determined by him, and he has the right to terminate the PMA board members and officers. Additionally, the Ungars showed that the PMA regularly used the PA’s letterhead.”
While law firms can take on all sorts of clients and Douglas Emhoff did not appear to have been involved in the Palestine Monetary Authority case, as a partner he likely benefited from the overall prosperity of the firm and politically he and Kamala might have benefited from the relationships created through his role at one of the top big government law firms.
Freedom Center Investigates previously found that Kamala Harris began receiving political donations from lawyers at firms where Emhoff was a partner beginning with their marriage and then his move to DLA Piper after she became a senator.
But beyond that there is a complex triangle of relationships between the Biden administration, the Palestine Monetary Authority and DLA Piper.
The Biden administration appointed George Salem as the chairman of the USAID’s ‘Partnership for Peace Fund’ tasked with handing out $250 million to Israeli and ‘Palestinian’ peace projects just three months after he had spent six years as a registered foreign agent for the Palestine Monetary Authority.
Salem had previously lobbied for Qatar’s Al Jazeera, also represented by DLA Piper, and had entered into what the firm describes as having “entered into a relationship as Strategic Advisor with DLA Piper”. When Salem was appointed to head the $250 million fund, DLA Piper issued a press release.
A few things that Emhoff’s former law firm didn’t mention is that Salem was a co-founder of various anti-Israel groups, sat on the board of the American Task Force on Palestine and of UNRWA USA, and had also represented theHamas front group, the ‘Holy Land Foundation’, Salem was not only its lawyer, but had supported HLF even before charges were brought against it. And Salem, a longtime figure in political circles, had donated to DLA Piper’s PAC.
Kamala had started as an insider in California Democrat politics, but even though she only spent a brief amount of time in the Senate, her husband’s very profitable law firms brought the Emhoff-Harris family into contact with foreign influence and foreign money in D.C.
Freedom Center Investigates had previously reported on the intersection between Emhoff’s previous law firm and its Cuban business, and Kamala’s opposition to the embargo on the Communist dictatorship. Similar questions might be asked about the intersection of Kamala’s hostility to Israel and the problematic and even terrorist clients of her husband’s law firm.
DLA Piper has represented Israeli companies and clients, but the relationship to the Palestine Monetary Authority and Qatar, is troubling, and raises questions about the Emhoff-Harris family.
Democrats have long used Douglas Emhoff, Kamala’s husband, who was raised in a Jewish family, as a defense against critics noting her troubling political views, but Emhoff’s law firm connections raise their own issues, both apart from his wife and perhaps reflective of her.
Kamala’s husband did not personally represent terrorists, terrorist sponsors or terrorist-linked entities during his time at DLA Piper (one of his clients at a previous law firm was however an arms dealer who was since charged and plead guilty) but he benefited from a firm that did.
In Washington D.C., it’s a better idea to follow the money than to follow the speeches. Kamala and her husband have made plenty of speeches, but more importantly, they cashed the checks.
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