https://www.thenation.com/
ipping-company/
Ref: Secret Empires: How the American Political Class Hides Corruption and
Enriches Family and Friends Hardcover - March 20, 2018
by Peter Schweizer
<https://www.amazon.com/Peter-
_1> (Author)
Peter Schweizer has been fighting corruption-and winning-for years. In Throw
Them All Out, he exposed insider trading by members of Congress, leading to
the passage of the STOCK Act. In Extortion, he uncovered how politicians use
mafia-like tactics to enrich themselves. And in Clinton Cash, he revealed
the Clintons' massive money machine and sparked an FBI investigation.
Now he explains how a new corruption has taken hold, involving larger sums
of money than ever before. Stuffing tens of thousands of dollars into a
freezer has morphed into multibillion-dollar equity deals done in the dark
corners of the world.
An American bank opening in China would be prohibited by US law from hiring
a slew of family members of top Chinese politicians. However, a Chinese bank
opening in America can hire anyone it wants. It can even invite the friends
and families of American politicians to invest in can't-lose deals.
President Donald Trump's children have made front pages across the world for
their dicey transactions. However, the media has barely looked into
questionable deals made by those close to Barack Obama, Joe Biden, John
Kerry, Mitch McConnell, and lesser-known politicians who have been in the
game longer.
In many parts of the world, the children of powerful political figures go
into business and profit handsomely, not necessarily because they are good
at it, but because people want to curry favor with their influential
parents. This is a relatively new phenomenon in the United States. But for
relatives of some prominent political families, we may already be talking
about hundreds of millions of dollars.
Deeply researched and packed with shocking revelations, Secret Empires
identifies public servants who cannot be trusted and provides a path toward
a more accountable government.
Folks, if you wonder why Mitch "McGoo"McConnell and other RINOs do not
support President Trump 's "America First" policies and fights against
unfair trade practices, look no further than McConnell's ties to his
father-in-law, James Chao, who owns an America based shipbuilding company.
The Foremost Maritime Corporation is a firm founded and owned by McConnell's
in-laws, the Chao family.
McConnell and Chao from China with profits.
* Senator McConnell and his wife, Elaine Chao, benefit from close ties
to the Chinese military-industrial complex.
* Chao's family has reaped large profits thanks to the Chinese
government.
* McConnell has become les critical of Beijing as those relationships
have blossomed.
* Elaine Chao benefits from huge speaking fees in China.
* None of benefits are currently illegal under election laws; but,
there is hidden "pay to play" similar to process in Clinton Foundation
corruption and influence that have made McConnell's family very wealthy.
McConnell's ties to the Chaos go back to the late 1980s, when James Chao
began donating to the senator. In 1993, McConnell married James's daughter,
Elaine Chao, a Republican activist and former Reagan administration official
who would later serve as secretary of labor in the George W. Bush cabinet.
James Chao emigrated to the United States from Taiwan, and founded the
Foremost Maritime Corporation upon settling in New York. The company has
grown significantly over the years, from acting as maritime agent
<http://www.horatioalger.org/
Vietnam War to controlling a fleet of approximately sixteen dry-bulk cargo
ships in operation today.
Foremost acts as a shipping agent, purchasing vessels made primarily in
China and coordinating shipment of commodities. Records reviewed by The
Nation reveal that Foremost transports corn, chemicals and other goods to
cities throughout the world. The company has offices in New York and Hong
Kong.
Some of the goods shipped by Foremost echo themes of the McConnell campaign.
At a Young Professionals Association of Louisville event this month,
McConnell stressed his opposition to carbon dioxide limits imposed by the
federal government that would impact the domestic coal market. He argued
that such efforts would be fruitless given the role of coal in developing
countries and the rising coal trade. Foremost ships routinely transport coal
from ports in Australia and Colombia, countries with cheap coal, for export
to Asia and Europe.
******************************
THE NATION
Mitch McConnell's Freighted Ties to a Shadowy Shipping Company
After drugs were found aboard the Ping May, a vessel owned by his wife's
family's company, Colombian authorities are investigating.
By Lee Fang <https://www.thenation.com/
<https://twitter.com/@LHFANG>
OCTOBER 30, 2014
<https://www.thenation.com/wp-
Mitch McConnell's father-in-law, James Chao (second from right), at the
christening of the Ping May in Shanghai (Image: Shanghai Mulan Education
Foundation)
Before the Ping May, a rusty cargo vessel, could disembark from the port of
Santa Marta enroute to the Netherlands in late August, Colombian inspectors
boarded the boat and made a discovery. Hidden in the ship's chain locker,
amidst its load of coal bound for Europe, were approximately 40 kilograms,
or about ninety pounds, of cocaine. A Colombian Coast Guard official told
The Nation that there is an ongoing investigation.
The seizure of the narcotics shipment in the Caribbean port occurred far
away from Kentucky, the state in which Senator Mitch McConnell is now facing
a career-defining election. But the Republican Senate minority leader has
the closest of ties to the owner of the Ping May, the vessel containing the
illicit materials: the Foremost Maritime Corporation, a firm founded and
owned by McConnell's in-laws, the Chao family.
Though Foremost has played a pivotal role in McConnell's life, bestowing the
senator with most of his personal wealth and generating thousands in
donations to his campaign committees, the drug bust went unnoticed in
Kentucky, where every bit of McConnell-related news has generated fodder for
the campaign trail. That's because, like many international shipping
companies, Chao's firm is shrouded from public view, concealing its identity
and limiting its legal liability through an array of tax shelters and
foreign registrations. Registered through a limited liability company in the
Marshall Islands, the Ping May flies the Liberian flag.
Mitch McConnell and his wife Elaine Chao with James Chao (image:
ElaineLChao.com)
McConnell's ties to the Chaos go back to the late 1980s, when James Chao
began donating to the senator. In 1993, McConnell married James's daughter,
Elaine Chao, a Republican activist and former Reagan administration official
who would later serve as secretary of labor in the George W. Bush cabinet.
James Chao emigrated to the United States from Taiwan, and founded the
Foremost Maritime Corporation upon settling in New York. The company has
grown significantly over the years, from acting as maritime agent
<http://www.horatioalger.org/
Vietnam War to controlling a fleet of approximately sixteen dry-bulk cargo
ships in operation today.
Foremost acts as a shipping agent, purchasing vessels made primarily in
China and coordinating shipment of commodities. Records reviewed by The
Nation reveal that Foremost transports corn, chemicals and other goods to
cities throughout the world. The company has offices in New York and Hong
Kong.
Some of the goods shipped by Foremost echo themes of the McConnell campaign.
At a Young Professionals Association of Louisville event this month,
McConnell stressed his opposition to carbon dioxide limits imposed by the
federal government that would impact the domestic coal market. He argued
that such efforts would be fruitless given the role of coal in developing
countries and the rising coal trade. Foremost ships routinely transport coal
from ports in Australia and Colombia, countries with cheap coal, for export
to Asia and Europe.
The firm, however, leaves a faint online trace. Foremost's website FMCNY.com
<http://fmcny.com/> is blank. Records and court documents obtained by The
Nation show that the ownership of the company's vessels-with names such as
Ping May, Soya May, Fu May and Grain May-is obscured through a byzantine
structure of tax entities. Most of Foremost's vessels are flagged in
Liberia, which ensures that crew members of Foremost's ships work under
Liberia's maritime labor laws
<https://repository.library.
gory_georgetown_0076M_11950.
intimidation in the workplace and few protections for labor unions. In
addition, a Liberian "flag of convenience" allows ship owners to pay lower
tonnage taxes than ships that fly the US flag. Maritime companies have
increasingly used the Marshall Islands to register their vessels. The
jurisdiction boasts of "no taxation, lax regulation, and no requirements for
disclosure of many corporate details-even to the United States government,"
according to a report inWorld Policy Journal.
The recent seizure of cocaine on a Foremost coal ship came as authorities in
Colombia have stepped up anti-drug trafficking enforcement in the region.
The Nation spoke to Luis Gonzales, an official with the Colombian Coast
Guard in Santa Marta, who told us that the Ping May's crew were questioned
as part of an ongoing investigation, but that no charges have yet been
filed. His team found the cocaine in forty separate packages.
Picture provided by the Colombian Navy after the cocaine seizure (image:
armada.mil.co)
Contacted by telephone, a representative of Foremost said he is "obviously
going to have no comment on this one."
McConnell has benefitted in many ways from his relationship with his
in-laws.
The Republican Senate minority leader's personal wealth grew seven-fold over
the last ten years thanks in large part to a gift
<http://www.politico.com/news/
wife in 2008 from James Chao worth between $5 million and $25 million
(Senate ethics forms require personal finance disclosures in ranges of
amounts, rather than specific figures). The gift helped the McConnells after
their stock portfolio dipped in the wake of the financial crisis that year,
and ensured they could pay off more than $100,000 in mortgage debt on their
Washington home.
The generous gift made McConnell one of the wealthiest members of the
Senate, with a net worth averaging around $22.8 million, according to The
Washington Post's review of his financial disclosures.
Following the gift, McConnell sent a letter of congratulations to an
auditorium of Chinese officials in Shanghai who were gathered for an event
honoring James Chao's wife (McConnell's mother-in-law, Ruth Mulan Chu Chao,
who passed away in 2007). The Shanghai Mulan Education Foundation, created
in her honor, regularly hosts students from the University of Louisville,
where McConnell has a leadership academy bearing his name that sends
students on trips to China.
The ties between McConnell and his in-laws have come under scrutiny before.
In 2001, they were probed in depth by The New Republic in an article that
charged that McConnell led an effort to soften his party's criticism of
China. Through James Chao, who was a classmate of Jiang Zemin, the president
of China in the '90s, McConnell and his wife met with Jiang several times,
both in Beijing and in Washington. McConnell subsequently tempered his
criticism of Chinese human rights abuses, and broke with hawks like Senator
Jesse Helms to support Most Favored Nation trading status with China. As
Foremost established closer ties with mainland China, McConnell endorsed the
position that the United States should remain "ambiguous" about coming to
the defense of Taiwan. In 1999, McConnell and his wife appeared at the
University of Louisville with Chinese Ambassador Li Zhaoxing. Li used the
opportunity to bash congressional leaders for rebuking China over its
repression of the Falun Gong religious sect. "Any responsible government
will not foster evil propensities of cults by being over-lenient," Li
reportedly said at the event with McConnell and Chao. Rather than distance
himself from the remarks, McConnell reportedly spoke about his "good working
relationship" with Li.
Last Friday, McConnell dipped into his personal fortune to lend his own
campaign $1.8 million for the final week before the election. Members of the
Chao family and employees of Foremost have also given over $90,000 in
contributions to McConnell over the years.
Requests for comment to the McConnell team about the Ping May cocaine
incident have gone unanswered.
McConnell has positioned himself over the years as a tough on drugs
politician. In 1996, McConnell was the sole sponsor of the Enhanced
Marijuana Penalties Act, a bill to increase the mandatory minimum sentencing
for those caught with certain amounts of marijuana. A press release
<https://www.scribd.com/doc/
would make "penalties for selling marijuana comparable to those for selling
heroin and cocaine."
In recent weeks, McConnell has touted
<http://www.kentucky.com/2014/
ml> his role in calling for more federal money to be used for drug
enforcement.
******************************
Lee Fang is a reporting fellow with The Investigative Fund at The Nation
Institute <http://www.nationinstitute.
covers money in politics, conservative movements and lobbying. Lee's work
has resulted in multiple calls for hearings in Congress and the Federal
Election Commission. He is author of The Machine: A Field Guide to the
Resurgent Right, a recently published book on how the right-wing political
infrastructure was rebuilt after President Obama's 2008 election. More on
the book can be found at www.themachinebook.com
<http://www.themachinebook.
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