Foreign Agents: How American Lobbyists and Lawmakers Threaten Democracy Around the World

Corruption on behalf of despots is the stock in trade of American lobbyists who work for foreign governments, according to this masterful exposé. Michel (American Kleptocracy), director of the Combatting Kleptocracy Program at the Human Rights Foundation, surveys many such lobbyists, with a focus on two egregious examples. One is pioneering PR man Ivy Lee, whose clientele included the government of Nazi Germany, which he advised to court American public opinion by playing down the antisemitism and playing up the anti-Bolshevism. The second is Republican political consultant Paul Manafort, Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign manager, who was fired from the campaign when his work advising the pro-Russian Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovich in the early 2010s came to light. Michel also investigates other vectors of foreign influence, including the Clinton Foundation’s receipt of donations linked to Saudi Arabia and other countries, presumably given in anticipation of a Hillary Clinton presidency; huge donations to American universities and think tanks by foreign countries, including China; and a notorious 2013 congressional junket to Azerbaijan during which the legislators received lavish gifts from the Azeri government. Michel’s portrait of endemic corruption is disturbing; lobbying firms, he finds, do little more than serve as conduits for channeling foreign bribes to American officials. The result is a hard-hitting takedown of a cynical industry. (Aug.)